Microsoft Game Studios

[NeoZeedeater]

Thanks to the Xbox, Microsoft has become an important part of the console gaming scene today. This is a thread devoted to the history of three of the developers currently owned by Microsoft.

Developer - Bungie
Upcoming games - Halo 2(Xbox)

Alex Seropian founded Bungie in 1991 and made a tank action game for the Mac called Operation Desert Storm. Soon afterwards, programmer Jason Jones joined the team and created Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete, a multiplayer action/adventure game for the Mac. http://www.macinstruct.com/reviews/bungie/minotaur.gif

Bungie reached critical success with their 1993 Mac game, Pathways into Darkness and proved that the PC wasn't the only format for the increasingly popular FPS genre.


Their next FPS proved to be one of the most pivotal in Mac history. 1994's Marathon was an engaging and technologically impressive sci-fi action game. It had a few sequels and was also released on PC.


Bungie published Crack Dot Com's 2d PC action game Abuse in 1996.

In 1997, Bungie took a crack at the RTS genre with Myth: The Fallen Lords for PC and Mac. It had an expansion set and a sequel.


Oni became the last non-Microsoft game for Bungie. It was an anime-inspired third-person action game for PC, PS2, and Mac. I wasn't too impressed with it but it temporarily filled a void in the PS2's early months.


Like Marathon did for the Mac, the sci-fi FPS Halo was exactly what Microsoft needed for their Xbox. It's easily my favorite Bungie game and the best console FPS out there.



Developer - Access Software
Upcoming games - Links 2004(Xbox, PC)

Founded by Bruce Carver in 1982, Access has made some impressive contributions to computer sports, adventure, and action games.

Released in 1983, Beach Head was a war-themed action game that used a variety of perspectives. My favorite was the first-person battleship level where you shot down airplanes.


Beach Head had a couple sequels. Access didn't develop the recent arcade/PC games of the same name.

Neutral Zone(1983)


Surpassing Beach Head was another war-themed game, Raid Over Moscow in 1984. This game also was quite varied; it had side-scrolling shooter levels and on foot battles near the Kremlin.


Access published Fanda's C64 platform games Ollie's Follies and The Scrolls of Abadon in 1984.

In 1986, Access released their first computer golf game, World Class Leaderboard. I'm not big on golf games but this is the one I have played the most by far. The graphics of the terrain and every little detail was very impressive for its time.


Golf games became Access' most successful genre with their Links series on PC. I'm sure Microsoft's acquisition of Access was to obtain the Links franchise and it continues on today, although Carver is no longer with the company.

Another 1986 sports game was 10th Frame, a bowling sim.

1987's Echelon was one of the more innovative space sims of its time. It mixed in puzzle elements and also came with a headset/microphone to give voice commands.


Heavy Metal(1988) - A tank action game.
http://www.c64gg.com/Images/H/Heavy_Metal.ss.gif

In 1989, Access began making graphic adventure games with Mean Streets, the first game in the Tex Murphy detective series. It had some action segments as well.


Mean Streets was followed by Martian Memorandum(1991), Under a Killing Moon(1994), Pandora Detective(1996) and Tex Murphy: Overseer(1998). Killing Moon is shown here.


Access made a few other adventure games as well: Countdown(1990) and Amazon: Guardians of Eden(1992).

They also made a shitty NARC-type game called Crime Wave.


Developer - Rare
Upcoming games - Kameo(Xbox), Conker: Live and Uncut(Xbox), Grabbed by the Ghoulies(Xbox), Banjo Kazooie: Grunty's Revenge(GBA), Banjo Pilot(GBA), Mr. Pants(GBA), Sabre Wulf(GBA)

In 1982, brothers Chris and Tim Stamper founded called Ashby Computer and Graphics(ACG) and began publishing their games under the name Ultimate - Play The Game.

Their first game was Jetpac for the Spectrum in 1983. Jetpac involved gathering the pieces of of your ship together while avoiding enemies. The game was a huge success. It was included as a mini-game years later in Donkey Kong 64 for the N64.


Also released in 1983 for the Spectrum were the racing game Trans Am, the bug spraying game Pssst and Cookie.

Trans Am is the ancestor of the RC Pro-Am series that would later appear on NES, Game Boy and Genesis. They're still some of the best RC car racers to this day.
http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/01/trans.html

RC Pro-Am(NES, 1987)


1984 had Lunar Jetman, a side-scrolling sequel of sorts to Jetpac.


Jetman had another sequel on the NES in 1990. Solar Jetman was a neat action game reminiscent of arcade classics like Atari's Gravitar. http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/nes/01/solarjetman.html

Atic Atac(1984) was an action game where you threw axes at oncoming enemies. I found the animation and art in this game to be particularly appealing.


One of Ultimate's most popular games was the 1984 action/adventure game Sabre Wulf.


It was followed by other games in the Sabreman series: Underwurlde, Knight Lore, and Pentagram.

Knight Lore used an isometric view as did its futuristic follow-up Alien 8.


Some other Ultimate Spectrum games:
Nightshade(1985)
http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/01/nightshade.html

The Cyberun(1986)http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/01/cyberun.html

Gunfright(1986) http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/01/gunfright.html

Martianoids(1987)
http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/01/martianoids.html

Bubbler(1987) - http://www.vgmuseum.com/images/01/bubbler.html

Many of Ultimate's Spectrum games were ported to other computers like the CPC, C64, MSX, and BBC Micro.

The Commodore 64 managed to get a few exclusive games but I think most of them were just published by Ultimate and not developed in-house.

The Stampers sold the Ultimate - Play The Game distribution rights to U.S. Gold in 1985 and began developing NES games under the name Rare. The influence of their Spectrum work is very noticeable in their NES games.

The first game developed under the Rare name was Slalom in 1986, a skiing game for the NES published by Nintendo. Nintendo also released it in arcade form. I really enjoyed it as a kid because it was the first arcade game I had played that used skis as a controller. Today, stuff like that is expected in arcade games like Namco's Alpine Racer series but back then it was quite novel.


Published by Acclaim in 1987, Wizards & Warriors brought Rare's style of fantasy action gaming to the NES. I still don't get how a knight in armor can jump so high. I loved the game back then but today it doesn't interest me. W&W had a couple NES sequels and a Game Boy game.


Published by Milton Bradley in 1988, Captain Skyhawk was one of the better shooters on the NES and had pseudo-polygon graphics. It was based on some toy, I think.


I loved Cobra Triangle(1988). The animation of the speedboat was incredibly fluid and it controlled perfectly.


Super Glove Ball(1990) used the Power Glove peripheral.


1990's Pin Bot was based on the Williams pinball machine.

Snake, Rattle 'n Roll was released for the NES and Genesis in 1990.


1991 introduced my personal favorite Rare series, Battletoads. Despite having characters trying to capitalize on the TMNT craze, 'toads was an excellent beat 'em up and much more varied than most with its platform and speed bike levels.


Battletoads was ported to the Game Boy, Genesis and Game Gear. The Game Boy also had an original game which was very well done. A sequel called Battletoads in Battlemaniacs was released for the SNES in 1993.


It was ported to the European Master System.

An excellent arcade version was also made and was published oddly enough by Electronic Arts. http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?...B&game_id=7058

Battletoads and Double Dragon for the SNES, NES and Genesis combined the two great beat 'em up series yet managed to fall short of expectations. I still recommend checking it out.

Here are the rest of Rare's NES games. The majority of them are ports of other companies' games.
Cabal, California Games, World Games, NARC, Super Off Road, Marble Madness, Arch Rivals, Jordan vs Bird, Pirates, Silent Service, Beetlejuice, High Speed, Double Dare, Anticipation, Jeopardy, Hollywood Squares, Wheel of Fortune, Sesame Street, WWF Superstars, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Taboo and Time Lord.

As we head into the later years of the 16-bit era, Rare changed their focus to become an exclusive developer for Nintendo. 1994's Donkey Kong Country for the SNES was a major success thanks to its fancy CG look and large marketing campaign. The game itself was a very solid platformer but nothing of Mario or Sonic quality. Unfortunately, Nintendo adopted Rare's awful new art style for future DK appearances.


DKC had a couple sequels on SNES as well a few Game Boy versions.

Also from 1994 was Rare's arcade fighting game Killer Instinct which focused on timing insane amounts of combos. It was ported to SNES and Game Boy. Killer Instinct 2 was an arcade sequel and Killer Instinct Gold was on N64. I'm not much of a KI fan so I don't know the differences between them.


Ken Griffey Jr.'s Winning Run was released for the SNES in 1996.

Their 1997 N64 game Blast Corps was one of their most original post 16-bit games. It was an overhead view action/puzzle game where you used various vehicles to smash stuff.


Goldeneye 007 was responsible for a lot of N64 sales. It was impressive for a console FPS at the time with its neat gadgets and well designed missions. It certainly doesn't deserve the "best FPS of all time" status many bestow upon it though.


Banjo Kazooie represents much of what went wrong with Rare in their N64 years. Instead of making great original content, they became focused on imitating Nintendo. Banjo tried to outdo the exploratory platform gameplay of Super Mario 64 but failed on most accounts. Like its sequel and the awful Donkey Kong 64, Banjo was a mostly tedious fetch quest with an art style that couldn't touch NCL's.


Diddy Kong Racing also tried to mimic Nintendo. I thought they did a pretty good job on this one though. It was very similar to the Mario Kart games but the adventure elements and flying vehicles were nice additions.


They also made another N64 cart racing game, Mickey's Speedway. I haven't played it. They made GBC Mickey game too.

Jet Force Gemini in 1999 was a decent third-person action game but a lack of control customizability killed the fun for me. With a little more tweaking, this could have been a great game.


Perfect Dark was as far from perfect as you can get. I expected this FPS to surpass Goldeneye but instead I was given a game that felt like a fan-made Goldeneye mod with a barely playable frame rate. Having a bunch of the Goldeneye team leave to form Free Radical during development is likely the reason PD turned out so bad. Elvis didn't help either.


A 2D Perfect Dark game was also made for Game Boy Color.

I liked Rare's 2001 platform/adventure Conker's Bad Fur Day. Any game that lets you get drunk and piss on people can't be that bad. This game was originally intended to be a typical cartoony game aimed at kids like the GBC Conker's Pocket Tales before it but they decided mid way through development to make it a humourous game for adults.


Rare's final game for Nintendo was Star Fox Adventures for the Gamecube in 2002. It was originally under development as Dinosaur Planet for the N64.


What are your thoughts on these developers, past, present and future?

[TaekwondoNJ]

Any game that lets you get drunk and piss on people can't be that bad.

And thats when I stopped reading...

[Regus]

Unfortunately, Nintendo adopted Rare's awful new art style for future DK appearances.

I don't understand the hate the Rare DK design gets. Not only have I fully embraced it, I would be strongly dissapointed if they changed it.


Didn't Rare also make Anticipation for the NES?

Man, Rare's NES games stunk.

[NeoZeedeater]

Yes, they did make Anticipation. I listed in the NES pile without the pictures.

[SamuraiMoogle]

I think Rare's making a huge mistake releasing Kameo for Xbox. Its going to sell total shit and I dont know why they cant see that. I cutsey platformer just is not going to fly on XBox,even if it is great. I'm already planning on buying Conker even though its just a port. Grabbed by the Ghoulies seems like a huge mistake also. Rare needs to can Kameo and Ghoulies and get their people working on Perfect Dark first. Xbox is the FPS machine, so where the hell is PD?

[TaekwondoNJ]

May I be the first to say that although the framerate in multiplayer sucked ass, PD was still a great, fun game. Oh, and I for one actually ENJOYED DK64.

[Rumpy]

I love the fact that Bungie started making games for the Mac and is now owned by Microsoft. I sign of what happened between 1991 and 2001.

Rare: R.C Pro-Am is a classic. Slalom owned me, I loved that game. It's incredibly simple but tons of fun. Battletoads needs no explaination. I totally forgot about Snake, Rattle N' Roll until now. Awesome game.

I loved Blast Corps, I'd kill for a sequel. I thought GE was the most amazing game when it came out, but I haven't touched it in years and I don't think I ever will again. PD was all about multiplayer. It was muddy as hell, but there is a lot there for multi-mayhem. Diddy Kong Racing was pretty cool. I thought it was a great alternative to Mario Kart, and the same with Banjo/Mario 64. I thought Tooie was just waaaaaay too much for the N64 to handle. Frame rate was all over the place and too much of a fetch quest (never played DK64). Finally, Conker was a lot of fun and I consider Jet Force by far Rares worst game. It looked like absolute shit, the controls were a mess and the characters just made it worse. And all of that bug blood did nothing but slow the game down even more.

[Will]

Banjo Kazooie represents much of what went wrong with Rare in their N64 years. Instead of making great original content, they became focused on imitating Nintendo. Banjo tried to outdo the exploratory platform gameplay of Super Mario 64 but failed on most accounts. Like its sequel and the awful Donkey Kong 64, Banjo was a mostly tedious fetch quest with an art style that couldn't touch NCL's.

Nah no way bro. I thought Rare used the Mario 64 and forged their own thing with Banjo. I esecially liked the buddy aspect and the graphics were really amazing for their time. There were things to obtain but they weren't really vital to finishing the game aside from maybe the Jinjo's. I thought it was on par with Mario 64.

[SXA]

I too enjoyed BK. Banjo Tooie was a big dissapointment for me though.

Blast Corps is the shit. I think it's one of their more underappreciated N64 games.

[Frogacuda]

I have trouble reading about Access in this context because I consider them a truly great dev that MS absolutely killed, robbing them of all creative freedom. It really is a shame.

[stormy]

another great thread NeoZE

[NoFace]

Yea I'm going to have to say that I too enjoyed the Banjo games, the first more than the second.

And Blast Corps was and still is fantastic. Heck, Perfect Dark was a lot of fun too IMO.

I had totally forgotten that Access made those Tex Murphy games... I got a big kick out of Under a Killing Moon when that came out, at the height of those FMV adventure games (like the 7th Guest and such).

I believe Oni was only half finished when Rockstar got the rights to it, and I remember hearing that Rockstar (or some developer under their control) finished the game while Bungie was busy doing the Halo thing. Thus the disappointment.

But as usual, great write up by NeoZeedeater. I love reading these.

And oh yea, opinion on DK64... I thought the game would have been decent fun, if you weren't forced to play through each level FIVE TIMES (basically). That just ruined it completely.

And, uhh, the opening rap song, made me want to slice off my ears every time I heard it. And I can sing every cursed word somehow (GG SSBM)

[NeoZeedeater]

Thanks guys.

What I read about the Oni/Halo thing is that there were two development teams within Bungie, one for Oni and one for Halo.

[NoFace]

But did that Oni team finish work on the game once MS bought Bungie? I thought I remember them losing the rights to Myth and Oni when that happened. Just piecing together random memories so my being wrong is far from unlikely.

[NeoZeedeater]

I'm sure they still have the rights to Myth since the games were self-published unlike Oni. Who knows if Microsoft is interested in the Myth franchise.

[AstroBlue]

My thoughts:

Oni tried too hard to be this slick anime game, and in the end sucked... it reminded me a shitload of Burning Rangers for some reason... maybe it was the bad camera, or the way the game trained you at the start...

After Sin and Punishment, Blast Corps was the only N64 game I played long enough to make my N64 warm. And people shouldn't rag on the Banjo-Kazooies, despite their short comings, they were a fun diversion. Perfect Dark was as good as GoldenEye, IMHO. And Elvis was TEH SHIZNIT! But the best rare games are still Battletoads and Snake Rattle n' Roll.

Bungie should be able to pump out some good games for MicroSoft, but I think Rare are a gutted company... StarFox Adventures was an excercise in suckiness. But maybe MicroSoft payed them to make it sucky?

[NoFace]

Yea, Starfox Adventures was just bad. And I've played and enjoyed a lot of the corny Rare platformers, but listening to the dialogue in SFA and that dino-language (very well thought out Rare, lets make all the important words like "Dinosaur Planet" and "General Scales" be pronounced in plain English) was gut-wrenchingly bad. And the gameplay was just super stale.

They still can make a very pretty looking game though, that's for sure. That being said though, I too have to wonder if any of their upcoming games will impress Microsoft with their sales numbers. Of the three titles they've shown (Ghoulies, Kameo, Conker), I think the only one that has the potential to sell decently is Conker, and that's iffy. Perfect Dark Zero needs to be something fantastic, and with a lot of the Rare FPS talent working over at Free Radical Design, that seems to be a task easier said than done.

It's going to be interesting to say the least.

[Tracer]

I'd like to see Bungie give Oni another go, the game was very flawed but the premise (ala Dead to Rights) is still one of the best of it's kind. It's just that it's kind sorta sucks right now. I'd think they'd do better one more time around (playing it on PC with a controler was really kinda fun I thought).

NeoZ: I thought there were more developers in Microsoft. I'm thinking of games like Mechassault and Amped - were these simply published by MS and not developed internally within one of thier developers? Also, on the PC they've got thier Age of Empires/Mythology business and whats-thier-name behind Asheron's Call (Darktide was really fun, shame AC2 is a pile, nice looking for sure... stable and and lag free too.. but not fun). I understand the intent is to focus on the Console efforts, but perchance you missed some?

[NeoZeedeater]

Oh, I know I missed a bunch. I was originally going to try and include all of them but since there's only so much the board will let you fit into a single post, I settled on three that have long histories. I already had to shrink it to get it to fit.

[NoFace]

The guys who do Asheron's Call aren't owned by Microsoft. MS needed to have an MMORPG, and they picked Turbine to make them one (and then another). Turbine is branching out now, free of MS's clutches. Middle Earth Online looks fantastic, and there's obviously great potential there. Also a D&D game is being done by them. I hear they're working on something interally that's going to be very impressive as well.

And I think NeoZeedeater just chose to focus on those three developers for this thread. Given the knowledge level shown, I'm sure he knows MS's game studio is far deeper than three developers.

[Tracer]

Oh I know he knows, NoFace

I was just wondering why they were left out, though it makes perfect sence - not railing on your post, I was just wondering. Goodshow.

On Turbine: If Middle Earth Online is like AC on Darktide then sign me up. If it's like AC2 - then I'm sure it'll be nice to look at -_o

[NoFace]

Without MS breathing down their backs, the potential for greatness is high. Although they get Tolkien-ites to tell them how things must be instead... but I don't think it'll be as bad. They shouldn't impede on the actual game design at least.

[Tracer]

Well... I want to be able to kill dudes when I want, wherever I want. Damn near every Online RPG is too weak to allow some decent PVP. We'll see how well they do. It's already shown that for some reason people want to be able to get Married in a fantasy world than they would kill people. What a bunch of sickos.

[Jeremy]

Great thread. I did not know that Access was behind Crime Wave, one of my favorite Saturn sleeper hits.

[xS]

Dungeon Seige was done by MS wasn't it? I thought that it was pretty neat.

MS's console division is pretty decent. PGR racing and Rallisport are really great, HALO and Brute Force are pretty decent as well. It's sad to see Rare stink up their console division though.

[Jazz]

I had totally forgotten that Rare made Cobra Triangle. That was a great game. In fact, next to Battletoads, it was probably Rare's best NES effort.

[Drewbacca]

I really enjoyed SFA. Great exploration and character in the game. I'm glad to see Perfect Dark gets all the nah-saying it deserved. I thought the concept, the stupid alien issues and everything needed to be rethought. How about making a good FPS LIKE Goldeneye was, and not worry about the story so much.

Rare was never good with story.

[NeoZeedeater]

Sorry Jeremy. I meant the PC Crime Wave. The Saturn one is a different game made by a different developer.

xS, Microsoft did publish Dungeon Siege. I don't think they own the developer Gas Powered Games.

[Andy]

Nice thread, as usual. Rare made Pin Bot for the NES? Heh, I used to play that game a lot, despite not really liking it. I must agree with the Banjo supporters though, I didn't play Tooie despite owning it breifly, but I really did like the original a lot. Not as good as Mario 64, but still very good. And about Oni, don't judge the game based on the PS2 version, the PS2 rev is absolutely terrible. The PC version, though not fantastic, is much, much better.

Also, are you planning to add Ensemble's history anytime, Neo? I don't know if they have much of one, but I'd be more interested in hearing their story than Access' or Rare's.

[NeoZeedeater]

Andy, I don't have much to say on Ensemble's history since I'm not into their games. Ensemble was founded in 1995 by Tony Goodman and Bruce Shelley. Shelley is known for his work at Microprose. He made Civilization with Sid Meier. From there they made the Ages of Empires/Mythology series. They also made the Star Wars Galactic Battleground series for Lucasarts.