News Articles
Wednesday5th Apr 2023
Random Ex-Rare Dev Explains The Origin Of Donkey Kong Country's Name
Take me home, country roads
When you think of the titles of some of Nintendo's most iconic platform games, many of them just make sense as they are: Super Mario World, Kirby's Dream Land, and Donkey Kong Country. It all fits as a naming convention, right? Well, according to ex-Rare dev Kev Bayliss, the inclusion of the word 'Country' in Donkey Kong...
Tuesday3rd Jan 2023
Random Perfect Dark's Vision Of 2023 Is Quite Different To The Real Deal
No alien wars, thankfully
Over the years, narratives in pop culture mediums have hypothesised over how the future might turn out for the human race: in James Cameron's Terminator 2: Judgement Day, 1997 would have seen Earth decimated by Skynet's new-found sentience; Back to the Future Part II visualised a 2015 in which we'd all be cruising around on...
Monday17th Oct 2022
News N64 Classic Perfect Dark Has Been Decompiled, Paving The Way For PC Ports
Following in Ocarina of Time's footsteps
Cited as one of the greatest video games of all time, Perfect Dark is unfortunately rather difficult to find these days. Unless you're lucky enough to own an N64 console and have a copy of the original game, or have access to the remastered port on Xbox Live Arcade, then chances are you might never have...
Monday26th Sep 2022
Random A Look Into The Birthplace Of Banjo-Kazooie Developer Rare Ltd
Or 'Ultimate Play the Game', as it used to be known
As that weird android from Ridley Scott's Prometheus once said: "big things come from small beginnings". Or was that Lawrence of Arabia..? Anyway... It's a quote that can be attributed to the creation of many of our favourite game developers, but is perhaps most valid when describing the early days...
Tuesday20th Sep 2022
News Footage Of Perfect Dark's Cut Feature 'Perfect Head' Emerges Online
Heads rolled
We often laud Rare's incredible library of games on the N64, and while the focus has recently been on its seminal movie tie-in shooter GoldenEye 007 over the past week, we want to turn your attention to Perfect Dark for just a few minutes. Footage of one of the game's cut features from E3 1999 has been shared online. As highlighted by...
Wednesday31st Aug 2022
Random Rare's Unreleased Game Boy Rival Is A True Handheld Marvel
Meet the "Playboy"... No, not that one
British video game developer Rare is undoubtedly best known for its close relationship with Nintendo back in the '90s and early '00s, before Microsoft outright acquired it in 2002. Indeed, games like GoldenEye 007, Banjo-Kazooie, and Perfect Dark have all cemented themselves as icons in the industry; games that...
Friday11th Dec 2020
News Developers Of The New Perfect Dark Will Treat It "Very Carefully"
"You have to avoid doing too much devotion to the past, but not enough"
If you watched The Game Awards last night, you'll have spotted that a beloved Nintendo IP from the N64 era is getting a new instalment – but unfortunately, it's not coming to a Nintendo console. Microsoft announced that a new Perfect Dark game is in production – one which...
Sunday17th May 2020
News Perfect Dark's Joanna Dark Was Based On Winona Ryder
"She had this great pixie haircut"
It’s been said in the past that Perfect Dark protagonist Joanna Dark was modelled on historical figure Joan of Arc, but we've been speaking to the guys behind the game and they've put us right on that score – and have revealed exactly who inspired the design of the famous secret agent. “I think that’s the...
Saturday16th May 2020
News Perfect Dark Was Supposed To Have Push Button Cheats, But They Accidentally Got Deleted
"I’m very sorry"
If you're old enough to remember the N64 classic GoldenEye 007, you might also recall that the game featured a bunch of push button cheat codes which could be entered to change the game and unlock all of the weapons. You might also be one of the many people who were upset that its spiritual sequel, Perfect Dark, lacked this...
Sunday15th Mar 2020
Poll Box Art Brawl #34 - Perfect Dark
Yeah, we know it's Japan
Welcome back to Box Art Brawl, the weekly vote where you decide which retro regional box art variant wins in the beauty stakes according to sophisticated modern tastes. Oh yes. Last week Castlevania for the N64 entered the ring in a third appearance for the series and one of the closest fought brawls to date. In the end...
Sunday26th May 2019
News The N64 Version Of Joanna Dark Joins The Totaku Collection This September
Relive the glory days
If you still have fond memories of the original Perfect Dark game on the Nintendo 64, you'll likely be interested to hear Totaku has announced a figurine based on the Carrington Institute agent, Joanna Dark. This particular figurine is expected to join the series later on this year in September and follows on from the previous...
Thursday16th Aug 2018
Random Perfect Dark Speedrunner Matches Air Force One World Record
Less than a minute
The speedrunning community is known for supporting classic games over a prolonged period of time. To this day, there are still many people worldwide actively playing older games in a competitive fashion on a daily basis. Twitch speedrunner, Kevin “KevinDDR” Birrell is one of them. Kotaku UK reports h
Tuesday16th Jan 2018
Rumour A New Perfect Dark Game Is In Development, But Rare Isn't Involved
And it's not for a Nintendo system, obviously
Reports are surfacing online about a potential new entry in the popular Perfect Dark series, which began life on the Nintendo 64. According to the rumour, Gears of War studio The Coalition has been tasked with reviving the franchise, which is now owned by Microsoft following the purchase of IP holder...
Sunday14th Aug 2016
Video Digital Foundry Puts GoldenEye and Perfect Dark to the Test on N64
Also dabbles in cleaning up the visuals
Digital Foundry is one of the premier online teams for technical analysis of games and hardware, often focusing on current-generation gaming to assess performance, frame rates and more. It's now turning its eye to some retro games, too, which provides some interesting context on classics from past generations...
Monday6th Jun 2016
Video Unseen64 Discusses the Perfect Dark Sequels That Never Were
Hello darkness, my old friend
Back in the glory days of Rare, the studio released the cult classic GoldenEye 007, and while it's perhaps a bit dated by modern standards, the game was wildly fun. Though the studio wished to produce a sequel to the shooter, it lost the rights in a bidding war, resulting in Rare choosing to create its own game as a...
Monday26th Oct 2015
News Nintendo Wanted A GoldenEye Sequel On N64 But Rare Turned It Down
And Nintendo gracefully accepted the decision
1997's GoldenEye 007 was a massive commercial and critical success for Nintendo, selling 8 million copies worldwide and generating an enormous amount of revenue. Unsurprisingly, Nintendo wanted a sequel and even asked developer Rare to make one - but the UK company, which was at the time a second-party...
Wednesday1st May 2013
News Grant Kirkhope's Perfect Dark Soundtrack Blasts Onto Bandcamp
The sweet beats
When we think back to iconic Rare shooters that helped to redefine the genre on the Nintendo 64, minds often drift to GoldenEye 007. That has a strong case as a trailblazer, but if you're looking for the best Rare title in that genre from the 64-bit beast, plenty of loyal fans will very enthusiastically and loudly point you towards...
Friday19th Feb 2010
News XBLA Perfect Dark Getting GoldenEye Maps and Weapons
Another nail in the coffin of Virtual Console GoldenEye?
Although it's pretty obvious to all but the most blinkered Rare fans that the N64 game GoldenEye has about as much chance of hitting the Wii Virtual Console as Tiger Woods keeping his club to himself, there's always been a part of us that held out hope. However, Microsoft's Ken Lobb (the...
