Rare and Nintendo enjoyed a particularly profitable relationship back in the '80s and '90s, with the UK-based studio creating hordes of titles for the NES, Game Boy, SNES and N64.
So close was the connection between the two companies that Nintendo eventually purchased a large stake in Rare and made it a second-party studio, and during the N64 years it produced a string of titles so critically acclaimed that many considered them to be equal - or even better - than Nintendo's own efforts.
Rare is now of course owned by Microsoft, but Hey! Pikmin suggests that Nintendo hasn't forgotten its old ally. One of the items you can collect in the game is a Donkey Kong Land Game Boy cartridge, which is given the title "Enduring Partnership":
https://twitter.com/KremlingForce/status/891847658465361925
We don't know about you, but it warms our hearts to see little tributes to the past scattered in modern-day Nintendo games, and it shows that the company hasn't forgotten its history - or the companies it worked with closely in years gone by.
[source twitter.com]
Comments 123
Banjo in Smash confirmed
Nintendo repurchases Rare, renames it Rareware and remakes Perfect Dark, Diddy Kong Racing and Goldeneye confirmed
@FragRed Can't forget Conker!
Golden days... They need to work together again!
Selling Rare has to be the most ridiculous thing Nintendo have done.
@timson72
I know, right? Who knows what good (or bad, dunno) would happen if Nintendo said "no", when offered to sell their Rare stock...
❤️
@Waninoko @timson72 Nintendo didn't fully own Rare, the Stamper brothers owned a good sizable chunk, so maybe them wanting to sell to Microsoft had a lot to do with why Nintendo did so too.
@timson72
They didn't really have a choice. They only owned 49% and Microsoft bought the rest. So they wouldn't have had any use for Rare anyway.
@timson72 I know. Grabbed by the Ghoulies and Perfect Dark Zero could have been Nintendo games. Booo.
It all seems so long ago now.
It could also mean the partnership between the Kongs.
Nice picture
I thought Rare games were bring diminishing returns, creatively and/or financially, during the GameCube era (or as early as the tail end of the N64 era?), and that played a role in Nintendo wanting to sell.
@In_Ex_Fan and Microsoft have had no use for Rare since lol
The way Xbox is going, it might not be long before Microsoft spins it off along with all its gaming IP into a sole corporation. And from they're, if another hardware iteration flops, well....
This is the only feasible way Nintendo could reobtain Rareware's IP; in a bidding war with every other gaming giant for the Xbox division IF its not profitable and IF Microsoft spins it off and IF its again not profitable as a sole company. Other than that, Microsoft will take Rareware's IP to its grave
If Nintendo truly cared about their partnership with Rare thrn they would have subsidised the company.
@FatAlbert1 There's no evidence to suggest any of that.
@timson72
It was totally the right decision at that time.
Even retrospectively, ex-Rare staff stated they had gotten complacent and considered themselves above their position. rareware actively pushed for them to be sold, 6 months after the sale to Microsoft, there was huge sellers remorse throughout the developer.
The Nintendo and Rareware relationship had broken down quite a bit and during the acquisition, so many staff left Rareware that Microsoft never really bought them, they just bought the name. Hence all the games from Rare ever since are nowhere near the quality of what we al know Rareware was.
Not sure how it matters since Rare ditched Nintendo a long time ago...
Rare games for N64 Classic confirmed.
@FragRed I wish.
Anybody else notice the buttons on the GBA that Diddy's playing are the wrong way round.
Just to add, other than owning the rights to the I.P, what would be the point in buying back Rare. Nintendo would need to spend time and money getting them back to being a worthwhile developer again.
Besides, Nintendo aren't exactly making much use of their 2nd party devs at the moment are they.
It could also be a reference to how former Rareware developers are working hard to bring Yooka-Laylee to a Nintendo system.
Guess people have kinda forgotten that most of the Rare staff are now at Playtonic. Might be a good idea for Nintendo to get all buddy buddy with them.
@dizzy_boy As any true Nintendo superfan would instantly recognise - i's the rare left handed version that was exclusive to the New York City branch of the Leftorium.
@In_Ex_Fan They did have a choice - Rare was put "up for sale" and Nintendo didn't buy the rest of the company out when it had the chance.
Activison was the other company in the running. Rare was very open about selling to another party, and I imagine that conversations with Nintendo will have happened very early on in that process.
Rare-Replay on Switch really does seem like a no-brainer.
@StuTwo Well that news never made it out over to the UK then, 'coz I never heard about it. I've been a Nintendo gamer since 1990.
@dizzy_boy It's a joke...
@Damo we didn't talk about Nintendos chance buying them. We talked about what Nintendo did after Microsoft did. Different story.
@In_Ex_Fan Before Microsoft bought the company Nintendo had the chance to buy out the remaining 51 percent. What happened afterwards is irrelevant; Nintendo was given the chance to buy out the remaining share, and didn't - hence Rare publicly courting other parties, such as Microsoft and Activision.
@Damo yeah, but still: that's not what we we're talking about. At all. And since we we're talking about what happend after Microsoft bought them and nothing else, it is not irrelevant to us.
This is super cute, and also reminds me how much I'd like to see Rare Replay hit the Switch. Hey, Minecraft is here, so why not.
@In_Ex_Fan wait, so we're saying that once Nintendo had made a choice not to purchase the remaining 51% they had no other choice than to sell their 49%.
I'm quite certain that Nintendo would have been aware of the consequences of not making the purchase and Damo's point is entirely pertinent.
Rare was one of the best ever game developers
I still like to play on the n64 to play perfect dark and others
Don't know what nintendo was thinking when they got rid of them
Face parm
@Kid_Sickarus I'm not saying he's wrong. But that is still not what I was talking about! I said that it made no sense for them to keep the 49% after Microsoft bought the remaing 51%. After that their hands were tied. What is so hard to understand about that fact? If it's their own fault or not was never the subject of that conversation.
Even if Rare went with Microsoft because of the money its true love will always be Nintendo.
@ChompyMage I think that is what it's referring to in my opinion.
Yeah it's still crazy that Nintendo did not buy Rare back then. Even if several of the key staff had left. All of the Virtual Console games they missed out on, not to mention the IP's they could've made new games for that Rare has not: Battletoads, RC ProAm, Wizards & Warriors...
To be fair about Nintendo selling Rare, by the time they sold them most of the staff that created their classic games had moved on. Like the ex-Goldeneye staff who set up Free Radical and the Timesplitters games. So really they made a few hundred $m for what was a shadow of its former self. Could be seen as shrewd. Rare's post-Nintendo output has hardly been much good.
I see a similar thing with Retro. Most of the team that created the first Prime games have moved on, so them not working on Prime 4 (if that's true) doesn't really mean anything. Luckily for us the current Retro can still produce a decent game. Well, DKC:TP was decent, hopefully whatever they're working on now is decent too!
That Diddy and Dixie image warms my heart. That's my childhood right there ❤️
@Damo Nintendo wasn't in position to buy anything. The Gamecube was a disaster and the consoles market was becoming a battlefield of electronic giants like Sony and Microsoft kicking out smaller toys company such as Sega, Atari, Bandai, SNK, NEC. A dwarf like Nintendo surviving this far is an anomaly.
@In_Ex_Fan Microsoft purchased the entire company, not the 51 percent share.
Oh, and there's this: https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2015/08/rare_co-founder_has_no_idea_why_nintendo_didnt_buy_the_studio_outright
R.I.P. Rare.
@Damo never said they ONLY bought 51%. And since Microsoft didn't have 90% they couldn't buy out Nintendos share. They had to give it up. So When Microsoft Bought the 51% Nintendo then had to agree to sell their own share. I think we have bit of a misunderstanding here. All I wanted to say was that Nintendo probably had no use for their share AFTER Microsoft bought them. That's it. I'm not saying they had no chance of buying rare themselves.
@timson72 Ridiculous but you do had to realize a lot of Rare employees are leaving anyways so it's best to sell it before it collapse. The only ridiculous part is that Nintendo didn't keep all the IPs that Rare made and instead sell those alongside Rare themselves. In selling Rare to Microsoft though Nintendo did make good use of those cash by buying Monolith Soft.
@Damo Surely the reason is simple: the Stampers had a certain valuation on their business and Nintendo didn't think it was value for money. Microsoft were willing to pay more for Rare because they desperately needed good console games and good developers and they saw a value in directly hurting Nintendo.
So the Stampers had tremendous leverage and they could set a price based on what Microsoft were willing to pay. It was good business on their part - they made a lot of money from the sale.
Microsoft probably had to offer to buy the remaining 49% from Nintendo when they bought the 51% from the Stampers.
Whether Nintendo were right to turn the Stampers down or not is difficult to tell. There is a lot of overlap in the types of games peak-Rare made and the types of games that Nintendo make. Maybe it just wasn't cost effective to duplicate.
Having a lot of classic IP is great... but useless if you lack the development resources to properly do them justice going forwards (see Konami, Capcom and Sega).
@StuTwo Well summarized. We don't know the details of their asking prices but it's a fair guess that the famously frugal Nintendo didn't see the value in the price they were asking. And it's not much of a stretch to see where Microsoft that's used to paying absurd amounts of money to buy out competitors and new tech they themselves are too bloated to innovate using merely money found in their couch cushions would have been eager to pay san overvalued amount, particularly when they were starting out and spending CRAZY (crazy as in, they still haven't actually paid off the debt 2 gens later...) amounts of money on XBox
And all they got was a name and Kinektimals.....
@FatAlbert1 lol wut. The way XBox is going? Another hardware flop? What hardware has flopped exactly?
They aren't lighting the world on fire ala PlayStation, sure, but really who is?
@NEStalgia Plus Avatars!
Seriously though - Microsoft made a very expensive statement of intent by buying Rare. They were making a big promise to the market that they were very serious - it was probably more effective for them to buy Rare than to spend an extra £500 million on advertising. Whether it ultimately turned out well for them or not :/...
I think the buyout of Rare was a mixed bag for Microsoft but ultimately they own a lot of good classic IP and acquired some excellent staff. But the cost!
Played the demo this weekend, the game already appears to be better than NL's 6/10 review score.
I think you're reading too much into it. I think it's just the partnership between Donkey and Diddy.
The deal always reminded me of sports signings. One team was willing to leave their best player walk to another team because they didn't want to pay the amount necessary to resign them. Sometimes it works, some times it doesn't, sometimes it works for both parties. I think Nintendo had done okay without them but would be better with them. I think it hasn't gone as well as Microsoft would like but I think they've got some good content out of Rare to justify the purchase. The new upcoming Rare Pirate game looks cool.
@timson72 they had to sell. seeing as the Tim and Chris stamper owned 51 percent and Nintendo owned 49 percent, when Tim and Chris decided to sell to Microsoft Nintendo had to give up their share as well. In an Interview Tim and Chris both said that selling to Microsoft was the worst decision they have ever made.
I really wish Microsoft and Nintendo could come to an agreement on the licensing of RARE's games.
@StuTwo Back in the XBox (zero?) days they were into spending absurd money to prove their intent (it was a tough industry to break into even with Sega in free fall.) But they spent stupidly large, even by Microsoft standards and never dug out. I remember the trade show where they were caught red handed....they were demoing the "X-Box", and it crashed....with a BSOD....and an NT4 kernel panic.... Under the table cloth? A dual Xeon box running NT and a GeForce. There was no X-Box at all, it was an empty plastic shell with wires running into it from under the table. So then they had to spend on getting the X-Box actual up to match that spec. I can't remember the figured I heard floated at the time.....I think they took something like a $200 bath on every X-Box they sold... Buying Rare was pocket change.
@King_Johobo Same here brother
@FragRed Plot twist: Rare somehow purchases Nintendo, changes the name to "Nintenweird" and makes Perfect Dark Super Mario Bros edition.
Doesn't the enduring friendship more than likely just refer to DK and Diddy? Using a Game Boy cart makes sense since Hey Pikimin! is on a portable.
@gatorboi352
The Xbone is doing OK and has managed to right the ship atm while still not being where Microsoft would like it's making some money. But before that the entire Xbox division was nothing but a money hole and bleeding money. The current CEO fully intended to either sell or spin off the Xbox division when he took his position and was very open about that, but he was convinced to keep it for a while.
If it ever turned in to a money hole again he would probably dump it.
@Raayo Golden days indeed.
@NEStalgia they lost $125 per console. And it's said that Microsoft lost $4 billion in 4 years because of this.
Just the partnership between Donkey kong and Diddy kong...that's all.
@DESS-M-8 THIS. Anyone who says selling Rare was a mistake doesn't know the whole story. IMO the game output from Rare since then further confirms the sale to have been a good decision for Nintendo.
There was no point in keeping rare. Even if they would have stayed the original rare devs would have moved on by now. Everybody always says that Microsoft killed rare but more than likely it was the other way around. Microsoft thought rare was going to put them on the map but without Nintendos guidance rare pretty much died and got in the hardware game which was probably why Nintendo acquired them in the first place. Rare knew how to get the most out of consoles and that is probably why Microsoft has used them to develop consoles and Kinect. I still believe Nintendo was responsible for the polished gameplay in all of rares classics.
@bitleman All of those companies kicked themselves out with poor decisions, particularly Sega, way before MS entered the mix. The success of Sony and the amount of money MS was willing to spend to position itself was just the nail in the coffin.
Nintendo "surviving" this isn't an anomaly. Even what you call a "disaster" was still a profitable console; just because it didn't sell as well as the PS2 (and honestly what could have) does not make it a "disaster". Calling Nintendo a dwarf is short sighted, and that's not even considering they're continues success with handhelds even if the GCN was such a "disaster".
@Linked2thaPast That's very unfair. Rare had some incredibly talented people on board. Many were veterans of the Spectrum era and responsible for making their own fully formed (and often completely innovative) games.
I think Nintendo acquired a stake because Rare were such a big and prominent contract developer in the NES era. They made some very high quality games but also tons (literally tons!) of garbage too.
They are a very interesting and very misunderstood company in my opinion.
I mean.... that's almost certainly referring to Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong and not Nintendo and Rare. I'm pretty sure that's what they mean by "enduring partnership".
Obviously the partnership between Nintendo and Rare didn't endure.
Nintendo should put in an offer to buy Rare back from Micro$haft. What have they done with Rare since the acquisition? Turned them from one of the elite studios in the world to pretty much an afterthought now. After Sea of Thieves launches, Nintendo should strike!
@Destron Finally someone else here familiar with the history! We still don't know if it's making money. They group the hardware sales with Surface and Winphone now, and they group their software sales with Minecraft as their overall entertainment software results. It's entirely possible they're making more money on Minecraft everywhere but XBox than they are on all of XBox. I'd wager the subscription was the only part of actual value right now, and since that keeps synergy with their cloud focus they're willing to keep it, while trying to funnel actual gaming ever more back to Windows (without the subscription.) Of course funneling gaming back to Windows was the whole point of X-Box to begin with....
@In_Ex_Fan Ahh, "only" $125....such a bargain.... I recall part of that 4b was more than raw hardware losses...there was something about licensing or such they took a hit on above that 125...I don't remember the details though...
@SleeplessKnight Why buy Rare back? What is Rare now? It's a name. And a collection of IPs less profitable than the ones Nintendo already owns. It's not a studio. Most of the people that made that studio left a long, long time ago. A bunch of them are Playtonic now. There's no "Rare" to buy, it's just a Microsoft studio with the name Rare on it, making Microsoft games....and not even many of those. The "Rare" that anyone here is talking about ceased to exist the day MS bought it and most of the staff headed for the exits.
@GravyThief Retro Studio's is not working on Prime 4.
I really don't think the "enduring partnership" reference was Nintendo & Rare. I think it was meant for Donkey and Diddy.
@NEStalgia I think you're right about the XBox Live subscriptions being the biggest thing left of value/interest to Microsoft in XBox these days.
Even funnelling gaming back to PC might be a dead end for them if it just leads to everyone playing (and buying) on Steam.
People leap to declare "Nintendoomed" but Microsoft - for all the backing they have - seem to be in a worse situation with few obvious ways to dig themselves out of their "OK" position. It's not unprofitable anymore but probably only because they've cut back on making as many lavishly funded games to chase Sony's market share.
My take on it is this: Microsoft will eventually either sell the division or try to do what they do best and become an operating system provider/licensor. They'll open up to allow companies like Samsung or Asus or even Alienware make their own "XBox One". There are advantages (even if critics online would blast them as "hobbled and weak gaming PCs").
The item descriptions seem like the best part of this game.
@FragRed Still wouldn't be the same Rareware though, considering all its key members who worked on our beloved Nintendo games left the company. Better they purchase Playtonic.
Still, I get the sentiment.
@NEStalgia I still wish that MS would just retool the xbone os into a sandboxed pc os. There is too much fragmentation via pc storefronts to hope that shunting games to windows 10 will turn a major profit. However if I could install a xbox os (not emulation but native so more computers can play it or at least a nested program) and pop xbone games into my bluray drive I would give my Xbone away and just game that way. Not gonna happen but I can dream. Seriously I haven't turned mine on in almost 10 months now...just waiting on crackdown 3.
...Did your HRAP ship?
@StuTwo I'm not sure they care much at all if it leads everyone back to Steam. They're not really looking to make money from the Windows Store (why are they even still RUNNING the Windows store? It makes Sears look like a popular destination...) It's, as always, all about Windows. The X-Box, or, "Project DirectX Box" was all about the API. DirectX wormed its way to being the defacto API for games, and games managed to sell a lot of new computers which meant a lot of copies of Windows. It was important to them to keep gaming as inextricably tied to DirectX and thus Windows as possible. PSX, and then PS2's early success was siphoning far too much development away from the firm lock DX had and bringing it to OpenGL. MS couldn't tolerate that, thus they were willing to spend INSANE money on building a console just to force developers to tie themselves to DX and thus Windows and stem the flood. XBox exists, literally, to secure DX as the prevailing API to make sure plenty of games are tied to Windows. Except that era is over and XBox still lingers. If the devs go back to DX games running on Windows sold through Steam, MS is perfectly ok with that.
I think the people that think of MS as a success where "Nintendoomed", tend to think of XBox as just another cog of the vast MS empire, not taking into account XBox is a tiny, fairly unloved division in the company they would gladly jettison and nearly have already. For now, Live subscription adds some value. Though I still wonder at the profitability. The market share is not very good, and is limited to a few regions. They have little in the way of first party software (though little expense), and they must have spent a bundle on X1X R&D. I would not be surprised if they're still "adjusting" numbers. And that's beyond the fact that it's not really profit if it's barely paying back the debt
I agree with your assessment. Selling it off has always been the likely outcome. I can see them trying to do what Valve failed to do with the open system idea though. They could succeed where Valve failed because it's their core industry. OTOH, what exactly would separate a "Samsung XGalaxy powered by Windows 10" from.....any other PC powered by Windows 10? If the Switch takes off I could see them going the other way and "energizing" Surface with Xbox with a super premium box.
Call this a crazy theory if you want. But, I don't think Microsoft bought out Rare to use as an asset. It was to cripple Nintendo's business.
Very much like how Apple is now 'competitively' buying out parts needed to make Nintendo Switches. These guys aren't playing fair.
@Ryu_Niiyama Didn't they already try to turn Windows 10 into a sandboxes OS with Metro? Lets not revisit that! For gaming though the idea does sound cool. j
But don't worry, they've confirmed the $500 X1X is still going to give the best Minecraft experience....so if you want to see the Neon Red/Neon Blue Nintendo Switch rendered in the highest quality, you're going to need an X1X
Nope, no HRAP shipping yet.... Strange. My Japan Nintendo account is advertising the HRAP on the news feed on Switch, so it should be out. Could have been a freight delay getting them here though.
@Destron preeeetty dang sure Microsoft (and Sony for that matter) couldn't care less about losing money on their game console divisions.
Actually, it's been that exact approach that has catapulted both brands head and shoulders above Nintendo in the last 6 to 8 years (for MS) and the last 2 decades (for Sony).
Well that settles it: Banjo & Kazooie confirmed for Smash Switch!!!!11!!! You heard it here!!
@gatorboi352
You should probably lean a bit more about history then. Sony never wanted to enter the video game market. Kutaragi was working with Nintendo entirely in secret and almost lost his job over it. After Nintendo screwed them the CEO at the time wanted to cut the losses and drop it. Kutaragi convinced them to develop the PS One and release it, putting his job on the line. If the system hadn't been successful he would have been fired and there would have been no PS2.
The PS2 was immensely successful for Sony and VERY profitable. PS3 had its struggles but came in to its own in the end.
PS4 is on track to surpass PS2 in profitability, that's he reason the PS4 Pro was not a powerhouse upgrade like Scorpio. You can bet your ass Sony cares about profit with the PS4 because that is one of the only divisions making money right now keeping Sony afloat. Sony has taken the hits when necessary but being profitable has always been their concern.
Yes systems are sold at a loss from time to time. But that's acceptable when you know you can make the money back through other means like software sales. At a point during the 360 they were bleeding far more money than they could ever bring in. That's also why Nintendo plays close to the chest on systems price. They know they can't guarantee enough secondary revenue to float the console loss.
As for Microsoft, your right they have not cared about profit in the past because they had an eventual end goal on mind (dominate the living room) and at the time they were willing to cut the losses to meet an end. However that has not materialized, and probably won't, so they are readjusting their strategy. The current CEO does care about profit for the division. They still have shareholders to answer to. They can only bandaid if for so long before it just becomes to much money spent.
A friend of mine that works for Blizzard has said that from behind closed door talks, it sounds like Microsoft is trying to position the Xbox as more of a steam machine that a game console. From the last year or so, I would say I believe him.
I loved my 360 and have nothing against Xbox, but the fact is it has been a money sink in the past and they can't continue that forever with no clear end game. Their real money is coming from enterprise especially Azure, so it's only a matter of time before they start to put more focus in that area.
@nab1 I really don't see any big bad decisions with the Dreamcast. It was just Sega's wallet was too small to compete on the marketing field against a megacorp like Sony.
And yes Nintendo is a dwarf. Take a look at the number of studio the Playstation division own and their size. It's an information kept secret but the Playstation division alone being three times bigger than Nintendo is probably a low estimation.
Because there's no chance the partnership it's referring to could possibly be Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong-- the two playable characters, who are pictured on the label... Critical thinking vs. wishful thinking.
@bitleman There's a lot written on the Dreamcast mistakes by people who'd put way more effort and research into it than I care to, but for one, they repeated the Saturn's mistake of rushing to market just to be the first, which also made it the least powerful console by far, without any real differentiating feature to make it worth it. They had completely abandoned their 32bit hardware, and as a consumer at the time you couldn't be blamed for not taking the risk on a new Sega console after their past failures. Even 3rd party developers were not enticed by it, I think most of the DC library (or at least the better games on it) came from Sega itself.
The loop holes which made it probably the easiest console console to pirate (to my knowledge) also didn't help. The inability to play DVDs was a mistake, which granted, is a mistake mostly in hindsight, and one that Nintendo also made, but still, a mistake nonetheless.
And by the way, this is coming from someone who still owns and plays a Dreamcast, and would vouch for it as a worthy console any day, it just wasn't what Sega needed to continue their business as usual.
Actually I believe Microsoft could make quite a bit of coin if the Rare Replay was rerelease on the Nintendo Switch, most Nintendo gamers still have a deep love for Rare.
When the Xbox One got X360 backwards compatibility and the Rare Replay, it's what made me acquire an Xbox One.
Quite a nice touch Nintendo!
@nab1
Piracy didn't kill the Dreamcast, the PS2 killed the Dreamcast because casuals loved the convenience that the PS2 could play DVD's, that same reason even effected the GameCube.
I can't tell you how many time when I was at BestBuy and Target were people completely snobbed there noses at the Dreamcast and GameCube just because it didn't play DVD's.
I didn't learn about the Dreamcast Piracy problem until the Dreamcast was already dead. I also had many friends that owned Dreamcast that never know about that Same issue.
@Meaty-cheeky Well, the piracy issue might have been more noticeable in certain parts of the world then. In my country, it wasn't long before no one was buying games since they were so easy to copy without modding the console, and even as a teenager I could understand how that's a problem business wise.
In order to acquire Rare fully it might have cost Nintendo $100,000,000 and Rare being on the downswing was not worth it.
Remember only months later that Nintendo purchased Retro for $1,000,000
@nab1
Another thing I forgot to mention is that lots of consumers personal PC's were still using floppy Disks. Having dial up internet and a high end PC back in 1999, well you were in a small minority.
Sad to hear that Piracy was a stronger factor in your country, SEGA, Capcom, and Midway truly made some awesome games for that system.
I miss Rare titles, it's culture was 100% Nintendo like. Passion for the detail was their trademark, we need more risk taking developers such as Rare. Awesome games
@Meaty-cheeky The thing is, you didn't need to have such a connection and PC, just needed to know who did and was enterprising enough to take advantage of it. There were A LOT of copied games being sold on the street.
And yes, there were some truly amazing games. I keep my DC around just for Capcom vs SNK alone (though there are other gems too of course, that's just the one I like the most and haven't found a replacement for). It's silly that no one has released that game digitally since.
"Hey! Pikmin suggests that Nintendo hasn't forgotten its old ally." Rare definitely hasn't forgotten!
@Meaty-cheeky Gamers are generally young, overly sensitive for marketing and have a terrible taste. They love generic shooters with 'realistic' graphics (aka outdated in a year), boring sports games and other big budget snore fests with high production values but little originality or challenging gameplay.
The Dreamcast is the best console of all time. I connected it to my tv a few months ago and was once again blown away by how much awesome games there are on the system and how well they hold up (the 60fps pixel perfect arcade ports are better than most modern games).
The PS1 was never that great to begin with horrible 3D graphics and terrible loading times. The PS2 didn't come close to the Dreamcast and had horrible blurry tv output. But some marketing dudes in suits threw money at it and it got cool.
@nab1 Do you know what Sega needed to have a good protection against piracy? Money. Do you know what Sega needed to get a dvd reader? Money. Do you know what Sega needed to get third parties? Money.
Where you see mistakes and bad decisions I just see a company too small to compete. The consoles market became a market of megacorps since Sony and Microsoft are in it. Nintendo is an anomaly. They have only 5000 employees. Even some third parties are bigger than them.
@NickOfTime90 Best game ever man!
What if the enduring partnership just refers to DK and Diddy?
@Leon-mirage
I would like to face palm your face parm.
Also, nice profile pic.
@NEStalgia
I didn't understand anything you posted, but damn if it wasn't compelling.
@FragRed funny thing is... these three games have been remade already
Looks more like a tongue in cheek commentary poking fun at the scenario.
Satirical in my opinion, but maybe I'm just cynical lol
@BigKing
Dreamcast failed for many reasons including piracy. Sega not having any money and very little consumer trust after Mega CD, 32X, Nomad, Saturn was a big issue. Piracy was an issue. Lack of DVD drive was an issue. Pushing arcade conversions when arcades were losing importance was an issue. Lack of EA support was an issue. The PS2 riding the success of the PS1 and quickly building up a brilliant library of games was a big issue. Dreadful advertising was an issue e.g.wasting millions sponsoring football teams, loudly proclaiming it's online capabilities that it then didn't have was an issue.
Nice console (stupid lack of buttons on the Controllers aside) and some games still look good through VGA. But while it would be comforting to think it flopped because of some horrible conspiracy in reality it never stood a chance.
@Meaty-cheeky
The DVD player certainly helped PS2. However let's not pretend that having GTA 3, MGS2, Gran Turismo 3, SSX Tricky, Jak and Daxter, Burnout, Silent Hill 2, Baldurs Gate Dark Alliance, Tony Hawks 3 by the end of 2001 didn't go a long way to helping it sell 😉
I'm highly disturbed over the amount of people not questioning the claim it was referring to Rare. Maybe I'm just crazy, it seems far more sensible to conclude it's referring to DK and Diddy.
A lot the other commenters don't their facts straight either-- Nintendo dropped Rare because they consistently went over budget, missed every deadline, then wanted Nintendo to bail them out when they ran into financial trouble. Despite the public image of being one of Nintendo's greatest assets, the behind the scenes reality was quite the opposite. They did make some iconic games in their day, but it's pretty clear that those projects were propped up by Nintendo. You can clearly see what happened to them when they went to Microsoft. They were never the powerhouse they were seen to be.
@JTMnM
"King of aaaall the lands..."
I still regularly quote him to this day: You'd be surprised how often and in what ways you can use "...Context... sensitive... ...Clever!"
@Ryu_Niiyama So much for HRAP, I had to authorize a delay to an unknown date as I'm sure you did. I noticed GS is listing it as 12/31 still, so I'm guessing Hori's the hold-up here not even providing a date. If I were to guess they intended to ship them now but the whole inventory went to Japan instead
Nostalgia will always run deep.. but the harsh reality is that Rare lost itself in those days and it clearly showed that with its output of games.. even their recent games have been extremely disappointing.. I see there's a lot of hype around their upcoming pirate style game but if I'm honest it looks kinda.. meh.. the best thing Rare had done since leaving Nintendo is creating the Microsoft Avatars - they look cool and have earned Microsoft a decent chuck of coin over the years.
@NEStalgia kicks rocks yeah, I got the email as well. Sigh. Ah well I'm sorta getting used to street fighter as is. I'll just be patient...kinda.
@NEStalgia Why buy Rare back? Great question. I suppose it depends on what Rare still owns and what Microsoft now owns. Regardless of whether or not the old dev teams are still with Rare or not, it's the actual IP that Nintendo would be buying more than anything. Nintendo would take those formerly-valuable franchises and resurrect them with our without the Rare name attached. And more importantly to an audience that has some history and appreciation for those franchises.
@SleeplessKnight The trouble is, what IPs? Of Rare's most famous games, they don't own the IPs, DKC was a collaboration IP with Nintendo that Nintendo owns, and Goldeneye was MGM/Disney licensed. They own Battletoads, but I doubt Nintendo wants that. Banjo seems to have this golden aura to N64 era gamers, but is irrelevant to pretty much the rest of the industry, plus the platformed is mostly dead while Nintendo already has 2 of the biggest platformer IPs and is looking to broaden (hence Splatoon.) Not to mention the Banjo team is really Playtonic team now and they're still making (for better or worse) Banjo-type games with Yooka. Conker was edgy in the 90's even MS doesn't care about that one now. KI has value, but Nintendo has ARMS and Pokken (and Smash) on that front. Perfect Dark is a cool series, kind of irrelevant today as a name, though. A lot of what they own is so stale as to have little value as an IP outside the nostalgia market. Nintendo probably doesn't need more of that!
There really isn't a whole lot of value in those IPs at this point, as Microsoft found out. Certainly nothing to pay 10's of millions for a half-dead brand stable for. Most of their "classic" IPs are redundant with Nintendo's own IPs and are valued less (far less) overall. The games were in some cases loved better than Nintendos not for the IP but for the game itself. And that talent isn't part of Rare anymore. If anything, if people want that, the chant should be for Nintendo to buy Playtonic, where the bulk of that old team resides.
Rare is now Kinektimals and Sea of Thieves. That's all Rare can really ever be now.
@NEStalgia I'm by no means implying Nintendo should pay top dollar for Rare or for their old IP's. I'm merely stating that for fans of those franchises and characters who are hoping to see future installments or guest appearances by those characters in ( in Smash, Mario Kart etc.), it would be better if Nintendo were the stewards of those properties than Micro$haft. And even though you're correct that some of those IP's are stale now, like I said before, they're mostly stale due to Microsoft's mishandling of Rare since they purchased them. If Nintendo threw some time, love and marketing $$ behind them, I'm pretty confident they could make those IP's valuable again. And once more, it can't be overstated enough - Rare's games just simply FIT more on Nintendo platforms with Nintendo audiences than they ever have or ever will on Xbox.
@SleeplessKnight Haha, true, though I'm not sure those IPs were ever particularly valuable. Well remembered, sure, but as an actual brand, monetarily, I'm not sure Rare's stuff was ever a draw to a platform in particular. People didn't buy an N64 for Banjo they bought for Mario and played Banjo.
I agree though that "old Rare" fit Nintendo best, but that's why MS killed off "old Rare". Still those old IPs really fit 90's Nintendo more than modern Nintendo. What could Banjo do that Mario and DK can't do in the post-collect-a-thon world? Perfect Dark is probably the only one that doesn't directly overlap Nintendo IPs...but between PD and Metroid Prime, we know which is the bigger 1st person shooter, and the realistic version of Perfect Dark that would be expected today is pretty outside what Nintendo aims to do.
Iron Sword...wonder if they owned that? that would be a cool game to resurrect. Some of the REALLY old NES stuff. Rare was pretty unique back then. I think the N64/GCN stuff, the ship mostly sailed on already.
Of course, it's all just musing. MS absorbed it, and when MS absors a game studio they fully absorb it. Look what happened to FASA. A lot of people here might not remember that name but as someone who used the word "Micro$shaft" the first time I've heard it since the 90's, you may well remember
I don't know what was worse, Nintendo selling Rare, or Microsoft purchasing Rare and making them a Kinect developer...
@electrolite77 Conspiracy? That is in no way or form what I am saying. What I say is that the Dreamcast has a library full with awesome games that don't get appreciated by gamers, because gamers usually have a terrible taste. Just look up the best selling games on the PS2. One big snorefest.
Gamers don't want original games and new franchises like on the Dreamcast. They want the same boring games released over and over again.
They don't want challenging arcade games, they want sandbox crap where you drive from point A to B.
You can't blame Sega for releasing one of the greatest consoles of all time. It were the gamers who failed Sega, not the other way around. And because of the gamers we now have Microsoft instead. Who already tried to screw everybody over by pitching the idea of ditching physical releases on the Xbox One.
But hey, they have a huge marketing budget. Let's buy that one.
@BigKing
I can blame Sega. They screwed everybody over by releasing successive flops that put people off then put out the DC which didn't have enough buttons on the pad or a DVD drive. Ok that's the only real problems with the DC but the damage had been done by them failing gamers with Mega CD, 32X and Saturn. When DC released and the advertising hailed an online gaming system that wasn't working yet it was 'typical Sega'.
They also made the same mistake as you in thinking it was still 1991 and people would pay full price for arcade conversions and a machine to play them on when punters had realised these games were designed for a quick blast. Arcade conversions have always found an audience but need to be priced accordingly. Sega wanting £45 for Crazy Taxi in 2000 was a tough sell when even the less powerful competition were offering Perfect Dark, Resident Evil 3, Majora's Mask and Gran Turismo 2. A noble failure it may have been but Sega failed.
@electrolite77 Quick blast? There were tons of deep fighting games on the Dreamcast.
You don't know if something is going to flop. That is hindsight bias. Sega was on a creative peak and released classic after classic. And if it wasn't Sega, then it was any of the other Japanese developers like Treasure, Capcom or Namco. But I guess you applaud developers for playing safe. I'd rather see a Jet Set Radio, Ikaruga, Shenmue or Rez than another WWII shooter or GTA. If you call that getting screwed over, then I love getting screwed over.
The controller could use a few more buttons or better yet, a second thumbstick, but that never was a dealbreaker.
@BigKing
You're not responding to what I'm saying. And stop trying to guess what I like or think as if it's an insult.
Sega blew it with launching Mega CD and not supporting it well, then launching the awful 32X same week as Saturn launched in Japan, then flubbing the Saturn's launch, then dropping both Megadrive add-ons and the Megadrive itself to concentrate on the Saturn which was expensive (at launch) and under-supported, then dropping Saturn like a stone after 1997 and pretty much abandoning the market for over a year before the DC launch. It was doomed before it launched because Sega had thrown away almost every shred of trust and goodwill they'd ever earned. This isn't hindsight, there was plenty of scepticism at the time in the press especially after you add in the 3DFX/PowerVR shambles, 2 years of disastrous financial results and the farce at launch with advertising hyping up online gaming which wasn't actually working yet.
Yes it was a nice machine with some great games, but it was doomed from the start because of Sega.
MY EYES WERE DRY A MOMENT AGO
Aww.
@nab1 are you agreeing with me or saying something else?
@DESS-M-8 Definitely agreeing
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