Microsoft pulling stops for Perfect Dark 2?

  • By TomM_GScom, GameSpot
  • Posted Oct 17, 2007 6:28 am AEST

Source: Indian blog GameGuru. What we heard: Gameplay details for games nowhere near the production line are springing up like weeds as of late. In the course of a week, bloggers have tapped unnamed sources for rundowns on the next franchise installments in EA's Battlefield, Ubisoft's Prince of...

Source: Indian blog GameGuru.

What we heard: Gameplay details for games nowhere near the production line are springing up like weeds as of late. In the course of a week, bloggers have tapped unnamed sources for rundowns on the next franchise installments in EA's Battlefield, Ubisoft's Prince of Persia, and Insomniac's Resistance.

The latest to take sprout is from Indian blog GameGuru, which has apparently landed details on the "Xbox 360's next humongous killer app." Citing unnamed sources, the blog states that Microsoft's next big push will be for Rare's Perfect Dark 2, which will officially be announced "sometime during the latter part of next year." Whereas Perfect Dark Zero was a prequel to Rare's acclaimed Nintendo 64 game, Perfect Dark 2 will be a sequel proper, the blog claims.

GameGuru also states that PD2 will feature a Joanna Dark that is "darker than usual to give the player a feeling of a twisted edge," and that all of the characters will have tinted gray auras. This is likely in relation to what GameGuru calls Perfect Dark 2's "morality system," in which "choices are going to have a huge impact on the gameplay, giving players a variety [of] branches in the storyline itself." The blog also says that Rare's engine will feature a fully interactive environment, and that "there are probably going to be no cutscenes in the entire game."

Despite being peppered with rampant hyperbole, the blog is likely right about a Perfect Dark sequel being in development. Having sold more than 600,000 units and being one of the system's first Platinum Hits, Perfect Dark Zero performed respectably as an Xbox 360 launch title in 2005, which would warrant another installment in the series. The extended development time could also be plausible, considering that Rare has been neck-deep in copulating papier-mâché with Viva Piñata for the Xbox 360, as well as upcoming Nintendo DS and PC versions of the original game.

Whether or not Microsoft plans on matching its $10 million Halo 3 marketing effort for PD2 is a whole other can of worms. Given that Rare is owned by Microsoft, the game will undoubtedly be an Xbox 360-exclusive, which is a, pardon the pun, increasingly rare occurrence in this multiplatform era. As a result, a significant marketing push is to be expected. However, considering how prone to hyperbole the blog is, the reports of its size could be greatly exaggerated.

It's also worth noting that Viva Piñata was a risky investment for Microsoft, one that hasn't paid off quite as well as the company might have hoped, considering the game has moved less than 290,000 units to date in the US. Given that, Rare should be looking to make safe bets (read: sequels in established franchises) with its next projects. The upcoming Banjo Kazooie sequel is one such project, and a new Perfect Dark is the most natural other candidate.

The official story: Microsoft had not responded to request for comment as of press time.

Bogus or not bogus?: Not bogus that there will be a sequel. No call on the details.

223 Comments

  • uwiwami

    Posted Nov 5, 2008 10:35 am PT

    Yess. The original perfect dark game was the 2nd bestest game ever

  • REMLOC

    Posted Aug 19, 2008 9:31 am PT

    SCREW PERFECT DARK! I WANNA SEE KILLER INSTINCT 3

  • Blackspy04020

    Posted Mar 1, 2008 1:09 am PT

    If we would only be so lucky. I would just die for a proper KI3. But you'd need rareware to make it proper. Id still drop $60.00 in a heartbeat tho no mater who made it. To dish out some more rolling thunder. C-C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER!

  • sharpshooter188

    Posted Jan 15, 2008 4:43 pm PT

    aim sensitivity like Halo, FEAR , or CoD PLEASE.

  • leetzer

    Posted Jan 13, 2008 2:38 pm PT

    there was a glitch in perfect dark that i did were this body just kept bouncing it was funny

  • swollenmember89

    Posted Dec 13, 2007 5:59 am PT

    god!!! i am counting down the days for this game to come out...pd0 was absolute skill and harmony. reminded me of the counterstrike days...CANT WAIT FOR A SEQUEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    RARE FREAKIN ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • Sorasgirl1777

    Posted Dec 3, 2007 2:42 pm PT

    Let me just say this....PERFECT DARK ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • termadoyle

    Posted Nov 4, 2007 10:42 pm PT

    Awesome! but "Morality System"?! WTF?

  • goliath182

    Posted Nov 4, 2007 6:11 pm PT

    Dude kinglink2 are you on crack or something? Rare a 1 hit wonder? Ever heard of Conker, Banjo-Kazooie, Donkey Kong 64 and country, or Jetpack? Cause Rare is no 1 hit wonder

  • LordSpleach

    Posted Oct 29, 2007 8:28 am PT

    What Rare should do is breakoff from Microsoft and make PD2 on the Wii. Rare's biggest mistake was selling their souls to Microsoft, and lets be honest, who would want to have Viva Pinata be their most successful game in the post-Nintendo era.

  • matt_dangelo

    Posted Oct 23, 2007 11:31 am PT

    lol

  • wargraymon

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 1:07 pm PT

    to bad all the good people at rare left before microsoft bought it.

  • chakan2

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 9:52 am PT

    If they want a safe bet, they should make a sequal to Conker's Bad Fur Day.

  • nick15uk

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 9:27 am PT

    What about releasing the original on Xbox LIVE Arcade? And maybe even Goldeneye 007 with online modes

  • FLEEBS

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 8:49 am PT

    I just hope Rare can get back on track and develop as good a game as the first one.

    It will be nice to see where they take the story after the events of the first game, though.

    Personally, I'm a little apprehensive with what happened to PDZ and Kameo. I like those games, but they are not as good as they should have been.

  • 1Gigabyteofram

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 4:40 am PT

    "Perfect Dark 2's "morality system," in which "choices are going to have a huge impact on the gameplay, giving players a variety [of] branches in the storyline itself." The blog also says that Rare's engine will feature a fully interactive environment, and that "there are probably going to be no cutscenes in the entire game." Wait a second, didn't Peter Molyneux say EXACTLY the same thing about fable 2?

  • salamancecool

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 2:55 am PT

    I though PDZ was deadly. I hope 2 will be just as good. I never played the orignal so im not going to fully get the story, but I'll still get it.

  • salamancecool

    Posted Oct 18, 2007 2:55 am PT

    I though PDZ was deadly. I hope 2 will be just as good. I never played the orignal so im not going to fully get the story, but I'll still get it.

  • stafax

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 8:15 pm PT

    Rare needs to make a Killer Instinct HD

  • Anfinith

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 4:30 pm PT

    The world will be happy when Rare is back again with Nintendo, Rare's good one were with Nintendo, and anyone can tell nothing about it. Microsoft hope that having Rare with then, could be the essence they need to be well in the market, because the good games that Rare "supposedly" will make... I only wish that the misunderstandings between Nintendo and Rare were set, because if they were like before, We certainly have now very good games no doubt, and of course having back the old good ones.

  • demoralizer

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 3:25 pm PT

    Perfect Dark zero gameplay action just wasn'tt fun. They need to go back to it's roots.

  • X-RS

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 2:08 pm PT

    2 complaints:
    1)all fps!?!!? id prefer 3rd person w/ blades!??! i say uc3 would be nicer
    2)morality is always fun if you're good/bad. never anything for being neutral.

  • demi-OS

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 1:58 pm PT

    well maybe they can get it right this time I mean the original on the N64 rocked so I say give them another chance

  • jmate03

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 1:56 pm PT

    I did not like the frist one.

  • jay_rock_

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 1:30 pm PT

    Just let that game go, every game put out from rare since then been down hill

  • 1357900

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 12:46 pm PT

    I'm w/ Proman84 on this one. It would only be natural, I guess, for MS to do another PD. From what I've read from articles here, MS is basically done w/ Halo, eventhough they're going to continue milking the franchise for all it's worth, which really isn't a bad thing, provided the games rock. With this in mind, I think some fans on the gameguru website have come to speculate that MS will now try to replace Halo w/ Perfect Dark in it's place, based on the knowledge that PDZ became a Platinum Hit for the 360. But, MS may indeed, do such a move.

  • Space-Q

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 12:36 pm PT

    "KIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING COMBO!"

    Haha, that was always the best one. I used to stop at ten or eleven hits (whatever it was) just so I could hear that voice.

  • mjwickstrom1

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 12:35 pm PT

    Cool! PDZ was great, and I'll expect the same in PD2!

  • StolenVex

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 11:55 am PT

    PD 64 was supposed to be the sequel to goldeneye, so I dunno if you'll ever see Perfect Dark attain that same level of brilliance. I personally didn't like PDZ that much, I guess if they spent a good portion of time rethinking the style of the series for PD2, it could be okay.

  • Zerosumgame

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 11:40 am PT

    No perfect dark 2 is perfectly fine with me.

  • SalarianChemist

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 10:43 am PT

    Perfect Dark 2 will be a great Xbox 360 game that shows what the hardware is truly capable of doing at its best!!!

    We need to remember, even though Perfect Dark Zero ended up being a highly rated award winning game that was a best-seller, the developers at Rare still had some difficult obstacles to overcome.

    Pefect Dark Zero was originally supposed to be released for the Gamecube when Rare was owned by Nintendo. Perfect Dark Zero was then supposed to be released for the original Xbox when Microsoft purchased Rare. Microsoft then told Rare that they wanted Perfect Dark Zero released as a launch game for the Xbox 360. Microsoft then gave Rare unfinished "Pre-Alpha" Development Kits to develop Perfect Dark Zero on the Xbox 360. The Pre-Alpha Development Kits gave developers access to only One-Sixth of the General Purpose CPU power, because only one of the six CPU Threads could be accessed by the development kits and the developers.

    Games like Halo 3, Bioshock, Mass Effect, Forza Motorsport 2, John Madden NFL Football 2008 (on the Xbox 360) and so many others have incredible graphics that are far superior to Perfect Dark Zero and other first-generation Xbox 360 games.

    The main reason for this is because of the superior Development Kits that were used, which gave developers 100% access to Xbox 360 CPU Power.

    Rare is now 100% free to start making a new Perfect Dark game from the ground up exclusively for the Xbox 360. This means the Xbox 360 hardware will be fully optimized in whatever ways developers at Rare want.

    Viva Piniata is a game developed by Rare, and targeted towards younger games. Viva Piniata is a highly rated game that has won many AWARDS for "Original Gameplay."

    Perfect Dark 2 is going to be a TRUE sequel that takes advantage of the Xbox 360 hardware, while simultaneously showing the skill of Rare developers who create Award-Winning gameplay!

    Perfect Dark 2 is a game I'm looking forward to a lot, because it will give Rare the freedom to do create a game from start to finish for the Xbox 360 in ways that use the hardware "perfectly."

    Perfect Dark 2 really has me excited...and so does the thought of a new Killer Instinct game. Heck, I would be happy to see a Killer Instinct game on Xbox Live. Preferably a game that combines the characters and backgrounds of the first two Killer Instict games.

  • PS360Fanboy

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 10:25 am PT

    cool

  • Gamingcucumber

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 10:17 am PT

    Well at least they got one thing right. Perfect Dark 64 deserves a sequel not Perfect Dark Zero which was a complete let down. However I'm sad to see that they are moving away from the Goldeneye formula even more since there haven't really been any game like it since....well....Perfect Dark.

    Still love Rare and I hope they get it right with PD2 and B&T even though I would like to see them perhaps develop a new conker game or even a Battle Toad game for the XBL.

  • weiz

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 9:20 am PT

    I completely agree with LivingDeadNinja. So many old IPs are being revived these days. Its about time we see a new KI.

  • Trogeton

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 9:17 am PT

    Thats good... PDZ was horrible

  • Proman84

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 8:19 am PT

    I bet calling everything the biggest thing since "Halo 3" is going to become the next biggest marketing thing now.

  • weathertrooper

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 7:42 am PT

    PD2 would need the magic of PD64, not be more like PDZ. Even though PDZ is a good game, it's nowhere near as good as PD64.

    I'd rather see Killer Instinct 3 right now.

  • mrkame16

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 7:09 am PT

    Killer Instinct 3 would be a better title to bring back for this genereation. your right!! it was good on SNES imagine what they can do with todays high powered systems!!

  • Britesparc

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 7:05 am PT

    Hopefully it'll be more N64 PD than 360 PDZ... improve the single-player, but most of all, include all the multiplayer shenanigans from the N64 version! Ranked bots, star ratings, different tasks, etc...

  • jcloverboy

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 5:47 am PT

    love the Perfect Dark series...can't wait to get my hands on this, but I do agree we need some Killer Instinct this generation.

  • eminemv414

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 5:41 am PT

    That sounds cool !

  • wildmatt

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 5:01 am PT

    FalconerX is you would pull your head out of your a**, you would see he only mentioned THE GAME, nothing else, also the show didn't spawn off a cartoon or anything like that... I really wish you'd stop that and just read instead of reading what you want to read, then bashing people for it

  • -HCMF-

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 4:22 am PT

    perfect dark was more like somewhat ok, but not really good, and even sometimes fun dark, but if they made a second (third?) one maybe they could learn from their mistakes and release game once its finished this time...

  • Ricksterlau

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 4:12 am PT

    In respect to each of the game's time, the original Perfect Dark on the N64 surpassed everything Halo had to offer. In fairness I have played a huge library of FPS on consoles for the pass 10 years and nothing gave me a greater sense of satisfaction than Perfect Dark. It had to be said, it was the greatest FPS on a console of all time. That being said, when the Xbox 360 launched, Pefect Dark Zero was a must get. To many people and including myself, it is was a disappointment, a major disappointment. There was no possibility that you could compare PD: Zero with the Original PD as the difference in quality was so far apart. I honestly doubt PD 2 will be as good as the original PD. I dont think it will even get close to it. That being said, fingers crossed.

  • KingKoop

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 4:03 am PT

    I'd quite enjoy a PD2

  • carpathianrogue

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 3:40 am PT

    "Microsoft's next big push will be for Rare's Perfect Dark 2"?

    There was some advertising behind PDZ. Unfortunately though, whoever came up with the campaign opted to go the viral marketing route, that for better or otherwise was all the rage at the time. Being merely passable in implementation and reach, its little surprise its not been remembered (messages on phones - yours and hers!) There were also soft drink promotions, and even region-specific RL ads...

    If there is going to be a new Perfect Dark, Rare simply MUST concentrate on their lead character more. Sure, in PDZ there was the killing of Jack, her father, to motivate her, at one point in the story. But that was it for the story, basically, and further development didn't happen. We should be able to interact with the environment, rather than just walking through locations shooting everything. Some online tie-in to create a world of PD would be good. We can't all be Joanna Dark, but perhaps we could work with her, against the Datadyne threat?

    PD2 must stand out. It can't just be another shooter, or it'll fall flat on its face. Make us feel like we're playing as Joanna, and we'll be better immersed into the game.

  • xboxFan101

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 3:11 am PT

    damn son PFD2 is gonna b crazy son . i member when it came out everybody who owned a 360 had it and on live it was ridiculous with this game . the graphics was a if thing a little too shiny but game play was great .

    will Banjo Kazooie be exclusive to 360 ??

  • raze-boi

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 1:46 am PT

    I don't know why but I just don't like this game.

  • 705H1R0

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 1:02 am PT

    For a launch title, Perfect Dark was alright. There were a bunch of things that bother me. Mostly that every single texture in the game is either too dark, too shiny, or glowing. Personally I don't understand why people thought it was so great.

    Besides that, I'm still waiting on JetForce Gemini 2!

  • Rockfan_66

    Posted Oct 17, 2007 12:34 am PT

    I will never buy another rare game until KI3. EVER!!!!!

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