It worked GameCube flopped. A generation on Nintendo Wii has turned it around in a blink of an eye, Wii has bolted ahead of its competition.

 Umm, so GameCube flopped because Nintendo lost Rare? And Wii now won because Nintendo still doesnt have Rare?

Brilliant logic. 

Yes Nintendo wanted them to go because they sold their shares to Microsoft. They didnt own a majority, but they had quite a bundle, I believe 40% or so, and sold it for quite a profit.

 Also Rare was 2nd party I believe to Nintendo.

They made an excellent choice though. Look at Starfox Adventures. Good/decent game? Yea. Fall from the N64 and SNES brilliance of Rare's games? Hell yes.

Perfect Dark Zero, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Kameo were all decent games, but were NOT worth the price of what Microsoft paid for them and the money Nintendo made off of it. Viva Pinata is pretty fun and hopefully Banjo can pull Rare back around, but I doubt it. Do you all remember Grabbed by Ghoulies? *shivers*

Nintendo changed there direction with Nintendo wii, became more innovative by introducing motion control through Wii remote. More casuals and previous non-gamers (including grandma's, grandpa's, the whole family) all jump on board the Wii band wagon. Gamecube provided nothing more than same old enhanced N64 games. Rare as we have seen has gone downhill significantly by launching failed project one after the other since Microsoft bought them out.

 BTW: Microsoft + Rare = Fail.  Nintendo + Rare = Success

Rare isn't going to return to grace I don't believe. Many of their talented workers took a hike when they went to develop for Microsoft. As much as I'd love to see Banjo-Kazooie 3 be awesome i just don't see it happening.

Honest and sound prediction. BK 3 is uncertain. Nintendo has moved on since the departure of Rare to greener pastures after enduring the dreaded GameCube days. Nintendo wii is going from strength to strength and will more than likely have sold 40 million consoles LTD by the end of 2008.

I agree with you. Nintendo has successfully moved on. But also i find the PS3 has had an excellent year. I fully expect the PS3 to have sold 15 million units by the end of this year, if not even more. 

While Rare are nowhere near as good as they were (and I'm still pained over perfect dark zero) to say this generation is a write off is just silly. This gen they're doing much better then the gen before. They already have 2 million sellers with the other game selling a decent amount aswell. Their sales are increasing and they're releasing more games. But they aren't anywhere near as high quality as they were during the n64 era. They suck in comparison. But at least Rare are improving a bit :S

I hope Banjo is a return to their past glories, but Im not getting my hopes up.

All Rare is good for now is Banjo Kazooie. Anything else isn't worth buying Rare back for.