Rare Replay releases on the Xbox One this week, with it celebrating 30 years of the legendary developer by allowing you to revisit 30 games from their vast library, including favorites such as Banjo-Kazooie, Perfect Dark and Battletoads. As such, now seems like the perfect time to put on our nostalgia caps and take a look back at the very best games the famed UK studio has ever put their names to.
Here are the 10 best Rare games ever, from their humble beginnings on the NES through to their divisive partnership with Microsoft and the Xbox brand:
From GoldenEye to Conker: Top 10 Best Rare Games Ever
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10. Battletoads
The cult status it has achieved thanks to its incredibly challenging level of difficulty would likely lead you to believe that Battletoads deserves to rank at least within Rare's top 5 games, though in actuality the NES side-scrolling beat 'em up is a tad overrated.
Though it was Rare's first game to be considered a classic, when you look beyond its wonderful (for the time) visuals, that perfectly recreated the look of a Saturday morning cartoon, and its varied level design, Battletoads' unforgivable level of difficult made it vastly more frustrating than it was fun. With that being said, it was still a pivotal moment in Rare's history, and despite our reservations regarding the rose-tinted glasses with which people view it, it's still loved by enough people to warrant its position on this list. Also, it had some of the best pause menu music we've ever heard.
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9. Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise
The short-lived Viva Pinata series enjoyed a reasonable amount of popularity but is often overlooked when compared to Rare's other major franchises. Being one of the last Rare releases before the developer was requested to work on Kinect games for Microsoft, Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise was a lovely little game that tasked players with building their own garden, but was immeasurably more enjoyable than that short description makes it sound.
While Trouble in Paradise wasn't exactly a vast departure from the groundwork that had been laid by the original Viva Pinata game, it nonetheless improved upon its solid foundations and proved to be the perfect Sunday afternoon chill-out game, tasking you with little more than catching and nurturing little Pinata creatures, developing your garden and keeping an eye out for nasty enemies and predators.
Oddly, Viva Pinata's strange concept means that it's one of few Rare games that truly hold up today when the nostalgia factor is removed, given that there have been no games that have really improved upon its unique concept since. It may not be remembered as fondly as Rare's other classic games, but Trouble in Paradise is an excellent entry in the developers' illustrious library.
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8. Perfect Dark
With Rare having lost the license to James Bond, they instead sought to create a spiritual successor to GoldenEye 007 with the end result being Perfect Dark. Starring a brand new protagonist in the form of Joanna Dark, the N64 FPS shared many similarities with Rare's 1997 classic and boasted a similarly accomplished multiplayer component, and a single-player campaign that leaned more towards science-fiction than their take on Bond.
The game was successful with consumers and critics alike upon its release, and while it seemed as though it may spawn a franchise and a new popular mascot in the form of Joanna Dark, Rare unfortunately failed to capitalize on it and it only received one thoroughly underwhelming sequel, Perfect Dark Zero, years later during the Xbox 360's launch.
A graphically enhanced Perfect Dark later made its way to the Xbox Arcade complete with online multiplayer, though as is the case with GoldenEye, the game's old-school FPS gameplay had failed to withstand the test of time. That doesn't detract from our first experience with Perfect Dark, though, which remains one of Rare's greatest achievements.
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7. Blast Corps
Rare's most frequently overlooked classic game, Blast Corps was an early Nintendo 64 title that mixed wanton destruction with puzzle elements and wound up essentially residing within its own sub-genre.
Blast Corps tasked players with destroying a selection of structures that were in the path of a nuclear missile carrier, with it essentially being an excuse for the player to cause hundreds of thousands of virtual dollars worth of property damage, complete with over-the-top explosions that would make even Michael Bay blush.
It received a great deal of praise upon release but unfortunately sold below expectations, though it is included in Rare Replay so those who didn't get the chance to play it the first time around can do so now.
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6. Diddy Kong Racing
Mario Kart inspired some pretty woeful go-carting clones, but Rare made a great attempt at excelling Nintendo's racer with their own Diddy Kong Racing, a game which may have lacked the instantly recognizable mascots but certainly made up for it with its gameplay.
Diddy Kong Racing saw players being able to traverse through its levels either by land, sea or air, and while it wasn't exactly original, it did feature enough twists on the established format to make it stand out in its own right, such as its unique single-player mode which played out more like an adventure game, with it also including special boss races.
Diddy Kong Racing added enough to the boiling pot that it wasn't considered a mere Mario Kart clone upon release, and the in-game switching between cars, planes and boats has even since been emulated by Nintendo in Mario Kart 8, and by Sega in Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing Transformed.
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5. Donkey Kong Country
It's a crying shame that Rare won't be allowed to include any of the Donkey Kong Country titles in Rare Replay, what with Nintendo owning the license, as they are a big factor in what catapulted the developer into the stratosphere during Nintendo's prime. Donkey Kong Country was a major selling point for the SNES due to its revolutionary graphics, which adopted a 2.5D visual style that caused all of the characters to pop out from the screen, making it unlike anything else gamers had ever seen before.
Rare's revitalization of the Donkey Kong character helped turn Nintendo's fortunes around as competition from the Genesis heated up, with the game's remarkable graphics mixed with its precise, challenging platforming helping to make it one of the most beloved releases on the classic console, whilst also leading to the creation of a brand new franchise that would spawn two sequels and a 3D spin-off on the N64.
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4. Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest
There was a time when a game receiving a sequel didn't necessarily mean that we'd eventually wind up playing a similar, slightly worse version of the original, as back in the days of the SNES it was something of a common standard for sequels to be better than the original. This was certainly the case with Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest, which despite having an unreasonably confusing title actually managed to better its classic predecessor.
Diddy was always more fun to control than Donkey Kong in the original game, so the sequel did away with Donkey Kong altogether and introduced Dixie Kong, who introduced a new gameplay element by being able to cling to objects in the environment and perform a floating jump using her lengthy ponytail.
Having two lightweight characters to control made Donkey Kong Country 2's gameplay more fast-paced and enjoyable, while its visuals had also received a slight overhaul, making them appear more cartoon-like in design than that of the original game, which appeared to be more computer-generated. As such, Donkey Kong Country 2 surpassed its predecessor and continued Rare's run of excellence in the 16-bit era.
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3. Banjo-Kazooie
Back in the '90s only Rare would have the audacity to compete with Mario in the 3D platforming space on Nintendo's own console, but that's exactly what Banjo-Kazooie did, with the new IP even arguably surpassing the Italian plumber in the process.
Banjo-Kazooie had everything you'd want from a platformer: tremendous level design, a colorful cast of characters, an excellent soundtrack and, of course, hundreds of collectibles that are begging for you to snatch them up. Given the gaming industry's penchant for reviving old franchises, then, it's a wonder that we've yet to see a third proper installment in the Banjo series, with only the underwhelming Nuts & Bolts attempting to quench our thirst for more Rare platforming goodness.
Thankfully, Banjo's developers have left Rare to form a team of their own, and they are now working on the upcoming Yooka-Laylee, a game that will be a spiritual successor to the N64 classic. Hopefully it meets our lofty expectations and, even though we'd love to see Banjo and Kazooie appear in another game of their own someday, it should certainly tide us over in the meantime.
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2. Conker's Bad Fur Day
Conker's Bad Fur Day was released as the N64 was reaching the end of its life cycle, meaning that it wasn't played by nearly as many people as it should've been the first time round. Fortunately, as is the case with quite a few Rare games, it received something of a cult following that led to it receiving an underrated Xbox remake in the form of Conker: Live & Reloaded.
Bad Fur Day introduced the world to Conker, a foul-mouthed squirrel with a penchant for toilet humor, and his platforming adventure was unlike anything else on the N64 thanks to its mature themes and adult humor. Willfully immature and grotesque, Bad Fur Day also featured an often overlooked multiplayer component that featured a variety of game modes, which allowed players to control raptors, blow each other up with tanks or storm a beach in a parody of the 1944 Normandy landings.
Conker ranks alongside Banjo-Kazooie and Battletoads as a franchise that gamers really want Rare to revive, but aside from him being included in Project Spark, we haven't heard much from everybody's favorite alcoholic squirrel in far too long. Hopefully that changes in the near future.
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1. GoldenEye 007
Back in 1997, GoldenEye 007 was THE multiplayer shooter. Inviting your friends around to take part in a split-screen deathmatch was obligatory weekend entertainment, and as such it wound up being perhaps the only movie tie-in game that was better than the actual movie itself.
GoldenEye was a landmark achievement for Rare, paving the way for games such as TimeSplitters and Rare's own Perfect Dark by laying the foundations for new direction for the FPS genre. Though it doesn't hold up well now, GoldenEye was revolutionary for its time and managed to become one of the most heavily played multiplayer games on a console that also boasted the likes of Mario Kart 64 and Super Smash Bros.
GoldenEye 007 was one of the most popular games on the N64, and remains one of the most successful releases for Rare as a company, solidifying its position at the top of this list. Unfortunately it also ruined many a friendship, as anyone who ever had the audacity to pick Oddjob can attest to.
