Originally Posted by
Bladesyphon
People still unironically use Rare as an example of "Microsoft bad, they kill companies"?
Look, I loved Rare as a kid, they made fantastic games, as a kid. But even during their "Golden Era" on the N64, their games were starting to get questionable, we just never realized because were dumb kids. After Banjo-Kazooie, their 3D Platformers began to turn into extremely bloated, buggy games. We all have fond memories of DK64, I'm sure, but in reality the game was a complete mess. Banjo-Tooie, while not a bad game, basically overdid practically everything, bloating the game into a slog to play through. Star Fox Adventurers was rebranded from it's original Dinosaur Planet moniker because of how laughably similar it was to the Star Fox IP, and likely because Nintendo didn't think it was going to garner much attention otherwise. Also Blast Corps. The less said about Blast Corps, the better.
And of course there's Conker. Everyone loved Conker, because it was new, it was unique, it was naughty. Than when the game was remade near 1:1 on the Xbox several years later, people felt it wasn't that great. Why? Because when you take away the juvenile humor, what you're left with is a very bare bones, barely competent 3D platformer. Even when most of the original Rare team left Microsoft and founded Platonic Games to make Yooka-Laylee, the end result was a fairly average, meh game.
Rare was already beginning to collapse in on it's self - there's a reason why Nintendo didn't buy out the company instead of letting Microsft have it. Rare will always have memorable gems from our childhood, like DKC1-3, Banjo-Kazooie, and Goldeneye. But Rare was never an "OH MY GOD AMAZING COMPANY" that was smashed by Microsoft. It was an alright company, with a few good hits, that was already starting to become dated by the time Microsoft purchased them.