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Microsoft buys game developer Rare | |
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| Time: 17:31 EST/22:31 GMT | News Source: News.com | Posted By: Byron Hinson | ||
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Microsoft has acquired British game developer Rare, a Nintendo executive confirmed Friday. Nintendo said in a statement that it has sold its 49 percent interest in Rare--developer of games based on popular Nintendo franchises such as Donkey Kong--but declined to name the buyer or price. But Peter MacDougall, executive vice president at Nintendo of America, confirmed to CNET News.com that the sale was part of Rare's acquisition by Microsoft, which now owns Nintendo's 49 percent stake and Rare's majority share. | ||
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| #1 By 1845 (12.254.162.111) at 9/20/2002 6:04:46 PM |
| Well I guess all the naysayers were wrong. Hmm... |
| #2 By 3 (62.7.18.152) at 9/20/2002 6:20:02 PM |
| I'll hold off on saying excellent news til I play the new Starfox game to see how they did on that, but MS have purchased some good games companies. |
| #3 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 9/20/2002 7:07:07 PM |
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Well, the question is what will they develop... All of Nintendo's franchises will be retained by Nintendo (DK and StarFox); I can't remember some of the other games Rare did, but I believe I recall that they were ports or licensed copyrights/material... Don't get me wrong these are great developers and should be a good source of quality coding for MS games, but this doesn't bring a single franchise, namebrand to Microsoft as far as I can tell...
"Nintendo said it will retain all rights to Rare franchises such as Donkey Kong, Star Fox and Diddy Kong." MS unlike the other game developers need more franchise titles rather than quality employees. Sounds to me like the estimated 400-540 million doesn't get them anything but staff. |
| #4 By 2459 (24.233.39.98) at 9/20/2002 7:07:58 PM |
| I wonder if they were able to get the rights to the non-Nintendo licensed titles they worked on. |
| #5 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 9/20/2002 7:08:29 PM |
| Bob, what naysayers, by the way? I've been reading stories about this being in the works for four months now. It was more or less the case that Nintendo was admitting this a couple of weeks ago. |
| #6 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/20/2002 7:10:22 PM |
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Watching msft go into a new market is better than watching a soap opera. They are just so methodical the way they take the competition apart. And this is in a market where they are NOT leveraging Windows or Office. This is just straight-up competition. I LOVE IT.
Buying rare is a double-blow to nintendo. Nintendo loses their #1 second party developer, and microsoft gains the same. And don't for one second believe the nintendo press release inspired articles that talk about how little rare contributed to nintendo's bottom line. The truth is that Rare is known for long dev cycles that result in high quality games. NOW, nintendo is working the damage control and trying to spin this into a positive. Not gonna work for those with 2 eyes open though. Nintendo said "In other words, we passed on this opportunity for very good business reasons." I don't disagree with this. But to clarify, the "very good business reason" was that they couldn't AFFORD to buy the remaining 51%. Nintendo is smart enough to know the only way they can prolong their life, is to conserve that cash. THE HUNT IS ON! It appears that Rare got tired of nintendo's heavy hand of influence, and Microsoft was able to swoop in and practically steal them out from under nintendo's nose. This is yet another case of Microsoft's competitor tripping over themselves, while they look behind them at Microsoft nipping at their heels. |
| #7 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/20/2002 7:11:41 PM |
| jerk, it gets them the Conkers game and Perfect Dark, and who knows what else. Would it kill you to admit that Microsoft made a hell of a move? |
| #8 By 2459 (24.233.39.98) at 9/20/2002 7:11:55 PM |
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SJ -- Mainly Gamecube owners/Nintendo fans. Though I was surprised that many of them saw this as a good thing. At least the one's on the Rare fansite (can't recall its name) This post was edited by n4cer on Friday, September 20, 2002 at 19:12. |
| #9 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 9/20/2002 7:16:22 PM |
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mooresa, baloney, it was well known over a year ago that Nintendo wanted out of Rare. All they used Rare for was to farm out work that they didn't have capacity for... Now they do.
They haven't even released a Nintendo game in like a year... and I suppose there last one will be out soon. StarFox commercials have been saturating Japan, I hear. "But to clarify, the "very good business reason" was that they couldn't AFFORD to buy the remaining 51%." Rare was exclusively Nintendo so they reaped the benefits 100%; MS is forced to buy the whole 100% and gets zero (I'm thinking so far) of the titles! Sounds like good business. "It appears that Rare got tired of nintendo's heavy hand of influence, and Microsoft was able to swoop in and practically steal them out from under nintendo's nose." Rare decided to work exclusively for Nintendo before Nintendo invested in them--how's that heavy handed? MSFT wouldn't have gotten Rare to develop a single game for them without BUYING them--sounds heavy handed. enforcer, which ones? Golden Eye clearly doesn't belong to them... I'm pretty sure Perfect Dark is also Nintendo material... There may be a couple of others but they certainly aren't THE Rare games... This post was edited by sodajerk on Friday, September 20, 2002 at 20:59. |
| #10 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 9/20/2002 7:20:15 PM |
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I'm confused by what you're saying enforcer in #9. Can you make sense of it? [Edit:] Oh I get it, you're pretending to be Bob even though I don't know why you'd do that. But again, those aren't naysayers--as you yourself say, the people at Rare fansites were in favor of this. So who was saying that MS wouldn't, couldn't buy Rare? As far as I can tell, it's been obvious it would happen for many months, and no one was opposed to it.
mooresa, I'll agree they bought a quality developer, but I don't see a great move here. By all reckoning they paid a heavy premium. Nintendo was pulling out of Rare anyway. And as far as I can tell, all of the rights to the games still belong to Nintendo. Also note that Activision pulled out of buying Rare at what was beleived to be 250-350 million... With an estimated valuation of the company at 200-300 million. And now this is estimating that MS paid 400-540 million. This post was edited by sodajerk on Friday, September 20, 2002 at 20:30. |
| #11 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 9/20/2002 8:45:42 PM |
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Yeah, Famous, check a few of these comments out (there were plenty more, both pro and con) from Rare developers:
"Well, to be honest, you could say I'm pretty bloody put about by the whole damn thing. You know, a few of us knew something was coming for quite a while but still; you learn the ins and outs of a certain system, it's quite technical, and then you suddenly thrust onto a new one, with a half-finished game in your hand. Not my idea of fun, personally." "Well we're not really supposed to talk about it yet - if ever....but the short of it is that there is an extremely gray area. It's not straight forward yet. Nintendo is trying to keep most of the copyrights. In my opinion that's shit, because we made the games. That's not how it works though. Shame for Diddy and those games though. Won't quite be the same, you know?" "I'd probably get in a bit of trouble around here for saying this but I don't really mind. Sure it'll be a pain in the arse to make the switch, but I've been here for 10 years now. Change is always good. Maybe even for RareNet! ha. ha." To what extent are some of these guys (and girls) going to jump ship to continue developing for a system they know, or even go directly to Nintendo to work specifically on the franchises that they love, or the quality of Rare games decline becaue they are put off or are developing for an unknown system. "We'll all find out more on this when Microsoft makes the official announcement, which was scheduled for the 24th of this month in Spain." Actually I would say you have to wait about a year and a half... the typical amount of time it takes for Rare to put a game out. (That's another thing to consider: will MS really be happy with one or two quality games every two years, or are they going to pressure Rare into the MS way?) |
| #12 By 1845 (12.254.162.111) at 9/21/2002 12:26:44 AM |
| Do we know how much Microsoft paid for them? If we don't, how can this unknown amount be too much? |
| #13 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/21/2002 1:26:02 AM |
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jerk - "And as far as I can tell, all of the rights to the games still belong to Nintendo." "I'm pretty sure Perfect Dark is also Nintendo material" Did you read my whole post, I gave two solid games that came with the acquisition. And PERFECT DARK is the big boy. The anticipation of that game has sold a half million gamecubes in Japan. Read Nintendo's statement today. Nintendo mentioned StarFox and DonkeyKong, but not that Perfect Dark was staying, and surely they would if they owned that license. We shall see on that one. And your comments about Nintendo looking to unload them for a year is a typical jerk tactic, to take a shred of truth and elaborate completely. The fact is that RARE itself has been shopping around. Not Nintendo. Rare was sick of the micro-manage style of the Japanese (do a few google searches, and you'll find plenty of references to this). Nintendo DID get heavy handed in that way.
jerk - "Rare decided to work exclusively for Nintendo before Nintendo invested in them" Not exactly true. Rare received investment from Nintendo while only at a demo stage of their first nintendo (original NES) game. Its almost funny to see the MS-haters and the Nintendo-lovers trying to SPIN this into something it isn't. To even pretend that Rare isn't a huge loss, is a laugh. Just read how Rare is described by the press in the company bio... http://games.ign.com/objects/025/025151.html "Rare has perhaps the best quality track record of any development company." JWM - in what way is XBox not stellar. They came into a market as the newbie, and are all but right alongside the 20-year veteran Nintendo. IMO, that is absolutely amazing. A 20 year head start has gotten Nintendo a half million console lead after a year. Whoopie Doo. JWM - Microsoft didn't leverage a monopoly for any of their early server products. No way can you pretend that a monopoly existed as far back as 1997, when SQL Server was grabbing market share a point a quarter. For me to really answer your question though, I need to know when you consider MS to have attained their monopoly. This post was edited by mooresa56 on Saturday, September 21, 2002 at 02:00. |
| #14 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/21/2002 4:28:23 PM |
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Thanks XMLSOAP, I want to reply, but am unable as I used up my limited intellect while tying my shoes this morning. I just thank God for all nurses and volunteers here at the institute. They are so nice to help me get on the computer and respond to @$$^@|* comments.
JWM - so now they have to create wholly seperate products in order to compete fairly? OMG, thats like asking GE to enter a new market and not use their current billing dept, management school, or stationary. Your wishes, are impossible. Would you consider their entry into networking product this week, as a FAIR entry into a market? Does it have to be hardware for it to be FAIR? Would it be FAIR for them to start making hammers? Even if they designed the hammers on a pc? EDIT - hid my cursing a bit. My counselor told me it wasnt fair for me to be so truthful. This post was edited by mooresa56 on Saturday, September 21, 2002 at 16:36. |
| #15 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/21/2002 6:59:44 PM |
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From CNN.com
"Rare, though, will retain rights to the characters it created independently, including the "Perfect Dark," "Conker" and "Banjo-Kazooie" franchises. "Perfect Dark" sold more than 1 million copies (earning more than $55 million), and will likely make its way to the Xbox. Banjo-Kazooie and Conker games are also likely." http://money.cnn.com/2002/09/20/news/deals/rare/index.htm jerk? Edit - added bold to help jerk find the important parts. This post was edited by mooresa56 on Saturday, September 21, 2002 at 19:01. |
| #16 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/22/2002 7:43:22 PM |
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XMLSOAP - "Compeitition is a good thing, not a bad thing"
That is a quote from you, after you insult my intelligence for saying the very same thing. Make up your mind dipshite! |
| #17 By 3653 (65.190.70.73) at 9/22/2002 9:47:26 PM |
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XMLSOAP - I couldn't help but notice you didn't address your obvious change of opinion. Now I'm off to play on the monkeybars. Hope you aren't embarrassed by being brutally beaten in debate by a 9 year old.
Halcyon-X12 - did you read post 25? This post was edited by mooresa56 on Sunday, September 22, 2002 at 21:48. |
| #18 By 3653 (63.162.177.140) at 9/23/2002 10:12:44 AM |
| In case you are still monitoring this macrosslover... YOU ARE RIGHT. |
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