Unfinished prototypes of both Perfect Dark and Conker’s Bad Fur Day have been released online.
Rival companies, including Sony and Ubisoft, are being good sports by congratulating Nintendo on Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom's launch.
Well deserved and how AAA is done. 96 meta score...please be inspired other AAA companies lol.
I'm having a blast with this game. I love the fact that you can add different things to your sword and shield
While Sony doesn't have 96+ metascore game other than UC2, they are much more consistent in releasing 90+ metascore games than Nintendo.
Individual studio wise Rockstar beats any other studio though in releasing 95-96+ meta games.
@sadraiden
Metroid Dread was a bit disappointing to me those robot chases got old after the first one. Well made game but the robots were tedious more than fun and it ruined the game for me.
The rest of the game was really good but the robots played such a big part unfortunately.
Dread was fitting name when I saw them I dreaded another stupid robot to take down.
It’s like the weapon breaking in Zelda. Tedious.
Mario’s for my kids and Zelda for me.
I like games like Fire Emblem and Xenoblade.
Hopefully they make a mature RPG someday but Nintendo doesn’t do many new IP especially geared towards adults but I can hope. I want Sony to do the same thing
The 96 is because it has Zelda in the title and made by Nintendo.
I played 20 hours yesterday, and this is no way near 96 for ME. Journalists are to scared to judge games for what they are.
If another AAA game was missing voice acting, had long loading screens, up to 30 fps, non compelling story, annoying controls during puzzles, a unnecessary complicated way to go through your weapons and what to combine etc, that game would've been slaughtered.
Not gonna take anything away for TotK, it's a great game, but journalist are to scared to actually talk about what doesn't make it perfect, even if they give a perfect score.
So far for me, a strong 8, a little bit better than BotW, mainly due to what crazy combinations you can play around with.
You played 20 hours yesterday? That’s impressive for a game to keep you glued to a screen for 20 hours in a day. But don’t forget to take care of your health.
There’s several Zelda titles that had scored much lower. Most of the 2D / top down zelda games says hi. And Skyward Sword.
I agree, have the same feeling.
If games on the other consoles has some of what was present or lack of in TotK, I'm sure it would be marked down. Just the muddy texture in some area/jaggy lines/shimmering would be points deducted.
But some how TotK seems to be immune to these technical issues and lack of extras.
Seems like a two tier scoring system. iI's a great game but if it's technical flawed, so score accordingly.
These kind of action by game journalists (cough), just makes people trust them less. Granted most people fear a raging fan mob!!
"I played 20 hours yesterday, and this is no way near 96 for ME. Journalists are to scared to judge games for what they are."
So it sounds like you establish this is your opinion, then proceed to say journalists are not being honest (i.e., a 96 is not real based on your time with it). By the way, I really don't understand why people make this distinction between scores like 96 and 88. Both are extremely good scores and the point is that they are great games and highly recommended.
"If another AAA game was missing voice acting, had long loading screens, up to 30 fps, non compelling story, annoying controls during puzzles, a unnecessary complicated way to go through your weapons and what to combine etc, that game would've been slaughtered."
Okay....I have strong disagreements here. First, VA is not "missing". That would mean it was fully intended to have it and it launched without it. Second, I find it interesting that anyone would say any other game would be slaughtered for long loading screens, frame rates up to 30fps, or non-compelling story, when you have examples of games with that criteria doing exceptionally well. Metal Gear Solid 4 was excellent, but you literally had to install on a chapter by chapter basis (which, by the way, it is well known reviewers were not allowed to talk about it—no such restrictions for TotK). Demon's Souls actually had long loading times AND frequently ran sub-30fps and barely missed 90+ aggregate score. Then, of course, we cannot disregard Shadow of the Colossus. All phenomenal experiences, but would you be inclined to say they do not deserve their acclaim?
Regarding narrative, I genuinely hate how gamers feel that story is a necessity in modern gaming. Maybe I'm old, but I don't see why that's needed in a game. It can help with making sense of your actions in a game and give a sense of purpose and immersion, but really, that's not a must for game enjoyment. I'd go as far as to say I don't find it necessary in reviews.
Controls and complicated weapon mechanics are fair criticisms. The other stuff I don't agree with.
Play it longer than 20hrs. I get it, you are a busy family man, you don't have 40-60hrs to get "into the zone", but some games just need it. Just like some book series' and tomes of the past. Heck, some albums take 5-6 listen throughs to get the jist of it (especially classic Jazz or Classical music albums). It's just as is.
Zelda TotK is incredible, there's no denying it. Personally, I find the sound design and music the most impressive aspect of the whole thing. Second comes the creativity. Third all of those things the reviews write about it, game systems, story, puzzles and other "game stuff". I like the "art" stuff the most.
And that brought them to 100+ million plus Switch sales. I’m sure Nintendo is crying over having only 100+ million fan.
Of course they aren't. That's why they make the same games with minimal effort because they know you all will buy it with no resistance. They even charge $70 even though it's last gen.
TheEnigma313,
"Of course they aren't. That's why they make the same games with minimal effort because they know you all will buy it with no resistance. They even charge $70 even though it's last gen."
¿Que?
Please explain what you mean by minimal effort. Last I checked, their games run very well. The most recent Pokemon is the only exception to this that I can think of.
What do you mean same games? Same franchises? Some play in a very familiar way and some are even remakes, but it's amazing to see anyone complain about Nintendo making "the same games", yet remakes and sequels dominate the industry where mechanics that work aren't overtly revised. Why should they be if they work? To Nintendo's credit, I would say they do the most to change their games between entries. Splatoon feels largely stagnant, as does Pokemon, however.
Then you've got the bloody argument of Nintendo charging $70 for last gen. I think it's BS for them to charge $70 now—they're basically doing what Activision did with MW2: "because we can and you'll buy it anyway." The problem I have with this argument is that I swear to God it is impossible for haters to decide what generation Switch is. When Switch outpaces PS4/Xbox One, the argument was that Wii U was competing with gen 8 and Switch is gen 9. Now, you argue that Nintendo is charging $70 for a last gen game? Can we get a little consistency from you lot? Pick a lane and stay in it, please.
Plenty of reasons to go after Nintendo. Plenty. This just feels like nonsense.
"same games with minimal effort"
I'm pretty sure they would had ran these franchises into the ground already if that was true, but it's not and that's why their IPs continue to sale.
The same game? Have you honestly played it yet? There is a huge world on the sky and in the underground, along side the normal map from BOTW but with so many changes as well.
And why wouldn’t people pay $70 for a 96% Metacritic game? Or would they rather pay $70 for a “next gen” game like Redfall instead?
How this is a totally new game the IP might be old but realistically it's only the character names that link this game with the 80s and 90s Zelda games.
That's like saying you'd hate to see another Spyro
funny you said that when you talked about sea of thieves and Everwild on your profile. but want to play like you didn't know they've still around . you played yourself
@mjchitown I think you’re the only that played yourself. Lol He obviously knows they’re still around. He just said that because he’s sarcastically calling them irrelevant. Which they’re, compared to what they used to be.
Mjchitown,
Gotta learn a little sarcasm buddy. Read hofs post again a little slower
I own both PS5 and Switch and I am really enjoying BOTW for the moment so I am not ready for Tears of the Kingdom, but I'll get it eventually.
It's a quality game and I wish Nintendo were a cross platform developer and not a hardware specific one. as can you imagine this on series x or Ps5. Just look at the ue5 stuff people have done, hope there next hardware is extraordinary.
Thanks to whoever leaked it 2 weeks ago and the emulator team for patching it up last weekend! 4K 60 frames is how some of us are already been playing it.
Maybe instead of tossing empty threats towards Emulation they should find the person who leaked it right from their own barn.
Oh and I would give it easily a 10/10 Overall from what I have seen, love the customization part!
This game is the sole reason I'm looking at getting a Switch. I played BOTW on Wii U and while it wasn't the best version, it was nice to be able to play it on a console I already owned. But now I finally gotta upgrade
Microsoft has congratulated Sony in the past.
Sony is congratulating Nintendo now.
Has Nintendo congratulated any first party in the past?
I have a ps5 and switch I game on them each, still having fun on my ps4 n ps2 as well I’m definitely getting totk this week I thoroughly enjoyed botw I remember 2 weeks of feeling life weigh on me but in those 2 weeks I was playing botw I swear took my mind off things 🙂
It's been a few years since we last heard from Rare about its new IP Everwild, but executive producer Louise O'Connor says the team is looking to "warm up... for our year ahead.
I feel like its been 10 years since they announced everwild...I wonder if they've figured out what the game will actually be yet lol.
Good to know it's still in development but weird we know nothing about it years from when it was announced.
Hopefully will see it at e3 this yr.
Don't worry, when we all died our grand kids will get to see this game reveal with a teaser trailer.
Vapourware.
Rare, and many other MS developers seem to be coasting on the MS gravy train.
Xbox can't manage its studios to save its life.
Rare definitely coasting on the gravy train. An ex dev said the reason sea of thieves released bare bones was because the whole team spent well over a year just designing a ship.
It's been a decade since the launch of the xbox one and Rare have released one game with the next still years away. I'd love to work there, seems like they have a pretty relaxed work environment
Isn’t this the case with every Microsoft studio? Rare used to be great before Microsoft got a hold of them. Microsoft ruins everything they touch.
With a name like Everwild, one can expect it to be a live service title with grindy quests and a painfully simplistic crafting system.
Kotaku: “It's been 20 years since British developer Rare was acquired by Microsoft. Join us as we have a look at what those 20 years have brought.”
Pretty sad Rare an industry leader at one point, and the best game they've made in 20 years is Viva pinata.
Viva Pinata is actually a really good game, too.
The problem is MS and everyone else thought the best thing to do was make sequels and remakes of existing IP’s, but the studio itself wanted to make new ones. I still maintain if Nuts and Bolts wasnt a Banjo game, it would’ve been a modern classic.
At least Sea of Thieves turned around and became a success.
Totally agree about nuts and bolts. Banjo was never really my thing, but I absolutely loved nuts and bolts
@bathy
Rare became a shell of itself shortly after the acquisition as all those legendary developers left the company for other studios. No freedom no motivation to create greater new thing 🤷🏿
Wait I thought killer instinct was made by rare and they didn’t mentioned it on the article 🤦🏿
It really bugs me that they couldn't even be bothered with making a proper Battletoads revival.
They outsourced some indie company that made basically a mobile phone game out of it. They butchered the artstyle, nerfed the Dark Queen. Gameplay-wise it's okay.. but just okay. This is Battletoads, and deserved better.
That's Rares fault. They're the ones who didn't want to work on their old games and outsource Battle Toads. They're also the ones who actually WANTED to work on Kinect games. They sabotaged themselves.
The game looks horrible I hate the art style. They basically took a bunch of mini games and tried to make into one singular game and it just makes no sense .
Nothing has come of it. Rare is just a husk of a company now. They were better under Nintendo or they could've just gone 3rd party.
A flurry of good but not great games from Xbox to the 360 and then Sea of Thieves which I hold as an all time great game (now, certainly not when it launched). Sea of thieves is the best pirate game out there and some of my favourite gaming memories have been had.
I think a few of their games are underrated such as Banjo N&B and the Viva Pinata games but the core developers from the heady N64 games are all largely gone as far as I know.
"underrated such as Banjo N&B"
Oh no we've entered the time in history where Nuts and Bolts swung back around to underrated. Get me off this timeline.
Looking at this thread it absolutely is underrated and whats more I am almost positive the vast majorities of you all degrading Rare's output have never spent any significant amount of time playing their titles whatsoever.
Okay now you fully lost me. Once you react like that to the vast majority of people you lose any good faith you had in the discussion.
Clearly, based on reception and sales numbers, Rare 2001-and-forward are a shell of their former selves both in quality and the people behind the scenes. You can absolutely enjoy those games from that era, but be realistic and realize why so many people dislike those games and the company as a whole now.
Pre-2001 Rare is one of the greatest companies of all-time, that much is a given. That era is gone and never coming back, and Microsoft mishandled the company severely. Hell, they messed it up from the first day. They thought because they bought Rare they got Donkey Kong. That alone should have told people what was in store going forward.
Right, I was about to say the same thing. Viva Piñata, battle toads, killer instinct, sea of thevis, Kameo, Kinect sports, grabbed by ghoulies have all been good games that released under the MS gaming catalog in those 20 years. One or two of those games from their catalog has been underwhelming, but other than that it hasn’t been that bad a lot of you just don’t like MS so you’ll hold a certain bias toward Rare.
"That era is gone and never coming back, and Microsoft mishandled the company severely. Hell, they messed it up from the first day. They thought because they bought Rare they got Donkey Kong. That alone should have told people what was in store going forward."
Hahahaha that was a classic. I thought everyone forgot about that.
Didn't the actual original RARE leave long ago ? It's never really been RARE since forever ago.
RARE haven't been RARE since N64 imo
Most of the team behind Goldeneye and Perfect Dark formed Freed Radical and debuted with Timesplitters. But I think this happened before MS and they had made some divisive games on Gamecube before this.
Free Radical made Haze, so not sure there's a timeline where all was well.
Most of the key players quit around 2008-2010ish when Phil Spencer became in charge of XBox Europe gaming studios. 2010 he became Director of Games for all their studios, also seems to coincide with the uplift in Kinect development and steering their developers towards Kinect as he took control, and onward into XBox One's generation until the public backlash. Rare did best with Nintendo's guidance.
Actually Kinect 1.0 was a great success at that time. So it was logical for MS to focus a bigger focus on Kinect games.
Currently, Sea of Thief is a good game, with constant new contents.
The state of most Ms 1st party.. rare had a diverse portfolio of games...their other 1st party didn't so they had no idea what to do.
One disappointg banjo game and what feels like a lifetime of shovelware for the Kinect of and can't forget a kids pirate live service game.
Basically 20 years of disappointment.
Sure it might be doing ok now but is it any good being the main question. It feels like just something to pass time playing easily forgotten overall bit like rare 25 years ago thatade timeless games.
Problem is comparing their calabre when they mostly worked for Nintendo vs what they output at ms
It has had high numbers for a long time so for those that play it, they must find it good. I don't play it for clarity.
It absolutely is good and a modern day classic. It has returning players in the millions and a strong twitch presence, so its not like its easily forgotten as you claim.
@Mcardle
I seriously doubt they have millions of players returning. It's #74 on steam with 7622 current players and peaked at 17,328. It isn't doing much better on xbox either, it barely makes the top 50 and is behind Farming Simulator. But credit to Microsoft for not abandoning the game.
Doing well and being a good game are totally different things
Sea of Thieves in it's best shape doesn't even hold a torch to something like Grabbed by the Ghoulies and that wasn't their best reviewed game back long ago
Some must think it's good with the numbers still playing, regardless of what you and I think about it.
It really is. Sadly all the good stuff about it was pre ms nostalgia in a hd bundle
I would love to see that come to PC at some point, I'm still hoping it can happen.
In twenty years we will be asking the same question except we will replace Rare with Activision and Bethesda
Lol suuuure if Starfield and Redfall score great your comment will be vastly outdated.
Donkey Kong Country 1-2-3, Goldeneye 007, Perfect Dark, Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tootie, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Diddy Kong Racing, Donkey Kong 64, ten of the best games in the 90s/early 00s and it was an amazing time to be a Nintendo fan.
Sadly, Microsoft buying them caused a shift and it's never been the same. All the core members left short after that and then all we got was stuff like Grabbed by the Ghoulies, Nuts and Bolts, instead of things we actually wanted like Banjo-Threeie and (before the purchase) Donkey Kong Racing.
If only Nintendo had purchased them instead, who knows what we would have gotten on the GameCube/Wii.
I feel like Rare was Nintendo's Insomniac. They were perfect together and their guidance and push towards perfection made a great relationship. They didn't miss a step.
Truly sad what happened to them 😭 they were such an innovative studio (similar vibes to Insomniac).
Completely destroyed by Microsoft's corporate structure.
Yeah it’s too bad Microsoft learned to late into being in the industry to let developers do what they do and cultivate their culture.
But sea of thieves has been a huge success for Rare so it seems they might be turning it around hopefully we’ll see with their next game.
Problem is, now that they have turned Sea of Thieves around, Rare will be locked into monetising that for the foreseeable future, I'd be surprised if Rare release anything new anytime soon.
Actually Darth, Everwild illustrates my concerns quite well. The game was announced years ago and is rumoured to be in development hell with talk of the game being completely rebooted. I cannot help but think that it seems the studio is unable to fully commit all of its resources to Everwild because it has to continue to focus on Sea of Thieves.
Under Nintendo, Rare was a name I’d buy a game for. It didn’t matter, it was gonna be good. Then MS bought em and it’s never been the same.
Rare had more masterpieces on N64 (one of the worst selling Nintendo consoles), in 3 years than they've had in 20 years at a $2 trillion company... Mental that.
Yeah they really broke loose, free and wild huh? Sad day was when Uncle Tusk was no longer able to answer questions or talk smack on the Rare site. That said everything about their crappy acquisition.
They went from an industry leading studio in the N64 days to just a footnote in gaming history under Microsoft/Xbox.
Since folks on here are reluctant to say it, I will do it for them. The acquisition of RARE studios has been an unmitaged disaster and a failure of epic proportion. The question to be answered is who's responsible? MS or RARE?
Not one great game since they were acquired. Heard the really talented staff/developers left upon aquisition by MS. Nevertheless, I personally thought they should have bought SEGA at the time. They could've had access to all of those SEGA titles that need to be resurrected and updated. Would have also helped their efforts in Japan which has also been a disaster.
Their most successful game to date has come of it.
The problem for me is, SoT isn’t really my thing. So there’s not been much from Rare for me. Goldeneye remaster is the first Rare game I’ve been excited for since they were acquired.
It means that Microsoft actually can't maintain a healthy development studio if they have to manage themselves.
Viva Pinata and Sea of Thieves are awesome, but notably, RARE should have made more notable titles.
Now, 343 Industries destroys HALO. Fable series is gone. Crackdown is awful. No more JRPG from Mystwalker, and Microsoft cancels Scalebound.
Only Forza is incredible so far.
Rare Is never meant for MS, should have gone to Nintendo where it could stay relevant.
Ahh rare please release something good it could be this old stuff and it would demolish your current projects you know unless your working on kameo 2
I still have very good memories of Rare games on the N64.
Then Microsoft turned them into a casual Kinect developer.
here is what we can expect from rare, i mean Microsoft
Really looking forward to seeing what they have for the next Xbox at E3. Really loved everything they've done this generation, Kameo, Perfect Dark, Viva Pinata 1 & 2, Banjo Kazooie Nuts & Bolts and Kinect Sports! The HD remasters of Banjo Kazooie and Perfect Dark on XBLA were awesome as well! Hopefully they push the next Xbox.
People are quick to kill Rare under Microsoft but they made some great games. Viva Pinata is and will always be a great game and even though it was a different take on the series Banjo N&B was also a great game.