Demands for your console

[Weltall]

I thought the main reason Microsoft picked up Rare was to attract the younger audience, or to give the perception of the Xbox being a "family console". Granted, PD is probably Rare's only franchise that would do best on the Xbox.

It is my personal belief that Rare saved the N64. Rare left a huge footprint on the N64, making the two very synonymous with each other, in my opinion. Also, there were more Rare games that I enjoyed for the N64 than Nintendo games I enjoyed for the 64.

But perhaps it was a good idea for Nintendo to drop Rare in the long run. Meh. I still miss them. :(

Oh, Rare undoubtedly kept the N64 from drowning. But they were, in my opinion, only able to flourish because they had the platform all to themselves. Had Square or Konami or Capcom been large-scale N64 publishers, Rare would have been the second-tier developer that they now are on the XBox. On a platform with faster-paced development, such as XBox, Rare's formulaic, unimaginative games and terribly long development cycles simply do not work. And, strangely enough, it seems like MS doesn't care. I would have thought for sure that MS would invest in Rare, provide them with extra developers or at the very least light matches under their feet to quicken the pace a little, but they have done neither. This leads me to believe MS grabbed Rare for the sole purpose of denying Nintendo.