You know, the funny thing is that if Rare and Microsoft put together a package of KI 1, KI 2 and KI Gold and sold it for 40 or 50 bucks even, I'd still buy it. To me, that's the real no brainer. Then a year or two after the compilation comes out, they release it on XBLA and make a killing again. Rare has to realize that they are most well known for 007 first, Killer Instinct second, Perfect Dark third and the resurrection of Donkey Kong back in the SNES days. Now Microsoft gets this powerhouse game developer and we get what? Grabbed by the Ghoulies? Does anyone really even care about that Viva Pinata game? Did anyone's jaws really drop when they got Kameo home and played it? I bought it for my girlfriend, and we both thought that it was the most ho hum, been their before platformer we'd played in years.
PD Zero was solid, but why no Killer Instinct? From what I've read in magazines (I think EGM had a small Q&A with Rare a few months back) the reason why KI remains dead is because the team that made it no longer exists at Rare, with several key players having either moved on to other companies or they're working on other projects. It's the same reason why we most likely won't see a Legacy of Kain game in the next few years, if ever again. When the creators and key developers/talent leave or get disbursed throughout the company, it's difficult to make a worthy sequel and it can be downright expensive in this day and age to try and resurrect a game from a bygone era without the talent that was close to it originally. For every Tomb Raider that brings a popular series back to the forefront, there's a Nico that never gets made. Or an Altered Beast that dies in development. Developers want to make new games, and while publishers want name recognition, that comes more with licensed games and more recent sequels.
The longer a game goes without a sequel, the more it falls out of the mainstream consciousness and into obscurity. Magazine editors might be excited about Shadow Run or Bio Shock, but the average gamer these days won't have any connection to the series previous offerings, so publishers most likely won't be able to rely on past appeal, and that hurts the bottom line. I would LOVE to see a new Killer Instinct, but the fact is that most of the gaming press didn't like the "dial a combo" approach and the "voice" etc. You put all of that stuff together with what I said before and it's hard to imagine a new KI getting made. Still, I think that there is a very devoted and loyal fanbase that would love to see a new KI game, and it would be another exclusive fighting game to go along side DOA, and in the next gen console war, exclusivity will be EVERYTHING. I'd personally take KI3 and DOA over Tekken (man is that series stagnating!) and Virtua Fighter (great game, but a bit too rigid for my liking).
So sign me up for a new KI game! I'll shell out 60 dollars in a heartbeat, and I'll even throw down another 50 for a KI compilation. Make it happen Microsoft, you have the power!
