Way back in the day, one of Nintendo's premier studios was Rare. The studio was reponsible for rebooting Donkey Kong from just being an enemy of Mario, to having his own acclaimed platformer Donky Kong Country.
In addiiton to that game, Rare worked on various franchises for the Big N, but for me (and I gather a lot of other people), the studio was quite well known for their work on Killer Instinct. Killer Instinct, for those who didn't know, was a combo-heavy fighter that had amazing visuals back then.
Rare's string of hits and name was forever changed when the studio was bought by Microsoft from Nintendo. Back then, this was considered an odd move by many as to why Nintendo let the whole studio leave.
Well, to cut a long story short, we all know how that turned out and let's just say Rare was a shadow of its former self these days.
So, how come we didn't see Killer Instinct 3 and more importantly, how come the studio focused more on kiddie games than focusing on their forte? As it turns out, most of these decisions can be attributed — or blamed — to Microsoft.
In an interview with NotEnoughShaders, former Rare developer Don Murphy talks about these things a lot more. Now let me just say that after reading his statements, the worst thing Rare could have done was what they did — which was being bought out by Microsoft.
When asked if there was a Rare game he'd like to see an HD remake of on Xbox LIVE, Murphy plainly stated it would be Killer Instinct.
Probably the same game every Rare fan wants to see and that’s KI3 (Killer Instinct 3). We all wanted to make KI3, but Microsoft [was] more interested in broadening their demographic than making another fighting game. So it never got made, I doubt it ever will.
Murphy was then asked how things have changed for Rare across the different console generations.
The big change in Rare came when the company went up for sale, people were unsure of the future of Rare. When they announced Microsoft was buying, a lot of people were unsure if it was a good or bad thing. For one, MS had deep pockets so financial security seemed assured, but on the other hand they were relatively new to the games market, and complete infants in the console market. Personally I don’t think it was a great mix. At first it seemed that they wouldn’t interfere much, but it was soon clear that they were more interested in using Rare to help aim at a younger market. This stifled a lot of creativity, Rare was renowned for their diverse portfolio, so to not be involved in making Mature games was a real blow.
When the Stampers (former founders) left it seemed that Microsoft was losing faith in Rare, it was hard to take when all around were incredibly talented people, with massive amounts of experience. There [were] numerous projects that were put forward that I believe would have been huge hits, but MS rejected them one after the other. I remember seeing a couple of prototypes that Chris Seavor had designed and was working on, that looked amazing, but alas they got shelved. It seemed that MS didn’t want to take the risk in Rare doing anything outside the younger demographic, they quickly forgot the companies heritage. We started to lose a lot of great talent then, people were losing job satisfaction, so they just left.
Sadly, Rare is not the same as it once was. Most of the senior developers have already left and all the studio has now are the franchises themselves and the studio name.
So, it seems like we won't be seeing Killer Instinct 3 or any of other Rare's IP for quite some time, no? Not when Microsoft's keeping the studio busy in making Kinect and Viva Pinata games.
Give the whole interview a read as it's one insightful piece.
As for Don Murphy, he now works at an animation studio in Dublin, Ireland. So he can at least be glad that he didn't continue making Kinect games, no?
Do you still have faith in Rare? Come to think of it, after reading this, do you blame Microsoft for Rare's failings in recent years?
