"Ebil Microsoft killed Rare cuz they hate gaemz"

At what point do we stop blaming Microsoft for Rare being shit, and start blaming Rare themselves?

This "Microsoft killed rare" narrative needs to die. They were in decline before Xbox was even a thing. Half of Rare left the company in 1999 before Xbox even came out. They went on to form Free Radical (who made the timesplitters series, and eventually the Haze "Halo killer" flop, before being bought buy Crytek and making Homefront 2, then being dissolved). They ran to Microsoft after Nintendo shut off the money spigots on them, and begging Nintendo to fully acquire them, Nintendo telling them to kick rocks. Nintendo might have been onto something. Even when Microsoft bought them, Nintendo were happy to sell their shares, and not even try to stop them. This was NOT a hostile takeover. Nintendo didnt even want them.

Out of the Conker Live and Reloaded, Kameo, Perfect Dark Zero, Viva Pinata, Banjo nuts & Bolts, all games they made before they ever touched the Kinect, Plus all of the Kinect bullshit plus all of the cancelled Rare projects that have leaked to Beta64 over the years, and finally Sea of Thieves (a skeleton of a game which they aparently didnt even have ideas for, if rumors are to be believed ) at what point do we stop blaming Microsoft for Rare being shit, and start blaming Rare? They cant hide behind the Kinect forever. None of these games lit the world on fire, and none of the cancelled ones looked like they were going to either. How many chances do they need to make non Kinect games, that were all meh at best, before we stop claiming that MS forced them to make Kinect shovelware?

Hell, even the guys who left to make Yooka Laylee cant hide behind the "ebil Microsoft hates gaems" narrative. A clone of the game that everybody claimed that they wanted, and threw money at like crazy, ended up being shit. The game was obviously not greenlit for a reason, despite Microsoft having the chance if they wanted to.

Im not quite sure what any of the people pouring out 40s over Rare possibly think Rare would have done differently had Microsoft not stopped them.

How dare you claim Rare wasn't Gods before MS purchase them. Blasphemy.

People still say that?

SoT and Rare are both just memes at this point.

Kameo was top notch

Rare made some great games for the Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64.

Since the N64 era, I will only defend Rare when it comes to the Viva Piñata games. Everything else is trash. I really wanted to love SoT, but... same old same old. Nintendo was right not to waste anymore money on them, but M$ wasn't necessarily wrong to expect magic for acquiring them- given their track record back then, so many great SNES and 64 games. Just a swing and a miss unfortunately.

I still really enjoyed Perfect Dark Zero, Kameo, Viva Piñata, and Nuts & Bolts myself though so I still feel that Rare a good and talented developer. I do think that Sea of Thieves is lacking in content and a sense of progression at launch but is a really nice looking game and has a solid gameplay foundation and I think that they can really fix this game up nicely with some content drops.

DKC series are the only good games rare has ever made

So...

-Killer Instinct

-Conker's Bad Fur Day

-Perfect Dark

-Goldeneye

-Banjo 1 and 2

-Jet Force Gemini

...all sucked huh?

Yup. The Viva Pinata games are great also. PD0 isn't great but it isn't as bad as people claim imo. Classic black/white vision by gamers.

@nintendoboy16: on point.

Rare killed them selves when they failed to deliver the goods aka perfect dark zero ...at one point the game was supposed to have more content ....and they did have 5 whole years and came up very short

^ ^ This.

Kinect killed Rare.

Kameo is such an underappreciated game I think... I really enjoyed it. As I did the Viva Pinata games.

I hope Rare can go back to making these types of SP games again.

Perfect Dark 0 was pretty darn good. My gf at the time was real into Kameo, though it wasnt my thing. Fact of the matter is, MS has had their IP a long time and could have built the studio as they see fit. Saying things were bad in 99 is a total copout.

Its a shame, because I actually really like the artstyle and the idea/premise of Sea of Thieves as an intellectual property.

Its just that the game ended up being Games-as-a-Service dogshit. It would have been awesome, if they had used the same premise as a single player traditional adventure game with a story. The kind of game they would have made in their prime. This is a game that has no place being Game-as-a-Service.

A sentiment I also share with David Jaffe's game Drawn-to-death. The unique artstyle, the edginess, humor, and (however limited)the storytelling of the tutorial, the weapons and the gameplay loop of that game, if extrapolated into a full singleplayer TPS could have been a solid AA-AAA game. Both of these games were basically wastes of IP's imo.

Back to Rare, I actually think that the fact they created a new IP in itself was step in the right direction. In contrast to all the people who mistakenly think they want Rare to revisit old IP, and constantly beg for nonsense they think they want like Banjo or Perfect Dark, or Battletoads, etc.....Trust me, you dont really want that. Just like you didnt really want Yooka Laylee. Dont get me wrong, things like that will be a dick-swinging moment at E3, or shatter kickstarter records, etc, but thats just nostalgia talking......when it becomes a real product, those games NEVER set the world on fire. You'll get your little nostalgia high, but when you come down, those games will come and go, and be middling/average at best (Crash/probably Shenmue) or terrible at worst (yooka laylee). Rare should stay on this path at least, and stick to making new IPs, and try to create NEW classics that will be worshipped 20 years from now. Dont cling to the past.

@StrongDeadlift: Lol, rare isn't going to make any games anymore that will be considered classics 20 years down the road, they can't even make a decent game that's considered good at launch.

I really don't care about Rare. Bought their collection for the Xbox One only to sell it a few weeks later because in all honesty it's all pretty mediocre. Don't get why people worship that release.

But of course MS is not guilt free.

@StrongDeadlift: Totally agree about SoT and having a SP component... it would've been amazing to have a campaign set in that world with a bunch of quirky Rare characters. Complete missed opportunity.

I really enjoyed Kameo........ and the butthurt it's texture detail it brought to PC gamers back in the day...Lmao!!

Rare is full of D and C list development talent, all the A and B list talent left years ago.

Yes, of course. Some of them just shaped whole genres into what they are today, but lets ignore that.

What you get when MS forces you to make shovelware for years. Everyone knows Microsoft likes to micromanage studios, first thing they do when they acquire a studio is send in the bean counters, a lot of the talent leaves as a result.

Rare Ruin Rare before MS got there hands on Rare.

How so? They released great games just before 2002 when MS got their hand on Rare, like Perfect Dark (2000), Banjo-Tooie(2000), Conker's Bad Fur Day(2001) and Star Fox Adventures(2002).

Sea of Thieves, has a bedrock open world foundation like I've not experienced before. Mark my words, SoT many years from now will have grown Mighty in content and options, still be played and eventually put in the Legendary games category.

Also, you must at all time refer to them as... Mighty Rare.... just sayin. lolol :P

Are we giving MS credit for not adding talent or building on the existing franchises they now own because they acquired that studio? This is a new low.

Can someone just confirm that I`m not misunderstanding the OP, because wow! 20 years isnt enough time to revamp a legendary studio or are we just so used to MS giving the axe to solve problems that you are just conditioned to hate games THIS much?

Rare was having management problems in the late 90's, despite they made good games on the Nintendo consoles, they were having issues on there own parts. Rare ask and beg Nintendo to buy them but Nintendo refuse to help Rare and they didn't have no choice but to let MS buy them out.

Rare ruin Rare is why they hit rock bottom. MS was just basically finishing the job by hurting Rare even more so.

Sony turned Guerrilla Games into an absolute powerhouse in much less time that MS has had Rare.

@StrongDeadlift: Once the the patch came out for homefront 2 it became a soild 9/10 game. i hate that cause it had a buggy release it flopped so hard, i know its their fault.

So true because Guerrilla Games had nothing to do with it right? What a stupid notion.

@Pedro: I see your faith in Microsoft's ability to manage game studios is at an all-time high.