I played a bit more in the Castle stage in DK64. This stage doesn't seem quite so annoying as the Galleon stage, insofar as it seems slightly more structured and less sprawling (there seems to be a main path through the level, and all the little goals branch off it, as oppossed to the Galleon level, which is just huge and shapeless). However...

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so it feels like you have to explore all the little parts of the stage 10 times to cover all the variations.


That's probably an understatement. I'm still (this late into the game) earning new skills, and again, each time you gain a new skill you have to go back and reexplore the level -- sometimes the entire game world (part of me wonders if I should try to map or otherwise take notes as I play this game, but I prefer ot use my memory). At the very beginning of the Castle stage, I found a target I couldn't quite hit. I also found another one at the top of the Castle's spire. Quite a while after I found those targets, I earned the ability to shoot farther, so now I have to go back for both of them. And I also in this level earned the ability for Lanky to run very fast. There are parts even early in the game that I'll have to go back to with that ability...

On the plus side, I now have over 100 golden bananas (out of 200 total). I'm one banana medal shy of what I need for Cranky's secret (which I believe is Rare's old Jetpack game; strangely enough, I earned that when I played FO's DK64, though I've probably put more time into my own cart). I need a banana fairy or two to unlock the next secret in the mysteries section of the menu. I'm still aways from being able to fight the next boss. At first, you need to find 400 bananas in this stage (and there are only 500 total). At this point, I think I need about 150 more. I also have more than half of the blue prints.
I LOOOOOOVE Flying Omelette!!
Crawl and 1000