January 30th, 2012 by Devin Durock

For those of you who don’t know, Fusion: Genesis is an Xbox LIVE Arcade title developed by a newfound games development company named Starfire Studios. This company happens to be comprised of four ex-Rare employees that worked on many of their ‘golden era’ titles, such as the original Banjo-Kazooie. Though he isn’t part of the development, Steve Burke (Kameo: Elements of Power) composed the music for title.

Essentially, the game is a type of space shooting MMO where players take the reigns of various types of spaceships to complete hundreds of different quests. There are different sides to choose from such as a merchant or mercenary and each side has its own unique quests and unfolds in different ways throughout the campaign.

That’s just a bit of an overview on the title. Personally, I haven’t downloaded it as of yet but I do intend to shortly. It’s interesting how with the mass leavings of Rare’s employees over the years has led them all down different roads, but roads they’ve taken to together. Like one big family I guess you’d say. Starfire Studios is but one example of this. So if you’re interested in seeing how some of those ex-Rare staffers are faring today, then give Fusion: Genesis a whirl and experience it for yourself.

December 25th, 2009 by hylian1

Rare has developed and released hundreds of titles since their incarnation back in the early 1980s. Throughout those years, they have created some of the most memorable characters the industry has to offer. Here you will find, in my opinion, seven of the evilest, most dubious villains that Rare has imagined to date.

7. Eyedol

Killer Instinct was tough. Fighting your way to the top was no easy task and when you finally do get there, you have to deal with a double-headed, club wielding beast from hell known as Eyedol. If by this time you still haven’t mastered the art of the combo, then eternal damnation in the fiery pits below will surely be your newfound residence.

6. Alec Trevlyan

Bungie jumping, train rides, imprisonment, espionage, betrayal. What is still donned by many as the greatest first person shooter of all-time, Goldeneye 007 had it all. While the multiplayer garnered the majority of the praise, the single player was just as brilliant and offered a unique challenge like no other when Bond is betrayed by fellow agent Alec Trevlyan, a.k.a 006. This results in a gun battle thousands of feet in the air with a rushed time to stop the Goldeneye satellite and ultimately Trevlyan himself.

5. Wizpig

“Sorry to break the party worms but I had to say goodbye”. Diddy Kong Racing wasn’t a ride through the park. The silver coin challenges were brutal and the boss battles rough and tough, particularly the main villain, Wizpig, who was a diabolical, giant porky that took over Timber Island and turned the island’s true champion racer, Drumstick, into a frog using his magical powers. One thing he didn’t expect, however, was the help from an unexpected chimp from a distant land and Taj the purple, magic carpet riding elephant genie (yes…I’m serious…). But don’t think that he took over for nothing! Wizpig is, undoubtably, a tough as nails racer himself, and both races against him will put all of your driving skills to the ultimate test…

4. Professor Pester

You’re relaxing in your Garden. Perhaps teaching your newly acquired Bunnycomb a new trick, having a house for your Fizzlybear constructed, maybe just simply planting some tall grass for your Syrupent…then WHAM! A horriic scream fills the Garden, as does some fresh candy, the tasty innards of one of your precious Pinatas. This is the work of none other than Professor Pester, ruler of the Ruffians and all things evil in the world of Viva Pinata. No Pinata is safe when this dastardly fiend intrudes upon your Garden with an iron stick, so you’d best be prepared to protect your Pinatas at all costs! I recommend a dummy Horstachio. Pester may be tough and mean, but he can’t tell the difference between a real Pinata and a fake one. Idiot.

3. Mizar

Jet Force Gemini is Rare’s most challenging game on the Nintendo 64. Rare was relentless in it’s design having the player do the most difficult of tasks in order to progress to the game’s final conclusion. With this being said, it should come as no surprise that the boss battles were the toughest to offer on the system as well…if not the toughest in any Rare developed game in the history of the company! None of the bosses, however, compare to Mizar. He took over nearly every planet in the Galaxy and held hostage the poor Tribal race, which led the Jet Force Gemini team on the excursion to put an end to his diabolical schemes. The forces of good were surely tested, however, as the final showdown with the tyrant was as intense as they come. Victory, though, only led to an unexpected twist, as Mizar’s true identity was revealed…

2. Gruntilda

“It really does seem quite absurd, adventure of a bear and bird”. Indeed, it is. The Banjo-Kazooie series is Rare’s longest running franchise full of magical worlds and creatures that the bear and bird duo must tackle on their way to defeat the ever scheming witch, Gruntilda Winkybunion. She’s kidnapped poor Banjo’s sister in the name of beauty, sucked the life force out of Bottles and King Jingaling for restoration of a skinless body, possessed the contraption of a mechanical robot, and most recently battled in a set of races to earn the deed to Spiral Mountain. Each time, however, Banjo and Kazooie put an end to her ill intentions, leaving her with nothing but future desires on her next attempt to outdo the duo. Perhaps next time she’ll succeed! Or perhaps not…

1. King K. Rool

He’s amphibious, fat, has really sharp teeth and a master of disguise…and loves bananas?! I’m still quite uncertain as to why an alligator would want bananas to begin with, but in the land of Donkey Kong Country, this indeed the case. King K. Rool enjoys nothing more than stealing Donkey Kong’s precious banana hoard and when this absurd act of evil gets him nowhere, he takes it to the next level by actually apenapping, chimpnapping, and monkeynapping (okay…I’ll stop) the Kongs. Each and every time he takes on a new disguies, from being himself, a Kaptain pirate, an estranged scientist and even a professional boxer. Of course, these disguises to do nothing to help his cause, as the Kongs are family and work together to ensure they prevail over the reptilian king.

Be sure and share with us below your opinions and feel free to tell us what your top seven Rare villains would consist of!

March 17th, 2009 by hylian1

To most people, the franchise of Perfect Dark lost its luster in November of 2005. After a successful outing on the Nintendo 64, expectations for the next entry were indeed high and fans of the series and gamers looking into purchasing the Xbox 360 console were anticipating the first ‘killer app shooter’ for the system to deliver an incredible experience like no other. While Perfect Dark Zero manage to sell over one million units, it unfortunately failed to meet expectations and was met with mixed reviews and utter disappointment from those who played the original.

Many do their best to place blame on the team that developed the game. Many people have left Rare over the years, including employees that were responsible for Goldeneye and Perfect Dark’s development. But the issue with Perfect Dark Zero wasn’t the team that developed the game. Sure, neither David Doak or Martin Hollis were on the development team, but there still remained Goldeneye and Perfect Dark veterans, like Duncan Botwood.

What happened with PDZ was the removal of the core fundamentals that made 007 and PD the incredible games they were. The sheer variety in levels and characters to choose from and most everything from PD was seemlessly removed from the title altogether. I understand Rare’s intentions of wanting to create games that are innovative and bring something new to a particular genre, but that needs to be accomplished by simultaneously keeping intact those things that have made a franchise a success. They failed to deliver that in PDZ.

What Rare did get right with PDZ though was the difficulty. There can be no arguement that, again, just as in GE and PD, it was utterly diffficult to complete the game fully on the Perfect Agent setting. Even today it still remains the most challenging title in that regard on the console, imo.

Now, let’s look ahead. There’s no doubt that a new entry in the franchise is probably in development. What could Rare do to please ensure the security of the franchise? Here’s a little list of suggestions…

-A new graphical direction where the characters don’t appear to be barbie dolls plastered in wax

-16-32 players online, allowing more than just two teams per match. For example, if there are 16 players in the lobby, allow an option to set that up as free-for-all or 4 vs. 4 vs. 4 vs. 4 or all teams of two, etc. etc.

-A deep, incredible story with an emotional impact and no cheesy dialogue

-Many more multiplayer levels that are much smaller than PDZ’s. Nothing worse than running around having to find someone to shoot. Action, action, action!

-Massive array of characters to choose from. Every character in PD and GE were playable, why not bring that back?

-Customization. This is what gamers want more than anything this generation. The ability to be capable of customizing things yourself. Include a level builder, customize your own character, build your own weapons by combining weapons together i.e. put the RC-P90′s secondary function of thermal vision on the Super Dragon

Perfect Dark is an incredible franchise with a lot of potential. Please take everything in this post to heart Rare. Playing something new and innovative is great and I do not doubt that you can deliver in that regard. But please… do not forget what made the first a success again. You are considered the true founders of the FPS genre on a console, so prove to your loyal fans and Xbox gamers across the globe that you’re still the best-of-the-best. :)

March 9th, 2009 by Tyrant_Reborn

Rare at one point was one of the greatest developers to create games on the Nintendo game consoles. Rare bled creativity with a solid release lineup with hit after hit, with classics such as Donkey Kong Country, Donkey Kong Country 2 Diddy’s Kong Quest, Donkey Kong Country 3 Dixie’s Double Trouble, Jet Force Gemini, Perfect Dark, GoldenEye, Battletoads, Conker’s Bad Fur Day, Banjo Kazooie, Banjo Tooie, etc…

Rare has also managed to pull in some major accomplishments. To name a few:

Rare reinvented Donkey Kong, they gave one of gaming’s most iconic characters a brand new look with a along with new attitude to skyrocket DK into the worlds most recogized characters with the new look still going strong.

Rare was one of the first developers to bring First Person Shooters to consoles properly. GoldenEye was one of the first First Person Shooters to arrive on the consoles and control extremely well while being one of greatest console muliplayer experiences ever.

Rare continued what it had started with GoldenEye by bringing fans Perfect Dark a few years later, Perfect Dark was one of the first and only titles to carry voice

But the question is what’s happened to Rare recently? The answer is Rare has lost its way, while they still bleed creativity, they seem to have forgotten that a game needs to be fun from the start and built upon that. Most games as of recently look amazing and overall have great idea’s but none seem to have that spark seen in Rare’s N64/SNES classics. The games lack the most important part of games in general, pure unhinged fun. Banjo Kazooie being rereleased on Xbox Live reminded me how much fun the original game was, even today the game is extremely fun to pick up and play. Thinking back there’s not a single Rare game since Conker on the N64 that’s been really memorable. Its not that they were bad games it’s just that all of the titles since then are missing the mainstream appeal, the fun factor is not the pickup and play of the original games, the problem is Rare has gone too far with making games too complicated.

One aspect I absolutely despise recently is that old franchises seem to be coming back, yet they are reinvented alienating the fans that actually want the games and still failing to capture a new fanbase. Rare can definately fix their falts and come back strong it’s just a matter of when they figure out what needs to change and changing it.

July 6th, 2008 by Daniel Duncan

A question that arises quite often is if Rare could ever develop for Sony’s Playstation Portable (PSP) handheld. Microsoft has made it quite clear that developing for handhelds is not considered as competition. They have allowed Rare to develop not only on the Game Boy Advance, but for the Nintendo DS as well. In fact, Microsoft is now utilizing the incredibly massive fanbase of the dual-screened system to fluctuate their own franchises such as Blue Dragon and Viva Pinata. But what about the PSP? Could it join the limelight as well?

It is believed that Microsoft doesn’t want Rare to develop for the PSP because Sony is considered more of a rival than Nintendo, despite the lack of ‘competition’ it would induce. Recently, however, the PSP has hit its stride and has been outselling the DS, especially Japan. Microsoft could really take advantage of this and purchase some PSP development kits for their first party studios. I personally think that titles like Kameo and Perfect Dark would work extensively well on the system. To have a good title in the universe of both of those franchises, you would need a decent amount of horsepower, and the PSP certainly packs more than the DS ever will.

The most important question of all though is this: would Rare’s fans invest in the Playstion Portable to purchase their games? The majority of the Rare fanbase is either with Nintendo or with Microsoft or both (the better choice, obviously). Sony has never had the privilege of having a Rare title on any system of their’s, so releasing a Rare game on the PSP would be quite the gamble.

Despite not liking Sony much myself, as a dedicated Rare fan I have to say that I would most definately invest in the handheld. I can’t help it, I’m just a Rare fanatic! What about you? If Rare were to announce tomorrow that a title such as Perfect Dark, Kameo, or heck, even Banjo was going to release on the PSP, would you flock to your nearest retailer to make a purchase?