Screwed around with Banjo for a bit. He's a breath of fresh air/fun to play despite being incredibly basic/straightforward as a character.
No gimmicky, lame to play against BS like Hero and Joker.
While being fun to play, i don't imagine he has much of a future in high level play for a few reasons;
- Few, if any reliable kill options. Up smash kills late, up air kills late, down smash doesn't seem to kill at all unless you land it at the ledge (why would you?) and his side smash while being incredibly hilarious, is slow and easy to shield
- Incredibly exploitable recovery. If Banjo has no Gold Feathers to burn for it, it has a very limited vertical range, and on top of the charge time for it, i feel like he's gonna get murked for it in tourney play
- His combo game seems...meh? Lots of his tilts are one hit/knockback moves, his up tilt has to have the right angle and cannot be combo'd into itself. He does have a decent dash attack into jab flurry combo at low percents.
- Wonder Wing seems like a less intimidating Flare Blitz. I get cooked by Flare Blitz on the regular since it does insane shield damage/harder to read. Wonder Wing seems safer on block and has way, way more end lag on it.
In all honesty i'm fine with it. Banjo is basic but incredibly fun to play. Far better than the other crap DLC thus far.