This Month's Most Viewed Games Tagged 'rare' on The Great Games Experiment http://www.greatgamesexperiment.com/css/logo.jpg en-us Panzer Dragoon Saga (titled Azel: Panzer Dragoon RPG in Japan) is a role-playing game released in 1998 exclusively for the Sega Saturn. It is the third game in the Panzer Dragoon and the only one which is not a rail shooter. The game centers around the plight of Edge, a young boy thrown into an ancient conspiracy.

Category: Turn-based role-playing game

Release date: April 30, 1998 (US)

Developer: Team Andromeda

]]> 26 Mar 2007 11:27:38 Rare's 3D first-person shooter take on the lucrative James Bond 007 franchise could be described as a game that was truly worth the wait. The often- delayed title was once shrugged off as vaporware, but when it finally arrived in 1997 it delivered console gamers something that only PC owners had enjoyed previously: a remarkably fun, innovative, intuitively controlled shooter complete with pretty graphics and an outstanding multiplayer mode to boot. The title went from sleeper hit to one of Nintendo 64's biggest success stories in no time, and continued to sell throughout the console's entire lifespan. Even today, it remains a benchmark for console first-person shooters and serves as an inspiration for developers.

]]> 01 Feb 2007 03:49:14 Banjo-Kazooie is a 3D platform/adventure video game for the Nintendo 64. It was developed by Rare and published by Nintendo in 1998. The game stars a bear named Banjo and a bird named Kazooie who set out on a quest to rescue Banjo's sister, Tooty, who has been kidnapped by the witch Gruntilda. Along their journey, Banjo and Kazooie receive help from Mumbo Jumbo the shaman and Bottles the mole, as well as from various other characters in smaller roles.
Banjo-Kazooie went on to become one of the most popular games for the console.

]]> 20 Dec 2006 10:02:54 Killer Instinct 2 is a 1996 arcade-only fighting game developed by Rare Ltd., licensed by Nintendo, and manufactured by Midway. KI2 is the sequel to Killer Instinct (1994), an arcade game which was also ported to the SNES. Like its predecessor, the game features two 8-way joysticks with six buttons each for attacks (three punch and three kick), allowing for both a single player mode or a two player versus mode. A modified version of KI2 appeared on the Nintendo 64 as Killer Instinct Gold in 1997.

KI2 follows on from the plot line that the previous installment ended with. Eyedol's death at the hands of Orchid accidentally sets off a time warp, transporting some of the combatants back in time and allowing the Demon Lord Gargos to escape from Limbo. Now, trapped 2000 years in the past, the warriors that survived Killer Instinct, along with several new faces, fight for the right to face Gargos in combat. Each character that survived the journey from the first game has a corresponding background story, while new characters on this installment are native inhabitants of this past time period. Some fighters, like T.J. Combo who survives from the original, just want to get home. Others, like new character Tusk, want to bring an end to Gargos and his reign of evil. This time there is no tournament or prize money, just a fight to the finish with the fate of the future hanging in the balance.

As with most fighting games and indeed its predecessor, two characters square off with the goal of depleting the opponent's life bar. As with the original Killer Instinct, when a player's original life bar is fully depleted, s/he will fall the ground, and immediately begin on their second lifebar.

As with the first game, Killer Instinct 2 relies on an automatic combo subsystem in its matches. Additionally, a Super bar has been added to the game (similar to Street Fighter Alpha or King of Fighters). This super bar fills as players take damage. After the bar reaches a certain point, the player can use a multi-hit super special move (normally referred to as Super Move,) which is usually an extended version of a normal special move.

]]> 02 Mar 2007 01:16:12 Dragon Force is a rare and extremely sought-after role-playing strategy game, released for the Sega Saturn. It was created in Japan by Sega and translated into English by Working Designs in 1996. It has since been re-released on the PlayStation 2 as part of the Sega Ages series.

Category: Strategy role-playing game

Release Dates: March 29, 1996 (JP), November 30, 1996 (US), September 1997 (EU), August 18, 2005 (JP Sega Ages re-release)

Developer: Sega

]]> 26 Mar 2007 10:16:52 Killer Instinct is a fighting game by Rare and Nintendo. Initially released in arcades in 1994, and claiming to use an "Ultra 64" hardware engine. The game received a high profile launch on the Super Nintendo, as well as on the Game Boy. It led to a sequel, Killer Instinct 2.

Unlike many other fighting games, especially its contemporaries, Killer Instinct takes place in a modern/futuristic setting. Ultratech is a very powerful company which organizes a tournament called Killer Instinct. Along with regular participants, experimental creatures created by Ultratech also fight in the tournament. Ultratech also discovers a technology to make bridges between dimensions, and to also release from his dimensional prison a two-headed monster called Eyedol, an ancient warrior that was locked away along with his rival.
Developed using SGI computers and 3D modeling software from Alias, Killer Instinct was considered a graphical leader when it was released. It featured animated backgrounds that were pre-rendered movies which changed angles depending on the character location. This technique causes the backgrounds to have an unprecedented three dimensional look — a look far better than was possible at the time in real time 3D rendering.

Killer Instinct plays like many other typical fighting games, in which the player controls a character in order to beat an opponent in a one-on-one encounter. The game borrows Street Fighter IIs attack set (a weak, medium and strong attack for punches and kicks, respectively), but also is inspired by Mortal Kombats graphic violence and finishing sequences. There are several features that distinguish it from other franchises: A double energy bar; Automatic combos; Finishing moves; Ultra Combos; Combo Breaker.

]]> 02 Mar 2007 12:42:09 The game features intense Deathmatch and Campaign story-line modes via Xbox Live and System Link, and players can compete as one of six combat specialists across multi-mission campaigns covering Old War and Future War. The warfare promises to deliver the non-stop action, humor, and innuendos Conker is famous for.

Also included is the critically acclaimed single-player game, Conker's Bad Fur Day, completely recreated for the Xbox with stunning graphics and unparalleled attitude.

]]> 01 Feb 2007 11:59:31 Blast Corps (or Blast Dozer in Japan) is a video game for the Nintendo 64 developed by Rareware that was released in 1997, in which the player must clear a path for a truck carrying a pair of defective nuclear missiles, called the Missile Carrier.

Two defective nuclear missiles are being moved to a safe location for a controlled detonation. However, they start to leak, and the carrier they are onboard is automatically set onto a direct course to the detonation site. As the course takes it through many built-up areas, there are many obstacles on the way, and a single jolt could be enough to detonate the missiles and trigger a nuclear winter. The Blast Corps demolition company is given the task of clearing the route for the carrier and its missiles, to avoid a catastrophic explosion.

There are a number of Demolition vehicles in the game. Each has a different method of demolition, from the Ramdozer, which is just a simple bulldozer, to the J-Bomb, a robot that flies up to stomp on buildings. A number of smaller vehicles are also available, primarily used for the race levels, consisting of a police car, a hot rod modeled on the General Lee from The Dukes of Hazzard (complete with signature horn), a sports car modelled after the Grand Torino from Starsky and Hutch, and a duplicate of the van from The A-Team.

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