Microsoft Buys Rare

Phwoar writes "Microsoft have announced their buyout of the games developer Rare. After a $375 million payoff Rare will now produce games solely for the Xbox. After Rare's recent releases for the Nintendo systems bombed, Nintendo decided to sell their 49% stake in the company last week rather than buy the company themselves. Google News has a nice collection of links to articles regarding the announcement." You might be reminded of Microsoft's purchase of Bungie a few years ago.

Comments

No Great Loss

[nick_davison]

"You might be reminded of Microsoft's purchase of Bungie a few years ago."

When Microsoft bought Bungie, it was to buy a "killer app" for the X-Box and nerf it's simultaneous PC development for fear it would show up the X-Box.

Rare on the other hand has a whole one game announced and a legacy of Nintendo titles. Ultimately, it's just another shot fired in the console wars, rather than a loss to PC gaming, this time.

I would buy an X-Box, knowing Bill loses as much money as I spend on each one sold - but he has more money than me and so is going to win that war.

Re:No Great Loss

[morgajel]

if you read up on the release, nintendo kept a lot of IP, including the rights to some of their classics like donkey kong, etc.

the legacy of nintendo titles is just that- a legacy... not really an asset.

Re:No Great Loss

[phong3d]

Maybe. Nintendo's got Metroid Prime and Capcom's blessing of exclusive Resident Evil licenses for a long time, as well as plenty of other non-kiddie games to try and broaden their percieved demographic.

What does MS get? Banjo-Kazooie. Microsoft has no platformers worth mentioning right now, save for a retread of Crash Bandicoot 3, and I'll bet you Steve Ballmer's sweat-stained oxford shirt at one of his company's pep rallies that Christmas 2003 will see Banjo-Threeie (or whatver they'll call it) at the front of the marketing blitz.

Re:No Great Loss

[EvilAlien]

Microsoft is playing Pokemon with developers... gotta collect them all!

Re:No Great Loss

[Darby]

I do hate MS for thier practices, and I have a strong aversion to windows, but I fail to see how that can be turned into "I want to screw Microsoft every day"

It's a little philosophy called do unto others as they do to you.

Primates

[EvlPenguin]

Yippie. Now Steve Balmer won't be the only large, hairy monkey to hold an Xbox controller.

Re:Primates

[Anonymous Coward]

donkey-kong is trademarked by nintendo, they just licensed rare to make the game -- there will be no dk on xbox

this actually is a good thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering the fact that Nintendo is quickly picking up great 3rd part support, such as Squaresoft and Capcom's Resident Evil series, this actually makes a lot more sense then it did at first glance. the register, at http://www.theregus.com/content/54/26394.html, makes a great point about the logics of selling Rare, which is what many argued was Nintendo's greatest asset. Apparently, the founders of Rare, the Stamper Brothers, are soon to leave the company, so most of the innovation that came in Rare games was to leave them. I am a proud owner of a Gamecube, and all I can say is, we still get Starfox, and we can always just make another great 1st person shooter using the 007 liscense :)

Re:this actually is a good thing.

[leviramsey]

EA owns the 007 license now (and has since Tomorrow Never Dies). They do release some games from that license on the GameCube.

Re:this actually is a good thing.

[rseuhs]

Microsoft did a smart thing.

Is losing on hardware and now losing on software, too a smart thing?

Rare will never be able to pay the ~20 million/year, a 350 million debt would cost, therefore they will never be profitable. With XBox-only development, it is illusoric to even come near that mark.

Re:this actually is a good thing.

[hkmwbz]

It was my understanding that Nintendo actually make money off their hardware.

It looks like Nintendo are very much interested in making hardware. They dominate the handheld gaming market at the moment, and they apparently don't like the way the other consoles are trying to do everything. Nintendo just want to create a simple gaming machine.

I would be surprised if the GameCube was Nintendo's last console.

Re:this actually is a good thing.

[hkmwbz]

Your childish comments aside, I think both Nintendo and Microsoft are gaining something from this.

• Nintendo are getting some cash to start focusing more on third-party support, and pulling out of a relationship which was no longer as healthy to them (Rare's games apparently made up a whopping 1.5 per cent of Nintendo's total sales last year, steadily going down). Don't forget that the Stamper brothers are pulling out, and that many of the original developers that helped to build the Rare brand name have left to create their own company.
• Microsoft are buying a brand name which has a good ring in most hardcore gamers' ears, including the gaming press. They also get a few licenses (although some of the ones you mention no longer belong to Rare, AFAIK)

But remember that much of Rare's success with their games was due to the heavy involvement of geniuses like Shigery Miyamoto (Nintendo's not-so-secret weapon). He oversaw the development of several smash hits, including Star Fox and Donkey Kong.

And when you consider the fact that the Stamper brothers are pulling out, and large part of the original development teams have moved on to other companies, what Microsoft is left with is basically a brand name and a few licenses. Rare will still be able to create nice games I think, but will they be able to make the same impact as they did in the past?

I seriously doubt it.

You are talking about how Nintendo fanboys raved about Rare in the past. This is true. Rare was once a force to be reckoned with. However, have you noticed how silent the fanboys have been about Rare lately? I think they realize that Rare is no longer the same as it used to be.

All in all, it looks like Nintendo have made a smart move. They have lost little - the ones that quit Rare are now working on GameCube games, it seems. The licenses aren't half as strong as Nintendo's own.

Microsoft have bough the brand recognition of a company which currently is struggling hard to live up to its past glory, but not quite succeeding.

I wouldn't call it a ripoff, because gaming fans have fond memories of Rare's games. But then I wouldn't exactly call it a major breakthrough for Microsoft either.

But that remains to be seen. Maybe Rare can start doing their magic again, without the people who have already left and are leaving.

that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[Anonymous Coward]

375 million? i think they paid that much just for the prestige of owning a previously successful game company. Now after they pay the cost to switching to the xbox development environment, they got to produce something worthwhile. I dunno about you, but 375 million is difficult to live up to. I think the idea it total garbage on microsoft's part.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[zaffir]

I think it's less about making tons of money from Rare's games than just having the games on their console. Example:

1) Rare makes another Goldeneye.
2) Rare's new game makes MS $5 million
3) 10,000 people buy X-Boxes just to play this game. Conversely, these people DON'T buy PS2s and Gamecubes because those systems don't have this cool new game.
4) MS increases user base.
5) ???
6) Profit!

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[erpbridge]

Wasn't Rare the ones who made BattleToads as well?

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[the eric conspiracy]

1) Rare makes another Goldeneye.
2) Rare's new game makes MS $5 million
3) 10,000 people buy X-Boxes just to play this game. Conversely, these people DON'T buy PS2s and Gamecubes because those systems don't have this cool new game.
4) MS increases user base.
5) ???
6) Profit!



Microsoft buys Rare for $375 mill. Microsoft sells $5 mill in games for 4 million in profit. They sell a bunch more consoles at some unkown loss per console.

Looks to me like Microsoft is still out $370 mill at least. Sure doesn't look like a profit to me.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[sweetooth]

Anyone that buys an X-Box just for golden eye probably already owns the other two or is going to shell out the money for the other two when a "killer game" comes out for those consoles. Especially if you consider that someone makeing a console purchase based on a "killer game" approach will probably have to have a game cube for zelda or a ps2 for Final Fantasy etc.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[parliboy]

5) Microsoft loses $200 per box x 10,000 boxes.
6) Bankruptcy!

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[bergeron76]

I think you guys are missing the big picture here. MSFT isn't going to go "bankrupt" over buying this company. This is simply a power play. Why do think they don't mind losing money selling the Xbox. To them, $375 million is a drop in the bucket. Their goal is to proliferate the Xbox as much as possible. Once it's the dominant platform, they can:

• A) overtake their competitors much the way they did to the the PC platform.
  
• B) force XXX million homes to upgrade to "new features" (DRM) for the users benefit.
  
• C) control the home media platform (which the xbox is just the diving board for (at this point in time). Within 3 years, the "console" will be a DRM box, a game machine, a PC for people that aren't power users (aol'ers and MSN'ers), a home stereo, an HDTV processor, and home theatre / DVD machine.
  
• D) merge the PC market; the home entertainment market; and the ASP internet space (MSN).
  

The result will be one giant leap into world domination. From there they'll buy countries and governments (oh wait, haven't they done that already?). Open source will be outlawed, and consequently a revolt will ensue. The corporation will be the governor and the people will be slaves. The true hackers, free thinkers, and idealists will be outlawed.

[ Fill in your own ending here ]

Be very afraid my friends. Mark my words.

MSFT Shills feel free to challenge this post. We already know who you are.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[brianvan]

(snicker)

Microsoft has $60 billion in cash reserves, or something like that. $200 x 10,000 is 2 million dollars (evil pinky finger to lips).

Microsoft is well known for throwing lots of money at lost causes until either:

1. They know for sure no one will ever want what they're trying to sell
2. They finally get it right and it takes off like wildfire

Most of the time, the result is #2. (I'm using Internet Explorer right now, as a matter of fact.)

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[ZaMoose]

I still have nightmares featuring Snake, Rattle n' Roll's theme music... *shudder*

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[Yorrike]

No. Selling 100,000 copies would garner $5million gross at the retail level. When you buy a $50 game, the money does not get put in the shop's till and then given directly to MS next time their rep comes in.

I believe the game companies make between $5 and $10 on each $50 game. In order for MS to make $5million, they need to sell more than 700,000 copies (that is, of course, disregarding the loss they incure with every sale of an Xbox). In order to make the $375 million Rare cost them, they must sell somewhere in the order of 60 million games (this is still disregarding the loss on every Xbox). Rare cost Microsoft way too much.

Good one Nintendo. You pulled a fast one.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[tc]

Er, no. MS probably make somewhere in the region of $5 to $10 for every Xbox game sold in licencing fees. That's regardless of whether they are the developer or publisher of that title. In the case where they are both developer and publisher (as is now the case with Rare titles) the revenue per title is more likely to be in the $20 to $25 per unit range.

Rare's titles have sold an average of around 1.4 million each throughout their history. Let's suppose they manage to do half that in future. Revenue for MS from each Rare title might therefore be around the $14-21M range.

Suppose Rare ship another 5 titles over the lifetime of the Xbox. That's getting up to $100M in revenue. Now factor in the extra bonus of having more quality titles on Xbox - which should increase console sales and therefore revenue for all other games sales. Suddenly, it looks like MS's increased revenue as a result of the purchase might be quite substantial, and the purchase price of $375M looks like not a bad deal at all.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[GMontag451]

I believe the game companies make between $5 and $10 on each $50 game.

The game shops only make $5 to $10 for each $50 game. The rest of the money goes to the game company, minus a piddling amount for reproduction costs. Granted, you have to take into account development costs, but those are one time fees. After the development costs are recovered (first 250,000 games or so), the company makes at *least* $30 per $50 game. This puts your 60 million games figure down to 12.5 million. That is still quite a few games, but is easily manageable if spread out over 3-5 big name games.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[ceejayoz]

IIRC the original cost of manufacture for Xboxes was about $350, so MS was selling them at a loss. I wouldn't be surprised if it's a lot cheaper to make them now, though.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[nzkoz]

Microsoft won't be looking to get a 'payback' over the near term.

They're after yield. At present that $375m in cash is only earning them $15m a year. if they get more than that over the long term then they're better off, the odds of that are fairly high.

Similarly nintendo haven't necessarily poorly because of it. They could well have better things to do with $375m USD.

It's all a question of who needs what. MSFT need rare and NTDO don't. Neither lost, both have probably gained

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[tc]

It's true that it's lost the Nintendo licences, but Rare still has a number of valuable properties (e.g. Perfect Dark, Banjo Kazooie, Blast Corps). The poorer than expected results for the most recent titles have, according to rumour, partly been to do with Nintendo dropping the ball - from what I hear they've been more arms length with Rare recently, getting GameCube dev kits to them later than expected and generally not keeping them as close as they did in the N64 era. This might explain the staff defections - disaffaction with Nintendo, a problem that might just have gone away with the MS purchase.

I'd be surprised if the founders were to leave any time soon. If nothing else, I'm sure MS were smart enough to lock them in contractually, since when you buy a development company you're buying the people as much as the IP.

Making back that $375 could be a breeze if it's the catalyst that kick starts Xbox profitability. Even if that doesn't happen, they'll still make a modest chunk of it back over the lifetime of the console. And it's not like the company and it's brands don't have any value after that - it's still a good purchase even if they don't make back the purchase price on revenue, because they are also buying assets which have value.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[Yorrike]

Nintendo will likely use the cash for their current developer seeding project. Giving large grants of a couple of million to small groups with good ideas and skills. They'll likely end up with 2 or 3 Rare-like developers out of this (depending on whether they make the right choices. Though Nintendo isn't stupid).

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[tc]

True, there are running costs associated with buying Rare. On the other hand, they also have assets, which the $375M are partly buying. Those assets will still exist even if the company generates no revenue.

MS are in it for the long haul. Rare don't have to pay for themselves in the next year, or even the next five years in order for it to be a worthwhile purchase. Take a look at the PE ratios of most companies - they're often valued at something more on the order of 20 years worth of revenue (if not more, in many cases).

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[edwdig]

Dig around at any GameCube website and you'll find that Rare was the first company outside of Nintendo to get GameCube dev kits.

The whole point of the sale was so the owners could get out of it and retire. They offered to sell the company to Nintendo first, but they decided they weren't worth the money, hence the sale to Microsoft.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[analog_line]

Consoles don't get a version 2. Designing, building, advertising, and getting to market a game console is an infinitely more complex and costly endeavor than doing the same for a piece of software. With earlier versions of Internet Explorer, if you decided you didn't like Internet Explorer, you could just delete it away and try the next version for free when it comes out.

You can't do that with a console. If your console flops, then who aside from the hardcore of the hardcore is going to buy the thing after you screwed it up the last time? Now you've got hardware with no new software coming out for it. Joe Gamer going to take a chance on that? It's a whole different world from the software industry, as Microsoft will eventually figure out. There are no second chances. Ask NEC with the TurboGrafx 16. 3DO. Sega threw everything they had at their second chance Dreamcast after the Saturn flopped over here, and it still didn't work. Sony and Nintendo understand this. Microsoft doesn't yet, I don't believe.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[tc]

Right, but if rumours are to be believed, they got them later than they were expecting, even if they were the first outside of Nintendo.

Remember that Rare were basically Nintendo of America's puppy. I'm wondering if there was some internal politics between NoA and Nintendo of Japan which made the whole thing start to go south? (I have no evidence for that, just some unsubstantiated rumours and speculation.) Perhaps the owners were just getting disaffected with Nintendo and wanted to be sold to get out of that relationship? Nintendo doesn't exactly have a great reputation in the industry for how it deals with 3rd party developers, and if they'd started to treat Rare like any other 3rd party developer I could see how that might have pissed people off.

Like I say, that's all just speculation based on rumour, but it has a ring of truth to it. Just looking at the revenue figures, and the assets that MS would be acquiring, it doesn't really seem like they got screwed on the deal when you compare other company valuations to their revenue streams. Remember that when you buy a company, you get all their assets - maybe Rare has some liquid assets (I'd be surprised if it didn't have a few million in cash and investments squirreled away), which you really need to subtract from the headline figure before you know how much MS really 'paid'.

Re:that doesn't mean they'll produce good games

[geekoid]

but now, people have xbox in there home instead of PS2 or gamecibes. That means future xbox titles will be sold as well. MS can look at the big long term picture reasonably well, today its xbox games, tomorrow its xbox running Office.
Think about it, a nice, quite system sitting in the corner, never a need to open it up, it only costs a couple a hundred box, plug and play into an existing MS network. MS will make a killing, and there cost to produce will drop as they sell more units. If it cost 2 billion dollars to make this happen, it would be well worth it.

Double take

[Akardam]

Am I the only person who read that as "Microsoft Bugs Rare"?

More proof that speed-reading CAN cause heart attacks. Or (insert soft drink of choice) to be spit all over the monitor, at any gate.

Re:Double take

[Tim Macinta]

Am I the only person who read that as "Microsoft Bugs Rare"?

No, Bill Gates would read it the same way.

Now that MS owns Rare..

[leviramsey]

It will be "rare" to have games from them that are "well done"!

If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[cloudscout]

It's an old story. Developers aren't exactly flocking to the XBox platform and most that do develop for the Xbox, also develop for the superior PS2 and GameCube platforms.

It's a last-ditch effort by Microsoft to take control of more game developers in an attempt to slow their continued decline in 3rd place.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Chemical]

What makes PS2 and GameCube "superior"? Because they are not Microsoft? Bear in mind that Sony and Nintendo areevil ruthless/faceless/heartless companies too (Nintendo to a lesser extent).

Fact is, beside the lack of games and the silly controller, the Xbox is a superior system. If you have ever played one you would know. The graphics on the PS2 just can't come anywhere close to the Xbox. The built in hard drive is a brilliant feature. It has an MP3 (or maybe it's WMA) ripper built in, as well as the ability to play your MP3s in certain games. It's got built in networking. People also like to bitch about how you have to buy a remote to watch DVDs on the Xbox. But with the PS2 you have to buy a network adapter to play online, a multitap for 4 player games, and a memory card just to be able to save.

Quit dissing the Xbox. It actually is pretty cool, even if it is from Microsoft.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[NineNine]

Call me nuts, but no matter how great the graphics are, if they don't have any games I want to play, I don't really care.

I'm willing to sacrifice a tiny bit of graphics quality for games with good gameplay, stories, variety, etc.

And as far as having a hard drive, that's a main reason that I didn't buy an X-Box. Your X-Box is gonna die loooong before my PS2. In case you've never owned a computer, the hard drive is *always* the weakest point.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[mosch]

beside the lack of games

Colour me stupid, but I tend to think that a superior game console that doesn't have games is best defined as a paperweight.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Kwil]

Fact is, beside the lack of games and the silly controller, the Xbox is a superior system.

Hmm.. and what, perchance, do the people who purchase console systems use the most?

Here's a hint: graphics != gameplay

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[NeMon'ess]

To all of you replying that the PS2 and GC have better software - YOU AREN'T READING THE PARENT PROPERLY. Cloudscout was clearly talking about the PLATFORM, that means the HARDWARE.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[mao che minh]

I think that the Xbox, for all of it's bells and whistles, just isn't that solid of a system. I have not seen any title on the Xbox that had graphics so compelling to persuade me to declare that the Xbox is the top graphical powerhouse. It is all about how much memory developers can use, how easy it is to program for, and how many special gimmicks you can get out of the system.

For example, the little GameCube has cranked out a few graphically amazing and all out awe inspiring titles with Mario Sunshine, the Resident Evil remake, and Animal Crossing. Resident Evil has the best graphics that I have seen in a new generation game. Mario Sunshine is amazingly complex, big, and fun. Animal Crossing is just fun as hell to play, innovatiuve with it's real time clock and animal people that remember things, and interactive capabilities with the Gameboy Advance.

The majority of game players, myself included, had jumped the gun on the GameCube and declared that it would never have any kind of real potential. We were proved wrong. A lot of people, myself included, origionally touted the Xbox as the premiere system once it hit. Well, it turned out to be not all that great (comparatively) after all.

P.S. we are sick and tired of hearing about Halo. It ain't all that.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Tim Browse]

As some guy from MS pointed out when asked about the HD reliability of the XBox, he reckoned the DVD drives used in current generation consoles (XBox, PS2, GC) were the most likely point of failure. The hard drive was definitely lower down his list of things to worry about.

Shrug.

Tim

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[letxa2000]

Why would I want my game machine to rip MP3 (or WMA), or play my MP3s in certain games? Or use my game machine as a DVD player? It's a game machine, not a PC. I'll listen to MP3s on my stereo or computer, and watch DVDs on (gasp) my DVD player.

The thing is, when you are Microsoft with a monopoly-built legacy operating system, everything looks like a "blank" PC. And if that blank PC doesn't have a hard drive, damn it, we're going to add one so that we can stuff our OS on it. :)

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Fulcrum of Evil]

Colour me stupid, but I tend to think that a superior game console that doesn't have games is best defined as a paperweight.

Nah, Paperweights don't cost $200

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Cryptnotic]

Bear in mind that Sony and Nintendo areevil ruthless/faceless/heartless companies too (Nintendo to a lesser extent).

No. Nintendo is not a lesser evil.

http://www.gamersgraveyard.com/repository/oddities /nintendosuits.html

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Jester99]

Fact is, beside the lack of games...

Case rested.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[spectecjr]

So replacable save cartriges or a network card, I personally find replacable save cartridges more usefull, can you take your saved games to your friends house on a xbox? Not to mention they can't break when you drop them or run them at angles...

You can get memory cards for the XBox too, if you want to take them from house to house. I have one.

I don't doubt PS3 will have a hard drive, but I have a strong suspicion XBOX has a hard drive because they had trouble running W2k without one

Just like Sony appears to have a lot of problems running network games without one. Oh, and it's not W2K.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Cryptnotic]

Sega Saturn was superior to Sony Playstation (two processors, more memory, etc). Sega Dreamcast was superior to PS2 in some ways (it had a more "normal" graphics system and each one came with a modem).

Sometimes, the superior systems don't "win".

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[stubear]

One use of this feature can be found in Project Gotham Racing. I can rip my favorine tunes from my CD collection and build a custom playlist. Instead of listening to the crappy in-game music and mindless radio DJs, I can drive to King's X, Van Halen or whatever I want. I think it was a brilliant feature with a promising future.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[drewmca]

There's a lot of crap out there in the console wars. People treat what they bought as if it's a religious stance. If I drink Coke over Pepsi, I don't treat it as a victory of good over evil; I just like the taste better. I think the 3 systems all have strong points. I don't think any are run by mom and pop shops, so none of them gets a sympathy card for not being a faceless corporation. That said, I have an xbox and I prefer it to the others. Sony pissed me off when the Ps2 first came out and I couldn't get one. I couldn't help but think that part of the shortage was a marketing ploy to drive up demand. Paranoid or not, it led me to buy a dreamcast instead (for $99), which I never regretted. While I'd like to play grand theft auto at some point, that's about the only thing that the PS2 has gamewise that I'd consider buying the system for, and that's not enough. The cross-platform titles all come to xbox, and consistently are better on that platform (check out ign; they do comparisons all the time). The titles I'm interested in, like good first person shooters and sports games, are on xbox. Hate to beat a dead horse but I've never found a console shooter to be as good through and through as halo. Just my opinion, but there it is. I think the hard drive is a great asset. Not having to mess with memory cards sounds like a small thing but once you've used it, you wonder why you'd ever have to handle saving any other way. I used to juggle between 4 cards on my dreamcast and it was a pain in the ass. Listening to your own music while playing games in also fantastic. I start to look down on games that don't offer this feature. A lot of people bash the xbox because they think the console they bought is some sort of religious expression or something, or they hate Microsoft. Well, a console is just a console, and if it does what you want better than others, offers more for you money than others, looks and sounds better than other, and plays more of the games that you want than others, then that's probably a good console for you. It's totally up to the individual of course, so there's no way to objectively say what is the best console. I just wish people would calm down a little and not act like their like or dislike of a console has any real meaning to the rest of the world.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[stubear]

The XBOX controllers allow for to memory cards to be used with it. The XBOX is also quite portable and the drive doesn't generate much heat at all. The benefit of the hrad drive on the XBOX ha syet to be fully realized but so far developers can design games which allow for saving without hoping people have the memory card. I believe an upcoming game for the XBOX, Blinx, is supposed to utilize the hard drive in new and interesting ways but details have not been forthcoming as of yet. Another use of the hrad drive is to allow gamers to rip their CDs to the box and play their tune in games such as Project Gotham Racing and Amped instead of having to listen to the canned tunes shipping with these games. Granted Microsoft got some big names to write or offer songs for these games but I don't care for the genre. I'd rather have Metallica or King's X blaring on the Ferrari's stereo while I'm tearing through downtown New York city. Beyond that, it't up to the developers to come up with more creative uses of the hard drive.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[jandrese]

I know this is a concern of mine. The DVD drive in my PS2 sounds terrible on a variety of games when it seeks back and forth. I figure it will be the first part to die.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Tofuhead]

More like, "systems that succeed have different strengths than systems that fail."

PSX pushes polys far faster than Sega Saturn. Same with PS2 (although textures aren't as good) vs. Dreamcast. 2-D graphics on Sega's consoles far surpass those of Sony's, but nowadays, the trend is 3-D games (to the point that it's more common to find 2-D emulated in 3-D via cel-shading than it is to see a home console game that uses only 2-D graphics).

But most importantly, hype over Sony's offerings in the American market killed both systems here. In Japan, Saturn did very well against the PSX, as would have the Dreamcast against PS2, had Sega not been bleeding money, forcing them out of the hardware business.

In short, PSX and PS2 have the Sony name to thank for their success, as well as Sony's ability to gauge market trends better than Sega. Too bad for me, since both of these Sega systems tie with SNES as my all-time favorite consoles.

< tofuhead >

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Yosho]

I don't know that I would say the Dreamcast didn't "win." No, it didn't earn Sega huge chunks of money, and it didn't smack around the PS2, but I don't know that the PS2 was really its main target; it came out inbetween the game between the PSX/N64/Saturn generation systems and the GC/PS2/Xbox generation.

It also doesn't have the largest library of games, but it does have a number of truly great ones; in fact, games for it are still trickling out in Japan. Thousands of people still play Phantasy Star Online on a daily basis, plus DCs have no type of copy protection that prevents them from running burned CDs (at least, all but the last model of the DC), they're very popular in the indie developer scene. I can play MP3s, VCDs, and DivX files on mine, as well as play SNES and PSX games through emulators; or, if you want, you can put Linux on it and have a low-end server.

So I don't suppose I would say the DC "won" in the sense of winning the console war, but it didn't lose at all. ;-)

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[ZaMoose]

They do if you buy them from the Sharper Image.

Then again, they'll sing songs and ionize your air too while they're at it...

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Yorrike]

Agreed.

What a lot of people don't realise is Microsoft is third in the current generation. Third. Nintendo is pulling away fast and though the GameCube will probably never catch the PS2 in terms of the number of consoles sold, it will do quite well overall.

People tend to disregard Nintendo too. They're not a small company, they're huge. Nintendo have made the most money out of all gaming companies year after year for the last decade. The GameBoy Advance has a monopolistic grip on the handheld market that'd make Microsoft jealous.

So people, when you're talking about the PS2 vs the Xbox, remember there's a tiny purple cube in the middle and it's kicking some pretty serious arse.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[ceejayoz]

Bad controllers RUIN a system

Just about everyone I know who owns an X-box, including myself, likes the controller. It fits in my hands perfectly.

A lack of games == failed system

I've got 7 games. What's your point again?

The GameCube has many titles for both children and adults. They effectively cater to many gaming genres. Xbox cuts most kids out of the market from hardware design up.

The X-box has always been marketed to teens and adults. Porn cuts out the children's market too, but it happens to be pretty successful. Just because X-box doesn't cater to children doesn't make it unsuccessful as a system.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[Pengo]

Hmm... i own both a playstation 2 and a xbox, and I find that most of the titles I am interested are out on both units. Most of the games, when compared against the Ps2 equiv, the xbox really shines. I do like the ps2 controllers better tho, thats one advantage. Stuntman is the only title i can think of that I really would like to find on the xbox, and can't.

oh.. and vice city when that comes out.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[stubear]

My definition of portable is to throw it into one of the bags designed to carry the XBOX and a couple of games and take it with me to the ski chalet or when I visit home on occasion. It's not heavy but then again, I don't think the XBOX controllers are all that bad. I might give the new S controllers a shot but I don't see the need to sink $30 into a new controller at the moment.

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[stubear]

Because my XBOX is using my stereo system so I can get the 5.1 audio some games offer :)

Re:If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

[poot_rootbeer]

Huh? In each of the lawsuits intitiated by Nintendo on that list, Nintendo was simply acting to preserve its own intellectual property rights. I don't see anything here that could classify them as "evil".

(Whether 'intellectual property rights' should exist is another debate entirely, please don't bring it up here.)

Re:Awesome

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, except Nintendo owns the rights to Donkey Kong, Star Fox, and many of the other titles Rare has worked on since they became a second party. Microsoft even had to pay extra money for the rights to Banjo Kazooie and Perfect Dark.

Cyclic links

[Spy Hunter]

Slashdot: "Google News has a nice collection of links to articles regarding the announcement."

Google News: "Microsoft Buys Rare - Slashdot - 11 minutes ago"

Slashdot: "Google News has a nice collection of links to articles regarding the announcement."

Google News: "Microsoft Buys Rare - Slashdot - 11 minutes ago"

Slashdot: "Google News has a nice collection of links to articles regarding the announcement."

Google News: "Microsoft Buys Rare - Slashdot - 11 minutes ago"

Wash, Rinse, Repeat.

Re:Cyclic links

[Salsaman]

Thats OK, eventually you will arrive here!

Forget the Nintendo -- what about the Speccy?

[Jonathan]

Those who have been around the gaming scene for a while may be interested in the fact that the folks behind Rare were also the same people behind Ultimate (Play the Game), a popular game development house in the early to mid 1980's.

I weep...

[pogle]

I weep for the loss of all future Rare products to the XBox.

Re:I weep...

[pogle]

Ever heard of innovation? As in, coming up with something new?

Does anybody else smell desperation?

[second class skygod]

375 megabucks is a lot of cash. MS has had significant problems marketing XBox. It seems to me that they must be really worried about losing a source of games.

Does anyone know how many employees work at Rare? I know it's not distributed evenly but they must be pretty happy about it on the average.
Especially so for those whose stock is already vested.

-scsg

Re:Does anybody else smell desperation?

[madprof]

Consider this - the founders of Rare are thought go to be leaving next year.
It will take roughly 2 years at least before you see any XBox title from Rare. How long has Star Fox Adventures taken to write? (longer than that...)
In that time the Gamecube has already had Star Fox Adventures and Nintendo have strengthened third party relations with the money they got from selling their stake in Rare.
Developers do not stay at a company forever. The Xbox is not as nice to write for as the Gamecube.
Some may leave with their bosses exit and the fact that they have to relearn how to do everything again (having no doubt perfected the art of Gamecube development).
Microsoft end up with Rare not as good as it was.

Money buys quality-but its too late

[Gizzmonic]

People who liked Rare that much have already purchased a Gamecube. And if they do like Rare that much, they probably like Nintendo as well-enough that they aren't going to sell that Gamecube.

Anyway, Rare doesn't have as much of a pedigree as Microsoft probably thinks it does. I'm betting most people associate Perfect Dark, Donkey Kong, etc more with Nintendo than Rare. They are going to have to shout from the makers of perfect dark on any future commercial advertising Xbox titles by Rare if they expect anyone to care, or even notice...

Foolish Purchase

[Rura Penthe]

Not to sound like an MS hater here, but this is an incredibly poor purchase. Rare as a development studio was cut loose by Nintendo because (in addition to making up very little of Nintendo's revenue for 2001 and 2002 prior to Starfox) they missed deadlines and put out subpar games (DK64, Jet Force Gemini, Perfect Dark (if you can't stand the horrid framerate)) for the last several years. To make matters worse, most of the decent devs (including the founders) have left to form their own companies and Rare itself only has two or three marketable licenses (Perfect Dark, Banjo Kazooie, and Conker (maaaaybe)). So MS is paying hundreds of millions for a game developer recently known for its overbudget, late games that aren't very good and doesn't even get any big licenses in the bargain. Why didn't they just sink $10 mil into 20 or 30 dev houses to fund a bunch of big exclusive games? They'd get more results faster and almost assuredly higher quality.

With the delay of Panzer Dragoon Orta to 2003 the Xbox's Christmas lineup is also fairly lackluster and sales this Xmas could be very poor. Of course, if MS keeps pumping marketing dollars into it maybe they can convince America that the console is doing great.

I'm not trying to start a console flamewar (I go where the games are in most cases, and I will probably pick up an Xbox at the next price drop), but with Xbox's sales figures for Japan (the-magicbox.com) showing that in some weeks even the PSOne is outselling it, I wonder if the Japanese game studios will be abandoning what little development they already do on Xbox and concentrating on the two surviving consoles instead.

Re:Foolish Purchase

[BoBaBrain]

My God, you are right! If only Microsoft consulted you before they made the purchace they could have saved hundreds of millions!

Re:Foolish Purchase

[hkmwbz]

But bear in mind that Star Fox and Donkey Kong were developed with cooperation from Nintendo. Shigeru Miyamoto himself oversaw the development of these and other Rare games.

Re:Foolish Purchase

[PotatoHead]

Sorry about the title of my other reply. I did make one like that, but it was a while ago on another thread.

Anonymous losers ignored (in this case)

I got a mail last night from slash with that subject in there. Also could not access my account last night either. Hmmm.....

Bungie, Rare, ... Sega

[jvmatthe]

I think the obvious next move is for Microsoft to buy Sega. Their own developers have some ok sports games, but Sega would buy them some real sports clout along with some younger generation appeal that they could use to balance their library of titles.

Just think, if they could claim exclusive rights to Sega's line of sports games, including NFL, NBA, NHL, baseball, tennis, and college football lines. They could be the premiere sports games for the Xbox Live online service, for example. And a Virtua Fighter would put Xbox squarely in the sights of many fighting game fans, since then DoA, VF, and Soul Calibur would all be available on one system. Add online opponents and tourneys, and they could potentially hand out more hats of money. Then with Sonic and those cute little Super Monkey Balls, they'd have a possible in with children and youngsters that aren't necessarily into the older games. Make all of these exclusives, and the Xbox looks a whole lot better of an investment.

You know they've thought about it, and now we know the stakes: $3.75e8 dollars for someone like Rare that doesn't have the rep or the library of Sega. Sega's gotta be worth what...twice that...in franchises and development talent alone.

While we're talking numbers, how many units of games does Rare have to sell to be worth it to MicroSoft? Or, perhaps more importantly, how many monthly online subscriptions? And how long is it going to take them to pay it off, given that they're going to incur more costs, in terms of development and promotion, just to get a game out the door?

The usual disclaimer: I'm not an Xbox or MS fan. Read my blog and you'll see where my interests lie. I'm just commenting on the situation as I see it...

Re:Bungie, Rare, ... Sega

[CondeZer0]

> I think the obvious next move is for Microsoft to buy Sega.
They already have tried:
http://www.redherring.com/insider/2002/0716/sega07 1602.html

And after that they tried to buy Nintendo for 25Bn(I think to remember 2.5Bn,
but in the news sites I found it says 25Bn!):
http://www.vnunet.com/News/1131308
http://gameinfowire.com/news.asp?nid=263

I don't remember much, I just found this links by looking in google for less
than one minute, I'm sure you can find some better info elsewhere in the net.

My favorite part of this history is the answer of Nintendo: "We weren't sure
what to think when Microsoft made the offer. In fact I was surprised - we
didn't need the money. I thought it was a joke."

hehehe...

I wonder what will they try next, it's obvious that they are desperate for
finding some other business now that the software licensing is going to become
obsolete thanks to opensource, I think they should stick to what(only) they are
good at: mouses ;)

\\Uriel

Re:Bungie, Rare, ... Sega

[stevarooski]

Mod the parent up. This move would make a lot of sense.

In the sports market, EA Sports and EA Big is king. To use football (the biggest sports game market by far) as an example, Madden is outselling NFL 2K3 by an extremely wide margin. Microsofts offerings are not really a blip on the radar (or weren't last I was updated), and GameDay even less so. Likewise for nearly all the other EA sports titles.

However, Sega has a superior football product in a variety of ways, and perhaps overall. Do not think that the people at EA don't know this. They probably play as much 2k3 as Madden. (Yes, I used to work there.) Graphically, its far superior--to illustrate this, look at the crowds on both game side by side--and the gameplay is also better, although this is somewhat subjective. The product is very polished.

However, Madden has a huge advertising campaign going for it. Its being used to demo plays on ABC's Monday night football. Its commercials occupy key timeslots for football fans. There is also the MaddenBowl. Madden online is gathering force. etc, etc, etc.

What Microsoft would bring to Sega is superior advertising dollars. Sega would bring excellent technology and expertise to Microsoft which would greatly bolster their sports line, if not their entire line. This teamup would cause real panic in competitors, and would make a lot of sense for both parties.

However, will it actually happen? Probably not, for a variety of reasons. Still its an interesting thought!

Re:Bungie, Rare, ... Sega

[sehryan]

I doubt it will happen since Sega is currently in bed with Nintendo. There is a reason you are seeing Sonic on the GBA and GC lately.

Speaking of Microsoft buying things...

[goldspider]

...looks like game companies aren't all that Microsoft has been able to buy.

Re:Speaking of Microsoft buying things...

[Phil Wilkins]

They bought Tripod?

rare's best game

[sirinek]

and one they should update for the XBOX.....

R/C Pro-AM!!!! :)

sorry, had to. i looove that game.

siri

Re:rare's best game

[ZaMoose]

Yeah, but I bet you the orange car would still cheat every 4th race or so.

Re:rare's best game

[Explo]

and one they should update for the XBOX..... R/C Pro-AM!!!! :)

IMO Rare's best game was Underwurlde, produced when they were still called Ultimate and produced games for 8-bit computers. ;) Sabre Wulf was not bad either, and I guess Knight Lore was pretty good, but I never saw it. All these games were mentioned on rareware.com, but sadly the information seems to have disappeared since. But you can get all that information on the Ultimate-Wurlde and get either nostalgic, enlightened about history or just plain bored. ;)

Re:rare's best game

[pastie]

Underwulde, Sabre Wulf, Knight Lore, Atic Atac...

The list of original and playable games they _used to_ make is huge. Shame that they haven't done anything so fantastic more recently, or they wouldn't need to be bought by Microsoft to get in the news... :(

Nintendo, Rare come out ahead; MS breaks even

[Tofuhead]

Nintendo sells their shares in Rare and top-off their coffers. They win.

Rare makes off with MS money, the finest money that money can buy. They win too.

MS gets a development house that used to turn out hits, but has floundered in recent years. Tim and Chris Stamper are leaving. That leaves Conker, Perfect Dark, and that's about it. No Donkey Kong or anything else owned by Nintendo.

About the only _real_ downside to Nintendo consumers (IMO) is that any sort of RC Pro-Am sequel will be an xbox exclusive. Boohoo. On a lot of the gamer website forums, this has been a huge non-issue for the past few days, since Rare hasn't been playing with the big boys in terms of game quality/quantity for quite a while.

< tofuhead >

There's one company MS needs to buy...

[NineNine]

If they buy Rockstar, THAT would be impressive. I'd consider an X-Box if they did that. Instead, they're buying Rare, who's hot new game sounds like some really, really horrible, drug-induced nightmare belonging to a 5 year old, combined with every other generic Japanimation-type game ever made.

How appropriate...

[Dan Crash]

Now Microsoft will be able to say what we already knew: "If it's good and it's Microsoft, it's gotta be Rare!"

Please Buy an X-Box!

[chill]

Please! Everyone buy an X-Box for the holidays, just don't buy any games. Hack it into a nice little Linux box.

With MS losing between $100 - $200 per machine, they are counting on people buying lots of games to make their money back.

Take the opportunity to get a nice $199 DNS, e-mail or web server.

Microsoft has money to burn -- give them the opportunity.

Re:Please Buy an X-Box!

[jgalun]

I think we've been over this already in other threads - buying an X-Box to screw over Microsoft is not a good idea. Reasons:

1) The amount of money Microsoft loses per machine is unknown right now, but the number has probably shrunk considerably from initial estimates made a year ago due to economy of scale.
2) Microsoft has a LOT of money in cash. They can afford to lose a few billion if they think it's in their long-term good.
3) In the long-term, Microsoft selling a lot of X-Boxes that nobody buys games for could screw them over...But in the short-term if X-Box hardware sales suddenly spiked, developers would assume that gamers were buying these X-Boxes. That would make more developers make X-Box games, which would make more actual gamers buy the X-Box, which would increase X-Box games sales, which would help Microsoft take over the video game console market long-term.

Re:Please Buy an X-Box!

[Tofuhead]

Brilliant. Let's all bankrupt MS by giving them $200 and inflating the sales figures that they show to developers and investors. That'll learn 'em!

< tofuhead >

Re:Please Buy an X-Box!

[chill]

The big question is WOULD it be in their best interest to sell machines to hackers?

The problem is that MS is positioning the machine for SECURE network connectivity, and the basis of a connected home entertainment system. Do your banking thru the Xbox, shop online, etc.

If it is HACKABLE then their facade of SECURE doesn't hold up. The whole problem revolves around what MS considers the end-use for the Xbox.

Is it just a game machine? Or is it their "beachhead" in the household for "non-computer" network access?

Whether the idea fails or not doesn't matter. Right now, what matters, is what MS THINKS is going to happen.

Re:Please Buy an X-Box!

[chill]

Actually, two days, two threads, and four posts to reach an intelligent response is damn fast for Slashdot. :-)

Hopefully, we can start a trend.

If this is not "anti-competitive", then what is?

[lingqi]

Here goes microsoft with their dirty tactics again... sigh.

not saying that SONY would not, if they had the money to do it -- oh wait, they DO have the money to buy a couple outside developers just for shits and giggles, but didn't.

Same story has happened before, guys... I remember back in the days when M$ literally parked a "hiring booth" in front of Borland and basically said "if you sign up right now, we give you 150% of what you are making and then a huge bonus (6 figures, maybe more)." look what happened to Borland.

As much as the Xbox is a better system (technology-wise) I would not buy it on principle. doing so is to encourage more of the bloodshed in the world caused by M$ that's already way-too-much. to paraphrase it -- Microsoft is the sickle that harvest the souls of computing.

Anyone who don't think you are suffering because of this game developer buy-out thing: remember: Halo was supposed to be released for PC first. and now Halo 2 is about to come out... where is the PC version?

Hmmmm.....Is it.

[Anonymous Coward]

1) Microsoft buys Rare
2) Makes Games
3) Profits.
4) Slashdotters get pissed because the question mark is missing.

Who is "Rare" - what do they make?

[DunbarTheInept]

I'm trying to figure out if this affects any games I'd be interested in. What exactly is "Rare" - or, I mean, what games do they make. What games did they make?

Re:Who is "Rare" - what do they make?

[Ziviyr]

What games did they make?

Blast Corps!

Re:Who is "Rare" - what do they make?

[Explo]

And of course this all was done a long time after their initial start with 8-bit computers, where they had a quite nice success with several hits to top-20 lists and such. Information about their existence as Ultimate is either nostalgic, interesting or the mutterings of near-dead old-as-stars zombies, depending on your viewpoint. ;)

Phew

[Clue4All]

Surely I wasn't the only person who feared that Microsoft had finally acquired the Holy Grail?

Re:There is a reason Nintendo sold off its stake

[mao che minh]

As a side note, you are right, Rare has not been a big money make lately. Just to get Star Fox Adventures off the ground, Nintendo had to:

A. Wait a year or so for the development of some game called "Dinosaur Island" to grind to a halt in Rare development hell.

B. Spend money on the dead project to revive it with research and added development.

C. Bring in some new developers, who tacked on the Star Fox franchise as a good idea. Nintendo later spent time and resources on trying to hide this fact (why, I don't know), which failed and flooded game fan-boy eweb sites everywhere.

D. Pay for the closing development, which took forever and a fair penny.

How did I become privy to such useless info? Because me is pals with the local Nintendo sales agent. :)

You can't Buy the TALENT!!! The talent flees!

[Anonymous Coward]

It amuses me when stupefyinly large purchases are made of software dev houses.

You can't Buy the TALENT!!! The talent flees! Even with golden handcuffs and stock options most flee like hell and create other startups or go contractor.

The companies languish. Halo took eternity to ship. Still is 3 years late for mac system! It was demoed in 1999.

Its hilarious.

The "visionaries" "art directors" "designers" all have locks of stock as do the vps, but the core grunt talent-gods do not... and they flee.

then the companies churn through "Directors of Technology" one per year like clockwork as they flounder.

ALL GOOD GAMES are made by high IQ people with a knack for talent at game coding and these quirky guys are rarely compensxated correctly or despise golden handcuffs and shackles... many of which do not AUTO-VEST if the companies are sold!

The idiotic firms think lack of auto-vesting options will keep their talented prima-donnas.... WRONG!!!!!! They do not do everyting in life for money.

They get the hell out and fast.

Then the companies imploded.

Companies REFUSE to give proper respect and rewards to the most vital talent, primarily from IQ envy, or agism against youth.

Its the "peter principle" incarnate.

I have kissed off millions of dollars a few times in my life. And i dont give a rip. I laugh at the dead companies I once worked for. All dead dead dead!!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA (and their stock worthless to the very end).

Re:You can't Buy the TALENT!!! The talent flees!

[geekoid]

the peter principle states that you will rise to 'one level' above your competence.

It's NEW news....only recently became OFFICIAL

[dolphin558]

I have been submitting stories on this for the past week but they have been based on rumors. Only NOW did MS release the press statement. Slashdot was right not to post stories based on rumors of MS buying Rare.

Sure they're a lesser evil.

[jslag]

No. Nintendo is not a lesser evil.

http://www.gamersgraveyard.com/repository/odditi es /nintendosuits.html


Yes, there are some stupid lawsuits listed there, but I don't see anything comparable to enforced DRM, abuse of monopoly power against software companies, abuse of monopoly power against hardware manufacturers, undocumented routines built into the OS to cripple applications from competitors, etc.

I need new glasses.

[augros]

I thought it read "Microsoft Buys Rare Sofa". Just the thought of Lazy-Boy XP makes me shudder.

Re:I need new glasses.

[NeuroManson]

Except in this case, the XP driven automation malfunctions, crushing you between footrest and chair back, resulting in the good ol' "Blue Face Of Death"...

Re:Sega made (past tense) awesome games

[ZaMoose]

Play some Super Monkey Ball 1/2, Virtua Fighter 4, Sega Soccer Slam, or Sega Sports Tennis, then come back and post that comment again. I dare ya.

There's not much that's more fun (at least when it comes to video games) than getting three friends together and playing Monkey Fight 2 for a couple of hours.

They're not a monopoly for games

[cultobill]

Please, people, stop saying "they're abusing their power of monopoly!" Nintendo and Sony have been kicking the crap out of MS in the console arena. They can play the same marketing games that everyone else does as long as their console isn't most of the console market.

in other news...

[2MuchC0ffeeMan]

nintendo executives have given themselves a $375 million dollar bonus, and nintendo has filed for bankruptcy.

Re:Isn't this what Apple does...?

[Archfeld]

How does M$ using 'monopolistic' tactics preclude or excuse Apple from doing the same ? The enemy of my enemy is NOT my friend by default.

Re:If this is not "anti-competitive", then what is

[spectecjr]

not saying that SONY would not, if they had the money to do it -- oh wait, they DO have the money to buy a couple outside developers just for shits and giggles, but didn't.

What kind of crack are you smoking, exactly?

Nintendo bought Rare, as well as a few other houses.

Sony bought Psygnosis (Wipeout), Square (Final Fantasy; major shareholder), Polyphony Digital (the guys who did Gran Turismo), Incog (Twisted Metal), Verant (Everquest), Red Zone (989 Sports), Naughty Dog (Crash Bandicoot), The Station (Online game center), RTIME Inc. (online game infrastructure company), Millennium (Medievil), Arc Entertainment Inc., Sugar and Rockets Inc. (Kurushi), and Contrail Inc.
(Wild Arms).

So, I guess Sony's customers are suffering because of this game buy out thing?

Or do you still claim that sony DIDN'T do this?

Re:OT: Its effect not affect.

[PotatoHead]

I agree with you for the most part, but I must say that Perfect Dark is a great game. Frame rate could have been quicker, but that was just because they pushed the N64 hard.

I keep an N64 around just for that one to be played in multi-player mode once in a while.

Re:If this is not "anti-competitive", then what is

[junkpunch]

I always find it funny when someone thinks they are so insightful and important, then they get to have their own ignorance thrown back in their face. Naughty Dog, Incog, Red Zone, Psygnosis, etc. How many game developers would you like me to list that Sony has purchased?

Let me guess - it's not "dirty tactics" when they do it, right?

Stupid Business Model, too!

[ackthpt]

"You might be reminded of Microsoft's purchase of Bungie a few years ago."

When Microsoft bought Bungie, it was to buy a "killer app" for the X-Box and nerf it's simultaneous PC development for fear it would show up the X-Box.

Throwing away money to assure exclusivity, same as with their acquisition of rights to FASA's BattleTech video game development (IP value, if nothing else... too bad they don't roll out Ralph Reed's BattleMech!)

Rare on the other hand has a whole one game announced and a legacy of Nintendo titles. Ultimately, it's just another shot fired in the console wars, rather than a loss to PC gaming, this time.

More good money after bad. Seems apparent, to me, that without their monopoly they couldn't shoot fish in a berrel. I can't recall where I've seen this strategy of spending money like crazy on to prop up a dying horse, but I do recall it's unusual in the extreme to see it succeed. They're hemmoraging cash and the estimates (from CNN) are they'll get 1.5 million units into the Europe-Middle East-Africa market, and Sony/Nintendo will cover the remaining sales of 12.7 million units.

IMHO Sony and Nintendo are smarter to leave much game development out of house, in the hands of garage developers everywhere, which fosters more creativity than:

"We bought you for $375 million dollars from some guy who dragged the sacks of cash off to the bank, while laughing his head off, now here's a soda machine, a fax for ordering pizzas, a bunch of former Office coders to help you out, NOW BE GREAT OR YOUR'RE ALL GONNA BE FIRED!"

It's practically a guarranteed failure.

What next? Steve Balmer running around on a stage, getting all sweaty and telling us how great the new X-Box Solitaire is? Actually, that might sell...

Re:There is a reason Nintendo sold off its stake

[90XDoubleSide]

Bungie was at least as notorious for delays as Rare and Blizzard (after people got mad with Marathon games missing dates Bungie stopped even having release dates). The MS solution to this is obvious: they have them ship games before they're completely done. As for the quality of the games, PD had great features but nowhere near the fun factor of Goldeneye. The Banjo games were excellent; PD and Banjo are the big licences Rare is bringing with. JFG was awesome, but didn't sell as well as it deserved. DK64 was crap and sold better than it deserved just because it had a Rare logo on it. Conker was pretty goo, Diddy Kong Racing was also mediocre, and Star Fox looks to be quite good. So I think it was very fair for the N to say that Rare's games as a whole have gone downhill, and it makes even more sense when you consider Rare had not announced sequels to Banjo or JFG. I think the major thing to look at after the merger, besides just how unpolished the games become, is if MS will get them to focus on adult games (i.e. Perfect Dark sequels for the rest of eternety) or if we will se Banjo and JFG sequels.

Re:Sega made (past tense) awesome games

[GMontag451]

Play some Super Monkey Ball 1/2, Virtua Fighter 4, Sega Soccer Slam, or Sega Sports Tennis, then come back and post that comment again. I dare ya.

I'd second his comment specifically *because* of those games. Super Monkey Ball was an interesting concept, but was nearly unplayable due to camera control and the sensitivity of movement. They might have improved it with SMB2 though, I haven't played it. The Virtua Fighter series was just another fighter, with no ingenuity. As for the rest of them, I hate sports games.

A few things to set you all straight

[GweeDo]

First and foremost, we will NEVER see a DK game on the Xbox. DK is owned wholey by Nintendo. The same goes for Star Fox. Nintendo owns these franchises and will never let them go. As for anyother game by Rare, all their recent games have been floops. There games since Goldeneye have been: DK64, Jet Force Gemini, Conker's Bad Fur Day and Perfect Dark. While some will say each of these games where great none of them sold well. Goldeneye eye was Rare's last great title. The fact that their newest game (Star Fox Adventure) took them this long (even starting as an n64 projected called Dinosaur Planet) should only tell people how bad they have gotten. They have had Cube dev kits longer than most any second party that Nintendo has and it took them this long to make a 20 hour game. Have fun with Microsoft Rare, you surely aren't needed by Nintendo and soon the Xbox crowd will get used to your massive delays and lack of strong selling titles.

Re:A few things to set you all straight

[WildBeast]

Perfect Dark sold over a million copies.

Re:A few things to set you all straight

[Da VinMan]

Hey, Diddy Kong ROCKED! Don't make me come over there.

Split ownership

[yerricde]

donkey-kong is trademarked by nintendo

But even though Nintendo owns the trademark on the name and likeness of Donkey Kong, Rare owns the copyright to the 3D model of Donkey Kong used in Mario Kart 64, Super Smash Bros., Super Smash Bros. Melee, and possibly other recent games. (Check the credits.) Now Nintendo will have to license something from Microsoft in order to make Super Smash Bros. 3.

Exclusivity

[Winterblink]

I have two thoughts on this.

1. Now all of a sudden a lot of really good games that may have been produced and released on different platforms are only going to be for the X-Box. I was hoping to see the PS2 doing a sequel to Perfect Dark or Conker's but I guess that won't happen.

2. This is EXACTLY what Microsoft needs for the floundering X-Box. So far the machine has had only a handful of decent games that are exclusive to the machine, and a whole lot being developed for all platforms. If I own a PS2, why should I bother getting an X-Box for a game that is available on my machine? The more imaginative developers jump on to the X-Box bandwagon (or in this case are lassoed and pulled onto the bandwagon) the better it is for the platform.

Whether any of this is a good thing I guess remains to be seen. Considering that nothing spectacular has been heard to be coming from Rare (at least any time soon), maybe this won't make a difference worth mentioning. Anywho, just my 2c. Agree or disagree?

Re:Exclusivity

[Winterblink]

Not sure why you thought a PS2 sequel would ever be in the offing from a company where 49% was owned by the Big N, but hey, hope blooms eternal :) And at any rate, the Rare-Nintendo relationship was going strong for a long time -- after all, if not for Nintendo lending Rare the DK license, who knows where Rare'd be? Sure there was Golden Eye...but that was a long time after DK Country 1,2,3!

Chances are good that any developer would write their games for all platforms nowadays. That's the trend, and regardless of who has majority ownership of it (Nintendo, Sony, whatever) it's in the best interest of everyone that the game can be sold and played on all platforms. Microsoft is different -- they need the exclusive games to build a fanbase, otherwise there's no incentive to buy the machine.

Unfortunately you're not going to get much on the 'imaginative developers' from Rare-as-it-is-now :( I forget which game it was (either Perfect Dark or Goldeneye) but most of the developers left a year or so ago to form a new company. I think I read they were working on a new GC game, something with monkeys (could be WAY off on that though).

Weren't they the guys who formed Insomnia (Insomniac?) Games, and are getting set to release Timesplitters 2 for the PS2? Timesplitters 1 was a simple, yet incredibly fun game to play (especially the multiplayer stuff).

Sure, Perfect Dark, JFG & Conkers...but none of them sold exceptionally well...

I attribute that to the fact that at least two of those games that I know of used the memory upgrade for the N64. Although not required, it was pushed heavily. The N64 was dead at the time anyway, the PS1 had slaughtered it and the PS2 was coming soon.

It'll definitely be interesting to see where they go from here, and whether the new platform gives them the ability to produce good games that will sell. Myself, I'm not a huge fan of the X-Box, but mostly because of the fact that there's no games exclusive to that platform that really make me want to purchase it. Between my windows PC and my PS2, I'm in a pretty happy gaming place right now. :)

Re:Exclusivity

[Obiwan Kenobi]

2. This is EXACTLY what Microsoft needs for the floundering X-Box. [snip] If I own a PS2, why should I bother getting an X-Box for a game that is available on my machine?

This sounds EXACTLY like what Nintendo did in the 80's. Not buy companies per se (this is purely a I-have-enough-money-so-why-not deal), just make deals to where the games a company produced were exclusive to the NES, or forced them to sign proposterous deals that didn't make sense (like produce 5 games for NES, one for Sega Master System). This is how the NES dominated the 80's home video game market, and how the technically superior Sega Master System got crushed. Read all about it in the excellent Game Over, that chronicles this wicked tale of manipulation and greed.

Hmm...manipulation, greed, and Microsoft. It's all so...familiar, isn't it?

Re:Exclusivity

[Winterblink]

Hmm...manipulation, greed, and Microsoft. It's all so...familiar, isn't it?

Capitalism at its worst indeed. But, the goal of a competetive market is to, well, compete. It has to be hard for companies to do that without crushing their competition. Imagine if there was no restrictions to that effect? What kind of monopoly would MS have today? *shudder*

You're very correct regarding the Nintendo thing, I totally forgot about how they rampaged through the 80's. The SMS was a pretty cool system too, had some neat games.

Re:no DK games.

[JohnG]

Not goldeneye, they don't have the Bond license anymore either.

Re:If this is not "anti-competitive", then what is

[tshak]

What, as opposed to Sony paying MILLIONS to ensure that GTA3 would be exclusive to the PS2 (in the console market) until 2004?

Huh?

[autopr0n]

Do you really think Rare came up with donkey kong?

He's been with us since the begining, and is a product of the same mind that came up with mario, zelda, and many of the orgional nintendo characters.

Uhh No.. Nintendo owns ALL DK trademarks.

[Viewsonic]

Anything related to "Donkey Kong", 3D or no, is owned 100% by Nintendo. The only way you will see Donkey Kong on an XBox is if Nintendo allows it. (Not likely)

Rare lately has been making total crap games. It was a waste of $$ for MS to even buy them.

Re:Uhh No.. Nintendo owns ALL DK trademarks.

[dimator]

Wow, thanks for clearing this up, I hope it's true. Given this information, I don't see why MS would buy Rare at all.

My fingers are crossed for a future DK title for the gamecube. My toes are crossed that it will be a side-scroller.

6 words.

[autopr0n]

Jet. Set. Radio. Future. For. Xbox.

I paid $300 for a console I hate just to play that game :P

Actually, GameCube is selling HUGE now.

[Viewsonic]

Stores cant keep them in stock since the release of Mario .. And this is just the first of many games.. Next up is StarFox, and then Metroid, and finally ..oO ZELDA Oo.. - Their sales were never lacking in Europe, and in fact, were always ahead of the XBox there. All around the world the machine that is known as Nintendo is starting to dominate. Sonys weak online push is backfiring with shoddy games like SOCOM (terrible reviews), and the only thing keeping that boat afloat is a few key games such as Kingdom Hearts and GTA3. MS and Sony will be dumping so much money into online services that will just flop. If anyones been watching all these new online games for both systems, they're getting slammed left and right because of realtime chatting with voice its nothing but swearing, the parents dont want it, and the games you cant coordinate without keyboards and typing - The sales for the PS2 keyboard have been dull simply because people have just decided for online games, nothing beats the PC. Nintendo played it smart and saw this a mile away. thumbs up, big thumbs up.

Re:Awesome

[Qrlx]

Microsoft has a monopoly in PC OPERATING SYSTEMS, not game consoles.

What does Sony have a monopoly in? Aside from Betamax??

The whole point is: Microsoft can use their MONOPOLY POWER in the PC market to illegally influence that market. For example, they have so much money that they told a maker of great PC games to never make a PC game again. The company agreed.

Do you understand how that might be "more badder" than the sleaziness of Sony and Nintento?

(Here come the bad analogy...)
It's like if I had a monopoly on oil painting, and dominated the market and was filthy rich from it. Then I decided to port my painting skills into watercolors. Let's say you are a great water color artist. My millions talk you in to giving up water colors so I can try to dominate that segment as well.

The thing is: nobody has a monopoly on consoles (though Sony sems to be winning from where I am, and that is behind a Windows PC) and that's why the competition is so fierce.

Supposedly we little people benefit from this kind of thing. Fierce, cutthroat business tactics are apparently the paradigm on which to base your civlization. Go figure.

Well, you didn't look too hard.

[autopr0n]

Yes, there are some stupid lawsuits listed there, but I don't see anything comparable to enforced DRM,

Nintendo has always called emmulation illegal, and all nintendo systems have had DRM like technology to prevent people from making games without a license

abuse of monopoly power against software companies,

Remember when nintendo had a monopoly. You didn't make games unless you got permission from nintendo

abuse of monopoly power against hardware manufacturers,

Well, no one made the hardware but nintendo.

undocumented routines built into the OS to cripple applications from competitors, etc.

You were either with Nintendo, or your software wouldn't even run.

Re:Better graphics? Excuse me?

[autopr0n]

That was going to be Nintendo AND Sony's venture until Sony STOLE the entire thing behind Nintendo's back.

Don't you mean, until Nintendo told them to fuck off?

The orgional PS was a pretty shitty deal for nintendo anyway, and they did the right thing in rebuffing sony. (Sony would get all the rights to CD game licenses, etc.)

it is win2k

[autopr0n]

a specialy modified version

The Sega Saturn was inferrior.

[Inoshiro]

The PSX had an internal MPEG decoder (allowing higher-quality, fullscreen playback of MPEG files than the SH2-bound softdecoding the Sega Saturn used), a 3D acceleration engine based around triangles instead of quads. Its SH2 CPUs were slower (even if there were two of them, not all games took advantage of SMP), and its overall MIPS level was lover than than of the PSX. It was also very hard to program for, as the SMP locking was beyond most game programmers, or wasn't really as beneficial as Sega had hoped. A shame, because the SMP parts were more expensive to build -- which led to Sega losing money on each unit.

The PSX won because of its games, possible because 3rd party people had an easy-to-use developer kit which provided easy MPEG playback for cut scenes, an easier to write for 3D engine (triangles vs. quads againt, remember the NV1? It failed because it was quad-based), and because it was easier to write UMP games than SMP ones (although Yu had Virtua Fighter running with each processor computing one of the players' characters, this was the exception).

Sometimes, superior systems do win even if people seem to think something else was superior (although the PS2 is another discussion ;)).

You know

[Inoshiro]

You can always stop reading this site, or setup your own site which has to pay for its own bandwidth costs.

I mean, really, if they're wanting to give money away, who are you to question it? That's right, no one, because it's not your site, and you don't have to pay to run it. Thanks, YHL, HAND.

Re:Typical and not good business

[bmajik]

Hrmm.

Lets look at the acquisitions history of a few other companies.

Redhat
Cisco

Cisco is doing alright. They've acquired technology instead of developing it for a few reasonably big items (with more down the road payoffs).

Redhat, well, i have no idea if they're even afloat, but they swapped market cap for warm bodies at a pretty stagering pace.

I dont think theres any evidence that doing strategic acquisitions is a bad thing.

I also think you'll find that Rare cost ms less than 1% of its cash reserves.

A company with no debt, record revenues (in a recession no less), and > 40b in cash cant be struggling all that badly. Or do you know something about economics i dont ?

Re:Foolish Purchase???

[squaretorus]

I don't think MS are that stupid. This is a serious price tag, but a small %age of the cash already sunk into the Xbox, and a tiny %age of the MS fortune.

Remember that it only takes one game around Christmas to make or break a console. Sonic on the Sega was probably the biggest example of this - how many machines are out there in cupboards with JUST Sonic attached??

Rare have produced some amazing games in the past. If they have a pipeline full of concepts, part worked ideas, and part complete games that haven't made it into public knowledge yet maybe MS see another Sonic or two lurking in there...

Sure, a bunch of talent has moved on, and the last couple of years haven't been exactly rock and roll, but these things come in cycles.

Goldeneye has been re-released

[goldcd]

The original team that worked on it left Rare to set up their own company - Free Radical. If anyone were still in doubt about TS2's heritage, it kicks off with you launching an assault on a Russian dam. I might also add that the game is quite fantastic (TS1 didn't really impress me) with an absolutely massive number of multiplayer options and characters. Even better than Goldeneye I promise.

Yeah, it's not easy to use the HD as a cup holder.

[Kjella]

Bad pun I know, but... :)

Kjella

Re:Foolish Purchase???

[rseuhs]

Well, MS has lost 0.75 billion so far on XBox, the 0.35 billion for Rare is not a small percentage of that.

Also this adds up. MS will need over 1 billion PER YEAR just to keep XBox alive.

Re:If this is not "anti-competitive", then what is

[pastie]

..., Square (Final Fantasy; major shareholder), ...

At least in this case, they were buying into the company to help them out of the sticky situation they got themselves into by making a poor and very expensive film, which put Square into dire financial difficulties. Can't blame Sony for that, IMHO :)

Re:So they bought a lemon, eh?

[rseuhs]

More importantly, it will take them 2 years to release anything on XBox which means they come pretty close - too close - to the PS3 launch.

Microsoft's window of opportunity closes when the PS3 will be released. Just like it was impossible to build a competitive x86-console at PS2's launch, it will be impossible at PS3's launch.

Microsoft has 2 choices: Launch a more expensive but less performant XBox2 at the same time or wait 2 years until x86-tech can beat it. - But I'm afraid even the most rabid XBox-defenders will be disappointed when it becomes so clear that x86 is such a crappy gaming platform.

Actually, MS has a 3rd option, not release XBox2 at all and let XBox1 die.

Re:watche don't know...

[Melantha_Bacchae]

An AC wrote:

> that MS also had an itching to get Nintendo
> itself...

They already tried. Back in 1999, Microsoft tried to buy Sega. Then they tried to buy Nintendo. Nintendo politely told them they'd think about it.

In December 1999, an old friend returned to Japan and put his very large foot down on the deal. Seeing his most excellent wisdom, Nintendo sent Microsoft their refusal the very next month.

Who is the old friend that saved Nintendo from the jaws of Microsoft? Well, here is a poster for the game he did (with a certain large bug goddess) for Nintendo's SuperFamicon:

http://www.godzillatoy.com/posters/mothfam.jpg

Shinoda: "The age of Millenium."
Io: "What does that mean?"
Shinoda: "A thousand year kingdom. It wants to create a home for itself. There is one flaw in its plan: Godzilla."
"Godzilla 2000 Millennium", December 1999, (Japanese version)

An operating HD is more fragile than a DVD drive..

[Svartalf]

And the most probable failure point on the other consoles is also present in the X-Box. So, there's two parts that are going to break in the X-Box compared to the one in the competitors' boxes.

It's telling when they pretty much have buy companies (Bungie, now Rare...) to put "exclusive" games on their console.

Re:If this is not "anti-competitive", then what is

[Sludge]

Same story has happened before, guys... I remember back in the days when M$ literally parked a "hiring booth" in front of Borland and basically said "if you sign up right now, we give you 150% of what you are making and then a huge bonus (6 figures, maybe more)." look what happened to Borland.

Any references to back this up?

Heard in the Rare offices...

[hoggoth]

"I'm rich!"
"I quit"
"I quit"
"I quit"
"I quit"
"I quit"
"I quit"
"I quit"

anti-lameness-filterness goes here...

business strategy

[jafac]

I guess if they can't build a better mouse trap, at least they can buy up all the other mousetrap manufacturers out there and make them stamp an MS logo on them.

All during an Anti-Trust trial where they've been found guilty of abusing Monopoly power. Sigh.