RolStoppable said:
Panama said:
theRepublic said:
The Stamper brothers tried to get Nintendo to buy their remaining shares, but Nintendo was not interested. Then the Stamper brother shopped around, and got offers from Activision and Microsoft. Activision had the highest bid, but the deal fell through for unknown reasons. Microsoft jumped at the opportunity. Legally, Nintendo had a chance to match the offer, but Microsoft's offer was high enough and Nintendo's interest low enough that the deal went through.
Basically, the Stamper brothers did not want to be owners anymore and got out.
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Why didn't Nintendo want to buy them? They had some of the best titles on the SNES and N64. Suddenly that legend about Miyamoto calling Donkey Kong Country mediocre during the production of Yoshi's Island makes more sense.
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Rare was already going downhill around 2001-02. Their games kept taking long to finish and sold less over time. Some developers had already left the company, parts of the GoldenEye team had started up Free Radical. If I remember correctly, Rare's slice of Nintendo's yearly software revenue had sunken to a measly 1.5 % at that time, far lower than it had been just a few years earlier.
With Rare's importance to Nintendo diminishing and Microsoft putting a lot of money on the line, there wasn't much of a reason to hold on to Rare, not for that much money anyway. In hindsight, it was the right decision for Nintendo.
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I absolutely adore Free Radical and did not know that. Here's hoping Crytek revive Timesplitters at some point.
