In a World Where Rare was Never Sold

 

SACRIFICING A COUPLE GAMES TO APPEASE NINTENDO'S GAMECUBE LINE-UP.

 

Rare IP are referenced in Super Smash Bros Melee's Japanese release.

Rare as we know it today is a company with all hands on deck for Sea of Thieves. Prior to their more recent success they were producing hit after hit for the Nintendo 64, after the purchase by Microsoft in 2002, Rare found it hard to get its footing, only a few titles post-buyout were considered successful to a degree. A lot of Rare fans do wonder what would've been different if Rare hadn't been purchased by Microsoft. Well, we know that Activision may have snapped them up instead, as mentioned in the article, Activision Initially Almost Bought Rare by 1UP.com. But what if we change the dynamic, instead of Rare being up for sale, we make it so Rare never needed to put themselves up for purchase?

 

 1998 - 2000

Our timeline starts in 1998. Banjo-Kazooie released to commercial success to the detriment of Conker Twelve Tales. At this point in time, as Chris Seavor said in an interview with Destructoid, either Conker needs to change or the team developing Conker will need to break-up and assist other teams since Rare did not want to saturate the 3D platformer market. In this timeline the team decides to separate and assist with other games leaving Twelve Tales' fate and Conker to internet theorists of the future.

The only game released featuring Conker would be Conker's Pocket Tales, though it maybe cancelled if Conker's Nintendo 64 game is canned. 

One thing that needs to be known is a lot of this is hopeful thinking, Rare has never been good at time management, games by Rare often got delayed months or even years. Banjo-Kazooie was supposed to release November 24th, 1997. Banjo-Tooie was supposed to release in the fourth quarter of 1999. In the current timeline Kameo was delayed from 2002 to 2005 and so fourth. Let's just pretend that in the year 2000, the Stampers cared a little bit more about time management.

After Diddy Kong Racing, the Killer Instinct team worked on Dinosaur Planet, with an original release window of November 2000, people from the Conker team joining in 1998 may have given the game an earlier release window prior to E3 2000, where Nintendo got the idea from Shigeru Miyamoto to marry Starfox and Dinosaur Planet into one game. 

This is where things need to be moved around. In the year 2000, Rare had several Nintendo GameCube development kits prior to August of that year. The Nintendo 64 line-up would be changed, the games releasing that year would be: Perfect Dark, Mickey's Speedway USA and Dinosaur Planet. 

 2001 - 2002

Banjo-Tooie's release would be pushed to November 2001, since Banjo-Tooie had a release date of November 2000, and the team had explicitly received a GameCube development kit, so the project could've been ported over and the graphics redone, with hopefully little to no delay. With more than a year of continued development Banjo-Tooie may have worked out a lot of its game design flaws that the designers, as said by Steve Malpass, had noticed but could not fix prior to the original release.

With Dinosaur Planet finished, there are more employees to work on Kameo or Donkey Kong Racing both of which had an initial release date of 2002. After Banjo-Tooie releases on the Nintendo GameCube, the Stampers could have that team help with Donkey Kong Racing since they're veterans to the Donkey Kong Country games to ensure it makes its release date.

The major issue as explicitly told by Nintendo of America's former executive vice president Peter MacDougall, Rare's track record in 2001 and 2002 were not satisfactory to Nintendo and a huge part of why they were sold. Every game that Rare had planned for the early life of the Nintendo GameCube was delayed into 2002 and beyond. What I am doing to Conker, Dinosaur Planet and Banjo-Tooie would append the timeline and have Nintendo not see Rare as an incompetent partner.

After Kameo is finished, the team might split off once more. Those who worked on Kameo would go on to pre-production for a sequel or assist in other games being released. According to Chris Seavor, Urchin had a prototype in the making for the Nintendo GameCube. It could be entirely possible the group pursues Chris Seavor's game.

The Gameboy team has very few hiccups in our timeline, though each game got delayed because of the buyout allowing the developers to fine tune the games. So in this timeline Hey It's Mr.Pants! and Banjo-Pilot retained their Donkey Kong IP usage and continued to be Donkey Kong Coconut Crackers and Diddy Kong Pilot. Without the extended timeline the games most likely released in a far less refined manner.

 2003 - 2004

In the year 2003, we are starting to see the public appearance of Perfect Dark Zero with a stylized anime-look inspired by Ghost in the Shell. We might see Grabbed by the Ghoulies by the end of the year and maybe a trailer of Urchin: Pig Girl as of E3 2003, since none of the game development was pushed by an oncoming Xbox acquisition. Urchin: Pig Girl if Rare is still partnered but not purchased by Nintendo may have been a self publication or published by a company like THQ similar to Conker's Bad Fur Day, if Nintendo was not influenced by Eternal Darkness' M-Rating. 

When Donkey Kong Racing was finished the groups may split off again, the Banjo-Kazooie team might pursue Grabbed by the Ghoulies as a mid-to-late GameCube release, as we know that Grabbed by the Ghoulies was in production after Banjo-Tooie.

Update 5/21/2024 7:00PM CDT: Arc Angel, a narrative racing game may have seen a release during this time frame if it was co-developed with Urchin: Pig Girl.

Update 4/23/2024 10:30AM CDT: Nintendo was moving away from 2nd party developers and may have purchased Rare if Rare did not go 3rd party.

At this point Rare is assumed to still be a 2nd-Party developer. During it's early production years, 2002 to 2004, Viva Pinata, or it's prototype name "My Garden", was for the Pocket PC, but as its graphic style evolved it moved to Xbox but that too wasn't powerful enough so they pushed it to the Xbox 360, I think in this timeline, Rare may still feel this way. Viva Pinata needed a couple things: high fidelity graphics, and an online connection. It could be easy to say that Rare took advantage of the GameCube broadband adapter similar to Phantasy Star Online, but if we take into account their two needs, it might be possible that Viva Pinata sees a self published PC release. They could also push the project to the Nintendo Wii which is stronger than the GameCube and has the online elements they wanted. 

 2005 - 2006

Going back to Viva Pinata, most of the Banjo-Kazooie team was utilized for this game, if that were the case, we might not see their next game until the Nintendo Wii is published.

After Perfect Dark Zero's release in 2004 or 2005. A sequel called Perfect Dark Core, which would be a sequel to the original game, would be in pre-production for the Nintendo Wii, possibly utilizing the online multiplayer and the Wii motion controls. 

Urchin: Pig Girl was successfully developed, it could possibly push for a sequel called Urchin: Lady Wolf. Urchin: Lady Wolf may have seen a late GameCube release or be a title for the early life of the Nintendo Wii.

Of course, this might start to sound like sequel bait, but we know sequels were planned and Rare ran fairly the same as it always did until the company's restructure in 2009. A lot of game development was pushed years from their original target due to the change from Nintendo GameCube hardware to Microsoft's Xbox. But I digress, Kameo 2 might start to reveal itself, potentially being on the GameCube or Wii.

Kameo 2 was only cancelled two years after the first, if Kameo was successful and Nintendo wanted to invest, it may have seen the light of day.

 2007 - 2008

Several pitches for new games for the Nintendo DS were declined in favor of Diddy Kong Racing DS and Viva Pinata Pocket Paradise. It's entirely possible additional games that were planned such as Banjo-Kazooie Grunty's Revenge 2 and Donkey Kong Country DS made their way to the system.

After Viva Pinata the Banjo-Kazooie team would return to either make a sequel or remake to Banjo-Kazooie or a sequel to Grabbed by the Ghoulies, as hinted by Gregg Mayles. At the time the Banjo-Kazooie team felt that redoing an old game was better spent making a new game. Potentially a sequel to Banjo-Tooie would be produced, what it may have been is unknown, but we do know that Gregg Mayles wanted to try changing the formula somewhat and being on a Nintendo console knew that players may have wanted a 3D platformer.

In 2008, Shigeru Miyamoto wanted to make a new Donkey Kong Country game, since Rare was never sold off, Nintendo may have contacted Rare since they created the original games. It's possible the pre-production could've started around this time.

 2009 - 2010

It's entirely unknown what would happen to Rare after 2008. Urchin's 3rd game: Urchin: Wicked Witch may have been produced completing the Urchin trilogy.

Perfect Dark Core's sequel Perfect Dark Vengeance possibly made it on the Nintendo Wii or Wii U as closure for the Perfect Dark series. 

Rare's Donkey Kong Country 4 possibly comes to the Wii in 2010. 

 

I chose months that are common for Rare, I also chose months that were part of the original release date. This may not be the full timeline of games as Rare may have produced more or different kinds of games while under Nintendo.

I didn't include ports, but in 2008, Nintendo did push for new play controls for Nintendo GameCube games.

Full Timeline

1998

June - Banjo-Kazooie for Nintendo 64.

N/A - Conker Twelve Tales is cancelled. 

1999

June - Conker's Pocket Tales for Nintendo Game Boy Color.

November - Donkey Kong 64 for Nintendo 64.

November - Mickey's Racing Adventure for Nintendo Game Boy Color.

2000

January - Donkey Kong GB: Dinky Kong & Dixie Kong for Nintendo Game Boy Color

January - Dinosaur Planet is released on Nintendo 64.

May - Perfect Dark for Nintendo 64

August - Nintendo Game Boy Color

November - Mickey's Speedway USA for Nintendo 64.

2001

March - Mickey's Speedway USA for Nintendo Game Boy Color.

November - Banjo-Tooie is released on the Nintendo GameCube.

November - Donkey Kong Coconut Crackers for Nintendo Game Boy Advance.

2002

Feburary - Sabrewulf for Nintendo Game Boy Advance. 

March - Diddy Kong Pilot for Nintendo Game Boy Advance.

June - Kameo for the Nintendo GameCube.

September - Banjo-Kazooie: Grunty's Revenge for Nintendo Game Boy Advance. 

November - Donkey Kong Racing for Nintendo GameCube.

2003

March - Urchin: Pig Girl for Nintendo GameCube. 

June - Donkey Kong Country for Nintendo Game Boy Advance.  

September - Arc Angel for Nintendo GameCube.

October- Grabbed by the Ghoulies for Nintendo GameCube.

2004

June - Donkey Kong Country 2 for Nintendo Game Boy Advance.

November - Viva Pinata for PC.

November - Perfect Dark Zero for Nintendo GameCube.

2005

November - Donkey Kong Country 3 for Nintendo Game Boy Advance.

November - Kameo II for Nintendo GameCube.

2006

June - Perfect Dark: Core for Nintendo GameCube or Wii.

August- Viva Pinata for Wii.

November - Donkey Kong Country DS for Nintendo DS.

November - Urchin: Lady Wolf for Nintendo Wii.

2007

February - Diddy Kong Racing DS for Nintendo DS.

2008

September - Viva Pinata Pocket Paradise for Nintendo DS.

Update 4/23/2024 10:30AM CDT: Perfect Dark: Vengence was going to reuse assets from Perfect Dark: Core to speed up the time between releases.

November - Perfect Dark: Vengeance for Nintendo Wii.

2009

June - Banjo-Kazooie Wii for Nintendo Wii. or Grabbed by the Ghoulies II

August - Urchin: Wicked Witch for Nintendo Wii.

November - Donkey Kong Country 4 for Nintendo Wii.

November - Banjo-Kazooie: Grunty's Revenge 2 for Nintendo DS.