While it's been five years since Rare last released a game in any of the franchises it's best known for, it hasn't permanently moved on from the games that once made it such a beloved studio. In fact, following the release of its latest Kinect Sports game, Kinect Sports Rivals, it may look back to its classic franchises in deciding what to make next.
Speaking with The Official Xbox Magazine UK at Gamescom, Rare's Simon Woodroffe talked about making use of Kinect in "ways that actually really enhance the game," rather than in "gimmicky ways." He said Rare has "some ideas for how to use it in the right way," including an idea for a Perfect Dark game.
"Maybe! We've got an idea for that. It would be controller plus Kinect," he explained. "We've got ideas for most older Rare IP, you won't be surprised to hear. There's quite a lot of desire to do that, and Viva Piñata, Conker... Banjo's very popular internally, a lot of people want to do stuff with Banjo. So if we can find the right -- we're all about giving people new experiences, that's what we want to do."
He later talked about leveraging Kinect in ways that make new genres possible. "We want to find that thing that nobody's ever done before and make a game out of it," he said. "We should be inventing new genres, inventing new ways to play. And this sensor gives us new opportunities to do it, with the fidelity it has now."
Kinect Sports Rivals was originally planned to be a launch title for Xbox One, but was delayed until spring 2014 last month. Woodroffe said that, following its completion, Rare will begin working on multiple games, although he didn't offer any assurances that these games would be new entries in any of the company's older franchises. All we know for now is that, based on what Woodroffe had to say, those games seem likely to make use of Kinect in some way.
Rare can count on every Xbox One owner having a Kinect, as Microsoft has made it clear the system will never ship without a Kinect sensor in the box. However, that Kinect won't need to be plugged in despite what had been indicated previously.
Based on what we've seen so far from demos of Zumba Fitness: World Party and Kinect Sports Rivals, the new Kinect appears to be a step up from its Xbox 360 iteration.
