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Rare Still Leery of Downloadable Content
GamesIndustry.biz reports on comments by Rare lead designer Gregg Mayles, who has gone on record saying that Rare will only do downloadable content if there is a need. The popularity of their Viva Piñata title notwithstanding, the company has no interest in making content if there is no interest. From the article: "'We've got plenty of ideas for what we can do with downloadable content because Piñata is such a unique game ... But the jury is still out.' However, the team does still see the potential of Xbox Live and the push for downloadable content, with Viva Piñata offering interaction between players over the service. 'That vision of sending Piñata to each other was around before Xbox Live even existed. That's why [Viva Piñata] began life on a handheld PDA device because we wanted one machine that could communicate with another,' revealed Mayles."
I find it strange that they DON'T want to do downloadable content for this game. This is one of the few games I'd even want to see it done on.
Hey who knows, this whole networking thing could catch on... NAH, we'll just keep working in isolation and see if everyone else is wrong about it...
There's a reason Nintendo dumped them...
Well, the main reason was that Rare stopped filling the role that Nintendo needed them to fill and Nintendo was moving away from the 'Second Party' model. Rare was needed by Nintendo in order to supply their systems with several high quality games every year in order to keep consumer interest high, which was something they did fairly well up until about 1998 or so; late in the N64 generation many Rare games were taking 24-36 months to complete in an age where a long development cycle was 18 months. When Nintendo passed on buying Rare Perfect Dark Zero had been in development for 12 months, Kameo for 18 and both of those games were only released in 2005 (meaning they were in development for 5+ years).
Rare is still a good developer with lots of talent, the problem is their management structure needs a serious change
>> saying that Rare will only do downloadable content if there is a need.
that is so lame. "we'll jump in the bandwagon only if we see other people are making money first"
historically, its the one taking the risk that gets payed off in the long run. those jumping in later only gets fractions (ok, except for blizzard and WoW)
If we're beginning to see downloadable content its because there's a need for it, it'll only become bigger now.
If you look like your passport photo, you're too ill to travel. - Will Kommen
For years whenever someone has mentioned Rare I've immediately thought of that old "Donkey Kong Country" intro with Cranky Kong listening to his old crank-operated record player.
I guess Cranky still works there.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
...find it odd that Rare is more or less questioning the viability of downloadable content on XBox Live when they are owned by MS? They try to cover their asses a bit by saying the don't know if it's a good model for them, but in the end they are still questioning a business model that their parent company is promoting heavily.
We've got plenty of ideas for what we can do with downloadable content because Piñata is such a unique game...the team does still see the potential of Xbox Live and the push for downloadable content
The only "leering" going on here is Rare into my wallet.
"When Nintendo passed on buying Rare Perfect Dark Zero had been in development for 12 months, Kameo for 18 and both of those games were only released in 2005 (meaning they were in development for 5+ years)."
Neither Kameo no Perfect Dark Zero were that great. I have fond memories of Goldeneye, Diddy Kong Racing and Conkers Bad Fur Day, but the nostalgia may be clouding my judgement. Going back and playing these games now, they're not bad for a quick laugh, but they're not holding the attention the way I remember it. Where they really a great developer at all? Three stand out games and a bunch of other really, really ordinary titles doesn't really scream greatness to me. Especially considering the long development cycle of the games you mentioned, shouldn't the end result have been something truly outstanding?
Neither Kameo no Perfect Dark Zero were that great. I have fond memories of Goldeneye, Diddy Kong Racing and Conkers Bad Fur Day, but the nostalgia may be clouding my judgement. Going back and playing these games now, they're not bad for a quick laugh, but they're not holding the attention the way I remember it. Where they really a great developer at all? Three stand out games and a bunch of other really, really ordinary titles doesn't really scream greatness to me. Especially considering the long development cycle of the games you mentioned, shouldn't the end result have been something truly outstanding?
I can't say that I've had too much hands on time with either Kameo or Perfect Dark Zero but what I would say is that the problem with these games was not lack of skill or shoddy development work but that there were better games that were released before either of these games. With Game Development you're trying to hit a moving target, this target is pretty clear 12 months ahead of time, kind of blury 24 months ahead of time, and very hard to see 36 months ahead of time; I could imagine it would be nearly impossible to predict where games would be 60+ months in the future.
Goldeneye will suck in comparison to modern console FPS mainly because it was the game which spawned the genre on consoles; in the past 10 years they have come a long way. Conkers BFD would probably feel dated but I suspect the gameplay would still be fun, and I never liked DKR because I though Mario Kart was far superior. The game I think would demonstrate how great Rare once was would be Banjo Kazooie. Banjo Kazooie was probably the only platformer of the generation I thought was better that Mario 64, although Mario 64 was more important because it was more revolutionary; I personally don't think many games that have been released since then really exceed the quality of either of these games without moving drastically away from simple platforming.
This is probably one of those, "got caught with our trousers down", moments. Companies that make statements like this have generally been caught off guard. Xbox Live has been enough of a success that not only is Sony developing their own similar service for the PS3, even Nintendo has come to the online downloadable content party with the Wii. As another poster mentioned, Rare's development cycle has simply grown too long to keep up with changes in the market and technology.
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
1) DIY, homebrew. Huge fans of a game or people with way too much time on their hands (depending on your perspective). The problem is there is a danger letting people write code for you machine. This would open systems to hacks or malicious content, so everything would have to be checked out.
2) A viable market for add-ons or episodic content. They will build it if enough people pay for it.
What would really be cool is a mix of the two. They should let people make percentage of sales for submitting add ons. Since the days of making a game in the garage are fading with the Cecille B DeMille budgets we are seeing....this would give kids today a chance to break in and also insure that mods are 'safe' to use. The sad reality here is the cost to make sure they are safe is probably not worth the pennies to be made from the mod-market.
Are you kidding? The Xbox systems easily have more good games than the Nintendo systems. Nintendo has pretty much been supporting their past couple of systems by themselves. Rare is a media darling like Nintendo themselves so their games tend to get overrated in general. I think that would have held true on any platform. But that's starting to change. PDZ recently made a top 10 list of the worst launch games ever over at Joystiq. Maybe you don't play games that often or are simply unfamiliar with console in general, but most of the Xbox fan base doesn't consider PDZ or Kameo a step up from anything.
When was the last time microsoft actually paved the way and met with success? They only seem to succeed with their me-too-but-cheaper products. A headstart means something, buts a hell of a lot easier to watch some one else fall down 10 times and succeed and then copy them then it is to fall down 10 times yourself. I think there's an advantage to doing something first, but not as big as you would think. There's a reason patents exist, otherwise no one would do any research...they'd just wait for the other guy to do it and the copy it.
Something tells me that if they decide to make Killer Instinct next-gen they'll have the interest and demand they seek by an exponent of no less than 10...please Rare please?
The main reason they got bought out by Microsoft is that they were several million pounds in debt.
Three stand out games and a bunch of other really, really ordinary titles doesn't really scream greatness to me.
To me Rare is best summed up as Killer Instinct 2. God I loved that game. I hope they're making a new one for the 360.
you're definatly missing
the donkey kong country series, to me that trilogy
raised the quality of 2D platformers to a new high
and there is also killer instinct
man those were the days
Their problem was they paid $375,000,000 for the talent. The problem was the talent left. Rare got worse because all their decent developers left or were on the way out. It would've been smart to give key people some stakes in the success of Rare. That obviously didn't happen.
Rare's original IP (Conker, Perfect Dark) is in no way worth $375,000,000.
I don't know how much Microsoft paid for Bungie, but I guarantee you it was a better deal than Rare.
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
I did, however, enjoy every game that Rare created for Nintendo. Here's hoping they can beat thier old classics.
This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
The IP. I think all that Rare really has at this time is a whole load of IP. Mikey.S. won't let go of that without a fight... but has the Wii given Nintendo enough pocket money and gumption to make it a done deal?
The Xbox systems easily have more good games than the Nintendo systems.
True only if your idea of a good game is one that revolves around shooting.
Too many syllables per line, mate. It's not a haiku.
And too many lines.
Unfortunate that
you must persist in these bad
non-haiku hotness
Which is ironic, because that was a haiku.
Ha.
This is not the sig you're looking for.
Don't forget, Rare already pushed that bandwagon a year ago - Kameo and Perfect Dark Zero both have quite a bit of downloadable content. A lot of it is themes and gamer pictures, but they also released extra maps, online co-op and new game modes, some of it months after release. Some of it was picked up, a lot of it apparently wasn't.
I don't blame them for not rushing into it this time, especially after the reaction to downloadable content we've been seeing lately.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
.. is the seven pounds Microsoft charge to change your Gamertag. As I discovered when I tried to merge my pre-Live offline profile and my existing Live profile. That's as much as an X-Box Live Arcade game. Pure profit for something that takes their system two seconds to do.