Rare (company)

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Rare, also called Rareware, is a company that was a key developer for the Nintendo gaming platforms, but since has been acquired by Microsoft. It was founded in 1985 by Tim and Chris Stamper. Rare was originally started as Ashby Computer Graphics (A.C.G) even if they released their games under the name Ultimate Play The Game.

Company Overview

Rare is the company behind many of the most famous games for Nintendo: Battletoads, Donkey Kong, Killer Instinct, Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, GoldenEye, Perfect Dark, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Diddy Kong Racing, Donkey Kong 64, Jet Force Gemini, and Star Fox Adventures.

It has been a cutting-edge company because its games have always employed some of the latest technology in graphics. Its most renowned success was Donkey Kong Country, due to its use of pre-rendered 3D graphics on a 2D console. Later, Killer Instinct added several features to the fighting game genre such as autodoubles, linkers and ultras.

In September 2002, Rare was acquired by Microsoft in order to develop exclusive games for the Xbox console. The trademarks of the characters from the games that Rare made for Nintendo consoles have been acquired by Nintendo. In early 2004, it was reported that Microsoft is attempting to acquire Rare's characters and trademarks that were made for Nintendo consoles from Nintendo and offered Nintendo $12.2 billion for the characters and trademarks. In February of 2004, it was reported through many gaming news sites and general news sites that negotiations were ongoing between Nintendo and Microsoft for Microsoft to acquire Rare's characters and trademarks from Nintendo. According to various articles, Microsoft has reportedly offered Nintendo approximately $20.2 billion for the trademarks and characters.

List of games

This partial list of games developed by Rare uses the following construct:

gamename (system(s)) - brand

Where gamename is the name of the game it developed, system(s) are the computer systems the game was developed for and brand is the brand the game was released under.

1980s

1983

1984

  • Alien 8 (ZX Spectrum, Amstrad, BBC, MSX) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Entombed (C64) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Cookie (ZX Spectrum) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Knight Lore (ZX Spectrum, Amstrad, BBC, MSX) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Lunar Jetman (ZX Spectrum, BBC) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Sabre Wulf (ZX Spectrum, C64, Amstrad, BBC) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • The Staff of Karnath (C64) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Underwurlde (ZX Spectrum, C64) - Ultimate Play The Game

1985

  • Blackwyche (C64) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Nightshade (ZX Spectrum, C64, Amstrad, BBC, MSX) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Pentagram (ZX Spectrum, MSX) - Ultimate Play The Game

1986

1987

  • Martianoids(ZX Spectrum) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Bubbler (ZX Spectrum, Amstrad) - Ultimate Play The Game
  • Slalom (NES) - Nintendo

1988

1989

1990s

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000s

2000

2001

2002

2003

To Be Released


External links

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