No more rumors.. the truth about Rare!

The Saturn went belly up in the US shortly after TR2 was released. TRLR was released for DC. Inky deals I\'ve never read aside, TR being released on PC as well falls short of exclusive. If you want to talk about inked exclusive deals try HALO

Then you haven\'t been keeping up.  Most of us here more than likely know this.  TRLR was released April of 2000, after the deal expired.  

And seeing as how the console and PC market don\'t compete, you can still call it an exclusive.

Psygnosis, that was which- a Sega or Nintendo first/second party? Don\'t even mention ND, they had a long standing close relationship with Sony before recently hitching up.

besides, I don\'t remember Psygnosis developing for any other consoles other than PSX at the time.

Nope, they were third party.  Versions of WipEout were released on the Saturn and N64.  

Sony entered the console market and filled a huge void. MS is attempting to force it\'s way in.

There is no other way MS could survive.  Earning developers is just about the dumbest thing I\'ve heard...well, at least in today\'s market.  It\'s all cut throat...nice guys finish last.

Sony didn\'t directly buy up other developers in this exact same way, but they did use their money to make a large impact in the market. Microsoft is doing that as well, just with a more well know developer (probably because they have more money to do this same thing with). I just think of it as the same type of thing on a slightly larger scale.

But hey, I don\'t blame em at all. It\'s not like Nintendo had to sell, and Nintendo had a chance to buy Rare in the past. I just hope this doesn\'t hurt them too badly.

Thank you, shockwaves.

Video consoles and PCs are directly related. No way around it. Want some schooling on how closely they are tied? Look for an xbox thread I started around Nov. if you are really intersted.

Tell that to the rest of the videogame industry.    The day I have to upgrade a pc and buy an controller as an accessory instead of using the keyboard is the day I quit gaming.

if MS buy Square, I\'ll be more than happy to buy the XBox.

SonyFan...

Your name sure is ironic in this thread...

Ginko,

Why are you going on about a deal for TR being exclusive when the Saturn was dead as a doornail either way? Sony didn\'t cut Sega\'s throat, it was suicide. Okay, let\'s say making titles exclusive is the same as buying companies outright. You win. Happy? Past that it seems I might as well pick a language at random, send my posts through babelfish and back, and be as well understood.

Originally posted by Heretic
Ginko,

Why are you going on about a deal for TR being exclusive when the Saturn was dead as a doornail either way? Sony didn\'t cut Sega\'s throat, it was suicide.

Actually, it wasn\'t until a year later or so that the Saturn was declared dead.  I should know...I bought mine and Tomb Raider was my second game.  It wasn\'t until my 5th or 6th that Sega had dropped it.

I\'ll also assume you didn\'t know that Tomb Raider was set for a N64 version...until the contract came up.  

Tomb Raider was a hot property back then that sold consoles.  Sony made sure it was their console.

Okay, let\'s say making titles exclusive is the same as buying companies outright.

I know where you\'re coming from, but I just don\'t see how you can\'t comprehend that MS is doing exactly what Sony did so many years ago.  They are securing games/developers and ultimately a place in the market.

Question.  You just entered the videogame market with a new console...you\'re doing okay, but you could do better with a few key franchises.   OMG, look what just appeared.  A well known developer that\'s going to the highest bidder...and you have a mountain of cash.

What would you do?

Sit back and hope that you\'ve "earned" their respect while the bidders are throwing up 9 figure digits?  

MS made a good move, there\'s no other way to look at it.

SEGA=Stupid Egoistic Gaming  Anarchy

Hee-hee.

It\'s really difficult to imagine the company who starts the 3D revolution in the arcade with Virtua Fighter, Virtua Racing etc opts
for a 2D machine(Saturn) when they can see where the market is going.

SONY didn\'t kill SEGA. If SONY didn\'t exist, Nintendo would have dominate with the N64.

Originally posted by Paul
SEGA=Stupid Egoistic Gaming  Anarchy

Hee-hee.

It\'s really difficult to imagine the company who starts the 3D revolution in the arcade with Virtua Fighter, Virtua Racing etc opts
for a 2D machine(Saturn) when they can see where the market is going.

SONY didn\'t kill SEGA. If SONY didn\'t exist, Nintendo would have dominate with the N64.

Bah, that\'s not where I intended this thread to go.  Heretic questioned the contract of an exlusive TR, I answered.  

As I said, Tomb Raider sold consoles at that time.  Sony made sure it was only on their console. (Read, PC doesn\'t count)

It\'s the same tactic.  Sony was aggressive enough to secure that series, and just recently they secured the GTA series.

MS did an extremely similar move but on a much larger scale and secured every game coming out of Rare.  When oppurtunity knocks, answer. I guess being MS it\'s a hateful and evil answer though:rolleyes:

Heretic, I ain\'t searching through hundreds of threads from over a year ago. How about YOU post quotes or a link to that thread. Since you wrote it, I would assume you know which thread it\'s in or at the very least could still recall the points you brought up if you feel strongly about them.

Consoles and PC\'s are different. Period, aside from the fact that they both use a computing device to process software. There is no industry standard for videogames.. there is no big push to make everything compatable to one system so that buisnesses can communicate and share information quickly and efficently. Consoles are CLOSED boxes.. which means hardware must be updated only through the purchase of a new console. It\'s not like videogame developers have to worry about the lowest common denomenator and develop for people with outdated OS\'s and hardware.

In computers, there are a number of different form factors. Because of it\'s ease of use and push by IBM, buisnesses latched on to the PC market. A tie strenthened because no-one owns the copyright to the PC.. it\'s an open platform for which anyone can make their own PC and market it. That competition drove down prices which companies loved.. however it created a new problem. Since there is no one "PC" copyright owner.. that means anyone can make an OS. However, the OS for one PC must be compatable with the OS for another PC if you want them to communicate and share files. This is absolutely VITAL to buisnesses. IBM\'s OS/2 was fairly popular for awhile, but through ease of use and agressive marketing, MS pulled out ahead of everyone else. Once MS was a leader, everyone who wanted to be compatable had to have a PC running a MS OS. The home PC market was still in it\'s infancy at the time, but eventually MS took over there as well because it allowed office workers to bring their work home.. not to mention it was still the most user-friendly and versitile OS for the common user. It wasn\'t until the mid-early 90\'s that MS secured contracts with most major PC manufacturers to include MS OS\'s in with new computers. This is what started MS\'s monopoly.

Where is that circumstance in consoles? Where is the huge push to make all software compatable to one form factor? Where is the push to make them all compatable with each other? Where are the complicated OS\'s which drive the computer illiterate to seek out the most user friendly software so that they can play their games? The console industry basically starts fresh every 5 years.. the only thing carrying over is exclusive titles under contract and consumer mindshare. Consumer Mindshare - This is what got the PS2 where it is now. Otherwise.. gamers would have chosen the Dreamcast, a console with compairable/better graphics and a ton of games already. Most, were basing the PS2 off of the success of the PSX.. a console that rose to success mainly because of a lack of competition and the same tactics MS is now using.

You don\'t have that lack of competition this time around... but the PS2\'s success is already set because of it\'s huge backlog of software to choose from. The other two.. are growing in userbases at a much slower pace, yet still much stronger than the last generation\'s consoles did. If Ninentdo and MS produce good consoles and keep developer friendly relations, we\'ll see a much - MUCH different scene come time for the next generation consoles.

Originally posted by SonyFan
Heretic, I ain\'t searching through hundreds of threads from over a year ago. How about YOU post quotes or a link to that thread.

The first and only thread started by Heretic

 

Originally posted by SonyFan
Consumer Mindshare - This is what got the PS2 where it is now. Otherwise.. gamers would have chosen the Dreamcast, a console with compairable/better graphics and a ton of games already.

Consumer Mindshare- AKA respect, Sega had none left for their hardware after the Saturn. You guys really need to get this straight, DC was as good as dead at launch because of Sega\'s past, not Sony\'s tampering.

Sony, Sega, BigN ammo = conventional weapons
MS ammo = tactical nukes

Sony snatches a TR bobble from Big N while they\'re fumbling with the 64.

MS pacman bites Rare tattoo off\'a N\'s ass and pays them to limp away
(imo, Nintendo and the Rare brothers may end up walking away with the best end of that deal)

And you still blame them?

It was easy for Sony to just secure a few games and that was the end of the deal.  They didn\'t need to do anymore because the comptetion...well, there was no competition.

Today is an entirely different story.

Who said anything about blame? I blame MS no more than I would blame a bull in a China shop

Heretic, your suspicions for the real reason Microsoft entered the hardware market do hold some merit. I\'ve thought the same thing, although I suspect it has more to do with VRML and MS\'s stranglehold on the internet. The web is going to undergo a massive change from 2D "pages" to full 3D content in the next few years when Broadband becomes much more prolific. Sony was poised to take full advantage of this with the PS2, and it shouldn\'t come as a surprise to many that Sony was one of the pioneers of this technology with their Community Place VRML browser. This is the main reason why the PS2 was broadband only when it was first released, then later modified for 56k users since BB isn\'t nearly at the userbase Sony needs. This also explains why the Xbox is Broadband only despite the fact that it\'s cutting off millions of potential gamers from online play. There\'s already been alotta buzz going around about Xbox\'s own "Revolutionary" VRML programs which will be comming out soon after Xbox Live Launches.

You still didn\'t explain, however, how the Xbox can "save" the PC gaming industry for MS. It\'ll just shift focus to the Xbox if MS is successful.. all the while leaving their OS division with their ass hanging in the wind. Moreover tho.. look at the changes that have been going in to the various MS OS\'s. Gaming isn\'t a big reason for the changes. It\'s mainly networking, better compatibilty with new hardware, bug fixes, security, ect. If anything, why would MS see the PS2 as direct competition to their OS market when Free OS\'s like Linux are becoming more compatable with MS products and vastly more user friendly with each new version... not to mention being free.

Also, no-where in that artical you wrote did you explain how MS\'s dominance over the OS Market could help them gain dominance over the Console market. As I explained, since hardware updates and is vastly changed from generation to generation.. there is no industry standard to follow like there is in the OS market. It\'s not like people are going to be buying the Xbox to have compatibility with old programs. Everyone starts fresh at the beginning of each new generation. Except for as I said, Mindshare.

Even that\'s not too much of a problem tho. In the 8Bit days.. Nintnedo was THE company to go to if you wanted the best games available. However that didn\'t stop the Genesis from raging in taking a large chunck of the gaming market, even beating the SNES by just a hair (debatable) in the 16bit generation. Nor did it stop the PSX from taking over durring the 32 bit days despite their mindshare of ZILCH compaired to Sega & Nintnedo. And of course, the Dreamcast.. which.. as much as some people would like to claim, was actually well on it\'s way to being a success had Sega not needed to drop it due to the financial burden. Granted, it probably would never have been nearly as big as the PS2 is.. but compaired to Xbox and NGC it did fairly well. For a console that followed the 32x, SegaCD, and the Saturn, it\'s sales were shocking. It broke nearly all industry records for a launch at it\'s time.. and sold more units in it\'s first year than the Saturn did in it\'s entire lifespan. In jus two short years, the DC\'s userbase was tallied at around 10 million units worldwide.. 1/3rd of the N64\'s total userbase for it\'s 5 year span. While that\'s not particularly astounding compaired to the PS2 which has sold 30 million units in 2 years.. for a console that followed such failures as it did.. that is a very impressive number. I have no doubt in my mind that the DC could have easily broken 30 million units worldwide by the end of it\'s life had Sega not been in such financial trouble and needed to ditch from the market.

SonyFan the reason I didn\'t explain how the Xbox can "save" the PC gaming industry for MS is because I don\'t believe it can. MS sees the handwriting on the wall, games will no longer be the incentive it was for consumers upgrading their PCs, xbox has been/is a tool for postponing the inevitable. I did give some detail of how but maybe you should ask me about it there. I think you\'ll find the answers to a few other questions you ask here have already been spoken to. Since the thread is still alive, digging into them any more would be better done there.

Originally posted by SonyFan


Everyone starts fresh at the beginning of each new generation. Except for as I said, Mindshare.

...Nor did it stop the PSX from taking over durring the 32 bit days despite their mindshare of ZILCH compaired to Sega & Nintnedo.

Your ignoring the mindshare Sony owned as a giant in the electronics hardware industry and backing up the rep with a solid console that has new games being released eight years later.

Originally posted by SonyFan

And of course, the Dreamcast..

...It broke nearly all industry records for a launch at it\'s time.. and sold more units in it\'s first year than the Saturn did in it\'s entire lifespan. In jus two short years, the DC\'s userbase was tallied at around 10 million units worldwide..

What\'s not being taken into account in the quote above is the explosive mainstream growth in gaming that took place since the release of Saturn.

Originally posted by SonyFan

 1/3rd of the N64\'s total userbase for it\'s 5 year span. While that\'s not particularly astounding compaired to the PS2 which has sold 30 million units in 2 years.. for a console that followed such failures as it did.. that is a very impressive number. I have no doubt in my mind that the DC could have easily broken 30 million units worldwide by the end of it\'s life had Sega not been in such financial trouble and needed to ditch from the market.

Dude, I have a ton of doubt about DC ever reaching 15 mil. A respectable enough base to support if they\'d had the dough but even so, costly when there\'s much more money to be made as a third party.

I think you\'ll find the answers to a few other questions you ask here have already been spoken to. Since the thread is still alive, digging into them any more would be better done there. - Heretic

Since this is the thread where the question was raised, this is the perfect spot to discuss it. The thread in question was never meant to be raised or further the discussion in, only to serve as a point of reference for you. No use having two threads open debating the same thing.

Your ignoring the mindshare Sony owned as a giant in the electronics hardware industry and backing up the rep with a solid console that has new games being released eight years later. - Heretic

CD players and Videogame consoles are two totally different mediums. Sony\'s mindshare going into the 32bit generation was extremely minimal. The PSX\'s sales didn\'t even boom until it\'s second year when they secured enough 3rd parties to bring a ton of exclusive high profile titles to their system.. not to mention a streight assload of sub-par and me-too games.

 

What\'s not being taken into account in the quote above is the explosive mainstream growth in gaming that took place since the release of Saturn. - Heretic

Right, but since those who bought into gaming durring the 32bit generation were raised on Playstation.. not Sega. According to you, Sega had no mindshare going into the 128 bit gen.. or actually.. they had even worse. A bad rep.

Dude, I have a ton of doubt about DC ever reaching 15 mil. A respectable enough base to support if they\'d had the dough but even so, costly when there\'s much more money to be made as a third party.- Heretic

I don\'t. They had nearly that worldwide when the DC was discontinued.. and that was only 2 years. I think they easily could have broken 30 million by the end of it\'s lifecycle, expecially with as competetively priced as it was. The DC was doing better in it\'s day than the Xbox is doing now... even with all of the developers MS has added and having the strongest hardware. I can\'t believe you\'re still worried about them "Taking over". Shyt, I\'m half worried that they\'re gonna drop out and leave only Sony to dominate this generation.

And yet again.. going back to mindshare. MS\'s name is everywhere.. If you own a PC (70% of American households), then you know MS\'s name. Considering the amount of idiots out there too (See: AOL users) most of them are happy and think Windows is great. Yet MS still can\'t do as well as a console that\'s been preceded by nourmerous failures and a history of dropping out of the market?

That\'s pitiful. That wolf at the door looks more like a lamb.. and considering how much harder it is to monopolize the gaming market than it is to monopolize the PC OS market.. I can\'t see them ever being a real "Threat". What "Threat" anyhow.. how is a MS monopoly any worse than a Sony monopoly (which they almost had last gen BTW)? OS market has nothing to do with it..
a monopoly is bad for the market - PERIOD... no matter who holds it. I don\'t see one good reason why you should be discriminating against the Xbox, just because of what Microsoft has done in a totally different field.

[Living-In-Clip]

My two cents: The very fact that some of you have your panties in a bunch because Microsoft may of bought Rare is amusing. Let\'s face it, the only reason anyone is saying anything is because of who it is, it\'s Microsoft so now everyone has to scream about "strong arm tactics" and a MS trying to bully their way into the industry. Give me a break guys, it\'s business as usual and if you\'re just now catching onto the fact that companies buy developers, than you have been living in a cave. Did anyone scream about Nintendo and Retro Studio\'s? Sony and Naughty Dog?  The list goes on and on, but soon as Microsoft buys someone, it becomes headline news and the message boards get  plenty of posts with the anti-MS fear messages. It\'s  sad, in my opinion.

It was a smart move for Microsoft and I tip my hat to \'em. Nintendo was simply stupid for not goin\' ahead and buying them out. And if Sony would of tried to buy Rare and got the deal, I\'m positive a lot of you would be screaming with joy and bragging on how smart of a purchase it was for Sony.

Plain and simple. I\'ve discovered that ninety percent of Anti-MS posts lack any substance and boil down to one thing. People disliking the company for their so called apperance in the PC industry - even though I would imagine a good 60 percent of those people don\'t even know what MS done in the PC industry. It\'s just "hip" to hate MS now\'a\'days.

God, I hate when people make me defend MS....