GAME: Rare Replay
CREATED BY: Rare
As much as I would have much preferred the name of Ultimate: Play the Game Replay, the powers at Microsoft had to go with using Rare. Who can blame them though? The company, in whichever guise you know it from, has been a major player in the gaming industry for three decades now. Considering how many other companies have fallen by the wayside in that time holds testament to just how well they've done. The Replay collection brings together a whole plethora of work from the Spectrum days right up to the more recent Xbox 360 titles that they are responsible for.
What this does though is really raise the bar in how retro compilations should be done. The last majorly great collection was Taito Legends and the follow up selection back in the days of PS2 and the original Xbox. This was more through quantity and didn't really give you a lot of insight into the game creation or anything like that. What Rare Replay does, albeit with a bit of grinding and unlocking, is give an insight into the great British games company and some of the ideas behind their biggest franchises. Everything from Banjo Kazooie to Conker's Bad Fur Day is covered, as well as their brief foray into the world of the arcade with Killer Instinct and Battletoads.
The first thing that impresses you is that level of presentation. The musical number at the start really sets the tone and the layout is just of such a high quality, right down to the game screens themselves. It is all crafted together so nicely that you cannot help but feel happy when you load it up. It does take a little while to install mind you , mainly due to a lot of the 360 stuff, whether they are full games or XBLA jobs, to install separately onto your hard drive, as well as trying to collect your 360 data for them through thecloud. Once this is all done though you are ready to sift through the selection.
Boy, what a load of choice to go with. The Spectrum stuff has all been cleaned up, but still managed to retain the original feel. Jetpac, Atic Atac, Sabrewulf and so on are great additions for a couple of reasons. The first is that it gives Dad the chance to show their kids what they thought was groundbreaking before being laughed out of the house, but secondly, and more seriously, it allows us of a generation back to revisit old gems without having to fork out a small fortune to get an original Spectrum and an original copy of the game, which is worth a considerable amount these days.
The best selection comes through their Nintendo days. Snake, Rattle and Roll, RC Pro Am 1 and 2, Lunar Jetman, Battletoads and Slalom all maintain a high quality, but also a feeling of innocence, as the simplicity of what is there is matched by the beauty of how they play. The N64 titles have all been cleaned up, with the vectors all nice and shiny, as well as giving me personally a chance to have a go at some games I never really got to play the first time round, like Blast Corps and Jet Force Gemini. The platform games are where the main winners are. The two Banjo games are all here in their glory, as well as the often overlooked Bad Fur Day, with Conker still giving us one of the best intros to a game there has EVER been, and noone can tell me otherwise.
The other N64 range gives us Perfect Dark, which may not be Goldeneye, but still plays better than some other shooters I have to mention in a minute. The great things about this collection is that it is a warts and all package, so it gives us some of the ropey titles as well as the absolute bona fide classics. For all that Joanna did right in the N64 version, she ballsed it up on the Xbox 360 with Perfect Dark Zero. Before I fully move onto the Microsoft era completely, I'd also like to mention how bad Killer Instinct is now. Seriously, it's like Mortal Kombat with cardboard cut outs now. Fighters really HAVE moved on.
Anyway, the 360 arrived and again, Rare had a mixed bag on the Microsoft consoles. Grabbed by the Ghoulies was the only original Xbox title to appear from Rare and it was ok, nothing special mind you, but average, nonetheless. The last machine gave us a new Banjo, which was decent and the action platformer Kameo. This was a game that was well overlooked by many and I'm personally glad to see it on here, as it gives people a chance to have a go at it, even if it is only for the gamerscore. The Viva Pinata double seals things off nicely and gives a more quiet pace of gaming, which a load of people found to be good, although the cartoon must have bombed.
I know I have not covered all of the games on this collection, but considering what is there, as well as the quality of the collection itself, you would be absolutely MAD to miss it. The snapshots give you little snapshots of the NES and Spectrum titles, awarding you stamps to unlock music and video, which is good for keeping you entertained and making you play for longer, as well as milestones in the full games to aim for. Rare Replay really does have everything you could possibly wish for from a retro collection. It ticks all of the boxes for the older gamer and allows whole families to revisit stuff they played that was relevant to them at the time, bearing in mind there is still a little heat in the 360 carcass now.
You would be completely mad to miss this and considering you can pick it up for half the price of a full title, bearing in mind the sheer volume you're getting, it really is a no brainer. The first Xbox One exclusive number one title in the charts is this and that speaks for itself. An essential purchase and no mistake.
