Compilations are not everyone’s cup of tea, especially in this modern-day when we want bigger, better, longer, more graphics pushing games. On the other hand, someone like me can’t get enough of packs like this. I love them because it gives me the opportunity to revel in that nostalgia with games that I grew up alongside. Rare is an interesting beast of a company at the moment, and while this Rare Replay is an excellent collection of thirty games for thirty-dollars, it serves as more a history of the rise and fall of one of the industries most storied developers.
The thirty games goes back to the very early days of Rare, all the way back to systems like the ZX Spectrum, of which probably very few of you reading this from the US have even heard of. In fact, I’m almost positive that American gamers probably won’t know a good majority of the games included in this pack, but that’s not to say they aren’t a lot of fun. In many ways this actually helps the Rare Replay pack out as it’s nice getting games that are altogether new to most.
But let’s face fact here, most of you reading this are really only interested in the Nintendo 64 portion of this pack. Rare was arguably at its best when the studio was aligned with Nintendo, even if they pretty much avoid invoking the name anywhere here in the pack as if it would bring up memories of a lost friend, and while Rare has been working to rebuild since their acquisition by Microsoft they have yet to catch that same magic. That’s not to say there isn’t a great amount of talent at the studio, but the games they are known for just never seemed to mesh with Xbox users and the Halo culture it bred.
Thirty-dollars will nab you all the best Nintendo 64 games that you have either played, or always wanted to. Blast Corps (sooooo gooood), Perfect Dark, Conkers Bad Fur Day, the Banjo series are all here and easily justify the asking price if it were just them, but there are a few notable games left out. Goldeneye is nowhere to be found as well as any of the Rare Donkey Kong series, but this is to be expected due to the licenses to those games not belonging to Rare. Still, many of the other games in the pack that you know and love shouldn’t be looked at through rose-tinted glasses. In fact, age has not been kind to many of these games, and while one can easily forgive a games aging graphics, the gameplay on many titles falls far below expectations.
The early ZX Spectrum games are simplistic at best with keyboard controls mapped to the Xbox One game pad working as best as can be expected. The NES era games on the other hand hold up pretty great, and it’s especially nice to finally being able to beat Battletoads; or is it? You see, the Rare Replay isn’t just a fun name, it also tells of a main feature of the pack; the replay feature. At anytime during play you can easily rewind time. While on the surface this is great, it does take away the challenge that a game like Battletoads offered up. Not only that, but rewinding time really lets you see the design flaws of certain games in the way they intentionally inflated the difficulty.
The Nintendo 64 era is why most of us are here, and you’d think those games would hold up, and they do; more or less. The great thing about packs like The Genesis Collection is that all the games were pretty much from one era, and that era was 2D with D-Pad controls. In the case of the Nintendo 54 section of the Rare Replay you really run into some age problems more so even than with the NES games. You see, we have come a long way from the N64, and while that system innovated by introducing the analog joystick to a controller, in a world of dual joysticks, those early 3D days don’t function all that well. Yes, Conker and Banjo are still great, Perfect Dark is playable, but you will find that most of the times getting the character to do what you want is an exercise in frustration. I had and N64 – still do – and even I can tell you that of all the generations of Nintendo consoles, that one holds up the least in terms on controls.
But these are minor grips that will really only have an impact on any gamers that grew up in the PS2 era and beyond. Those of us that loved these N64 classics will continue to do so, even if we don’t want to admit the issues they have. Where the Rare Replay really falters, in my opinion, is in the addition of Rare’s modern titles from the Xbox and Xbox 360. Grabbed By The Ghoulies was Rare’s first outing on the original Xbox, and while a bit of fun shows that the studio was stuck in a transition phase.
The Xbox 360 side of the pack strangely enough holds up the worst of all, even when comparing it to the ZX Spectrum era of games back in the 1980s. Kameo is a lackluster 360 launch title, Perfect Dark Zero has such terrible design that the game implemented a “go this way” feature, Jetpac Refuelled is a fun arcade diversion, Banjko Kazooie Nuts & Bolts… well, it’s a game. Okay, so it actually holds up well, it’s just not the Banjo game any of us wanted and I still hold a slight grudge about that. Really the only new era property that holds up is Viva Pinata which is arguably the best game in the entire Rare library let alone this pack.
The Rare Replay is a fantastic timeline if you want to see the rise, fall, and hopefully with this pack and new games on the horizon, the new rise of a legendary studio. At $30 you really can’t go wrong with the amount of content you are getting. All the games look as they should with a lot of love put into making them standout with beautifully detailed borders, menus, and nice history on each. Even if you are only looking to play a handful of the titles included, the charm of going back and playing about with some lost treasures is fun.
The Rare Replay is worth your time, but just know going into it that many of those games you loved and played until the early morning hours may not be as mind-blowing as your remember them. And while Rare has been pretty much relegated to making Kinect games that nobody plays, one hopes that the once again get the chance to shine like we all know they can.
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