RAREware

Goldeneye 007 [N64 – Beta]

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GoldenEye 007 is a FPS developed by Rare for the Nintendo 64, based on the 1995 James Bond film with the same name. In the gallery below you can see various screenshots from the beta of the game, in which there are various differences and some weapons that were removed from the final game.

GoldenEye 007 was originally announced for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System before being stepped up to the Nintendo 64. The intention for the first few months of development was for the game to be an on-rails shooter similar to Virtua Cop (as seen in the very first trailer released); it only became a traditional free movement first-person shooter later in development.

GameShark users found several text references to a level called “Citadel” in the game. It was thought that a few textual references were all that remained of the level, but in 2004, GoldenEye 007 fan sites uncovered an unplayable but viewable single-player version of the level (with implemented sky and water textures). The test map is largely a mass of shapes and ramps that the players can climb upon, thus giving players many opportunities for sniping and for hiding. [Info from Wikipedia]

We can read some more info on Goldeneye’s development thanks to Martin Hollis’ talk in 2004 at the European Developer’s Forum:

Come March 1995 work was underway with a team of new recruits. Mark Edmonds, my first ever interviewee, was programmer, Karl Hilton was background artist and B. Jones was character artist. I had prepared my first ever game design, a 9 page document. The first sentence of that design may be a surprise to you. It was: “The game will be similar to Virtua Cop in terms of gameplay”. For those not familiar with Virtua Cop it is an old classic, an on-rails shooter, made by Sega, and released first in the arcades. So yes, for the first months, GoldenEye was partly envisioned as a simple on-rails shooter only with no lightgun. But I also wanted it to be a FPS. At this point the team was happy to contemplate making two modes for the game, an on-rails mode and a FPS mode. Yes, there was some vagueness here. You have to understand, we didn’t know what the control of the N64 would be like, so it made designing the control system difficult at such an early stage. We didn’t have any N64s, or anything like them. […]

So, in the specific case of GoldenEye, and with the benefit of hindsight, the gameplay model was Virtua Cop with a bit of Doom, plus some Mario 64. The theme or setting was (obviously) the Bond universe and particularly GoldenEye. Many of the visual effects and kinetic moments I took from Hard Boiled or other John Woo flicks. Especially, things exploding. Visually, there’s more to that than you might think.[…]

For example gadgets, I compiled a list of about 40 gadgets from various Bond films, most of which were modelled, and then Dave and Duncan tried to find levels where we could use them. This is backwards game design, but it worked very well. These models were the game design; there was very little written down on paper. And the models were researched and milked extensively. And, importantly, they all gelled together very well. […]

Also, in a beta screenshot found by Kek8, we can notice that the Cradle mission had a background in the beta version, while in the final game there’s just a lot of fog.

Also an article from NowGamer has some more beta-related differences and cuts:

Karl Hilton recalls the first mooting of the project: “I started at Rare in October 1994 and they had me modelling cars and weapons to see if I could do it for no particular game. Martin Hollis wandered in – he tended to float around – and said he was leading a team to do a Bond game.”

Initially, the intention was to do a 2D side-scrolling platformer for the SNES, a genre that Rare excelled in after the seminal Donkey Kong Country, but Hollis insisted the game should be in 3D and produced for Nintendo’s enigmatic Ultra 64, which was still in development. He also made explicit his design model: Sega’s lightgun arcade hit Virtua Cop.

Karl: “When I got involved, the first thing I did was model the gas plant. We put a spline through the level so you could follow a route like in Virtua Cop, but it didn’t go further than that. We decided to take it off the rails. Some of those early builds had bits missing because you’d never be able to see them and I remember going back and filling in the holes.”

Considering how the finished GoldenEye feels so suited to the N64, it’s easy to forget the machine didn’t exist for the first year and a half of its development. The team was using SGI Onyxs, hugely expensive Silicon Graphics machines, guessing at what the specs of Nintendo’s new console might be and using a butchered Saturn controller to playtest.

For a game with more than its fair share of wanton destruction, the team became remarkably good at recycling. The radar on multiplayer mode is actually an oil drum texture, which explains the cloudiness on the right, and sometimes whole levels were created with the detritus they had to hand.

How Martin had done a 3D gun barrel that had to be dropped due to frame rate issues; how code had been written to let you drive the van, but it caused too many problems if you got the vehicle stuck in a dead end; how the unreachable island you can see far in the distance from atop the dam originally had a solitary guard patrolling it; how they’d had to label certain wall textures as ‘floor’ so guards could ‘see’ you, which meant they would occasionally leap out of bunkers inexplicably.

“At one point, we were going to have reloading done by the player unplugging and re-inserting the rumble pack on the controller”, remembers Steve. “Nintendo weren’t keen on that idea and I think it might have affected the pacing a bit…”

For more info check our Goldeneye 007 Beta Analysis

Thanks to D-vide Kek8 and BM for the contributions!

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Perfect Dark [N64 – Beta]

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Perfect Dark is a FPS developed by RARE Ware for the Nintendo 64 and released in 2000. Martin Hollis, the director of GoldenEye 007 and Perfect Dark, described the development of the game in an interview with Retro Gamer magazine. He explained that Rare rejected the prospect of working on the GoldenEye sequel Tomorrow Never Dies “without hesitation”, as the development team felt they had spent too much time immersed in the James Bond universe.

Originally Hollis hoped that the difference between light and dark would be a significant feature of the gameplay, and the title was intended to reflect this focus. A flashlight was implemented by Steve Ellis (responsible for much of the multiplayer mode in GoldenEye), but it was not included in the final game due to the limitations of the N64 hardware. [Info from Wikipedia]

In the images preserved in the gallery below, you can see many beta differences: different weapons, changes in the levels, characters unseen from some of the single player missions (the grey Aliens seem to have been used more in the beta and they were enemies, while in the final game the grey aliens are friends), the removed “Face Mapping” feature that let players to map their face on the game’s characters thanks to the gameboy camera (an option removed because of the Columbine High School massacre in 1999), censored red blood, removed multiplayer maps and much more.

We have a deeper article that compares most of the major beta differences, check the Perfect Dark Beta Analysis!

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Jet Force Gemini [N64 – Beta / Unused Stuff / Debug]

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Jet Force Gemini is a sci-fi action adventure / third-person shooter developed by Rare that was released in 1999 for the Nintendo 64.  The main characters, Juno and Vela, were originally designed as younger in the beta version and their 3D models were more cartoon-like with large heads. They were later changed to their more mature versions before the release of the game. However, a similar set of childish models can still be played with via an in-game cheat.

Jet Force Gemini does not support the 4MB Expansion Pak, although Rare had considered the possibility. This led to some confusion as the box cover for the original release stated that it did support the Expansion Pak. Nintendo provided a quick-fix to the mislabeled covers by providing stickers declaring its rumble pak compatibility and fixed later printings of the boxes. [Info from Wikipedia]

Also, some debug rooms and beta maps were found still hidden in the game thanks to ps3punk7890, Luigi 316 and SubDrag. An interesting note, one of these unused maps is a racing track from Diddy Kong Racing: it’s possible that they used this to test the racing missions in Jet Force Gemini in its early stages.

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Jet Force Gemini Beta

 

Project Dream / Banjo Kazooie [N64 – Beta / Proto / Test Level]

Banjo-Kazooie was originally known by the project name Dream for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. The project starred a boy named Edison, who owned a wooden sword and got into trouble with a group of pirates lead by Captain Blackeye. Dream was also scheduled to include a rabbit that looked like a man, a dopey dog and a bear that became Banjo. A screenshot from the Project Dream phase, shows Edison in a pirate town, but we do not know if it is a concept art or a Nintendo 64 tech demo. Finally, Project Dream was shown at the 1997 E3 as Banjo-Kazooie. [info from wikipedia]

From Grant Kirkhope’s website we can read many interesting facts about Dream’s development and download some unused / beta songs:

I started at Rare in October 1995 and when I got there “Dream” was already going. The core team from “Donkey Kong Country” had given DK to another team to carry on with and was working on this game which was going to be Rare’s greatest SNES title. It was very secret and Tim Stamper was leading the team, nobody outside the team knew anything about it. […]

I was shown the demo of the game running on the SNES and was blown away; it looked beautiful and was obviously going to be a big step up from “Donkey Kong Country”. […]

Pretty soon after I joined the game it was decided that it was too big for the SNES and was converted over to the N64, plus we were going to be using the extra “bulky drive” add on, that Nintendo told us they had in development. […]

The game was a huge RPG, which I loved as I was a huge “Zelda” fan, and I tried to write some really strong themes for all the characters. The demos that I’ve put on the site are all using proper samples as opposed to the N64 versions which were obviously not as good quality due to memory restrictions.[…]

I think the final nail in the coffin for “Dream” came from another one of Rare’s teams. The “Killer Instinct” team had started “Conker” and it looked and played fantastically. In “Dream” we had this elaborate floor system that meant we could stretch the polygons into any shape to create some really great looking landscapes that really hadn’t been tried before, unfortunately the N64 just didn’t have the power to run it at a decent frame rate and we were struggling to make it work. The “Conker” team had gone more the tried and trusted route as used in “Mario 64” and had left us behind. I remember Tim trooping us all across the courtyard to look at “Conker” and our hearts all sank as “Conker” was really good.[…]

So we went back to our barn and tried their method, “Dream” started to run great. Then Tim was unhappy with the whole boy/hero thing and said we should change it to an animal. A bear was our first creature and “Banjo” the bear was born. So now we had “Banjo” running around in an RPG, I really can’t remember when we added the back pack and “Kazooie” but it was around this time. Again Tim still didn’t think it was all good enough and after seeing how good “Mario 64” was and with Rare’s platforming heritage it was decided to scrap “Dream” and do a platformer with ” Banjo” as the main character.[…]

Check our interview with Grant Kirkhope! Also, Coolboyman is helping Grant to restore the beta BK tunes to their former glory. Check the videos below, to find some of these beta songs!

In the gallery below you can see various screens and videos from the beta version of the game, with removed enemies and levels. One of the most famous beta areas is the “Giant’s Lair”, that should have been the world’s HUB before Gruntilda’s Lair. The “Mount Fire Eyes” is instead a beta level, that is talked about in the final game, as an easter egg. You can check the video below created by VIDEOmakerNezuke to read more info on the Banjo beta.

Some more info on Banjo Kazooie Beta listed by Mew Mew:

  • there were originally 16 levels planned for the game
  • some of the cut levels were reused in banjo tooie (as witchy world, glitter gulch mine and mount fire eyes)
  • it seems that mount fire eyes turned into the lava side in hailfire peaks
  • clankers cavern also went through a few changes in its devlopment for example there is a video which shows clanker the whale as a real whale not made of metal with the fungi forest music from donkey kong 64
  • clankers cavern is rumoured to have been a part of fungus forest (similar too donkey kong 64), as the level is very close to the underwater entrance to the click clock woods puzzle podium, which is covered in moss or fungus (this was believed to be where the orginal entrance or puzzle was for fungus forest)
  • This description of the game is still a work in progress, if you would like to write a better article on the development of the game, let us know!

Thanks to Princess Toadstol, Saga Darvulia, cheat-master30 Anon and BM for the contributions!

[Italian] Per maggiori informazioni: Banjo Kazooie – analisi Stop ’n’ Swop

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Below are some beta songs that the composer, Grant Kirk Hope, kindly uploaded.
http://www.grantkirkhope.com/betabanjokazooie.html 

Blast Corps / Blast Dozer [N64 – Beta]

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Blast Corps (Blast Dozer in Japan) was one of the earliest RARE games for the Nintendo 64. Using various vehicles, we had to clear the way for a truck full of nuclear material, so the dangerous cargo would explode only in a safe area. Certainly one of those games that you love or hate it, but without a doubt a truly original title.
Anyway, during the development Rare removed some of the strangest vehicles and tools, such a Scorpion-like mech, a strange throw-punches machine, a mechanical armor and a small tractor with a front paddle.

[English Translation by yota]

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Uno dei primissimi giochi RARE per il Nintendo 64, è stato questo Blast Corps (Blast Dozer in versione JAP). A bordo di una moltitudine di mezzi diversi, era necessario distruggere ogni edificio che impedisse il passaggio ad un camion pieno di materiale Nucleare. In questo modo, il pericoloso carico sarebbe esploso in una zona sicura. Se tutto questo vi sembra strano, una volta provato il gioco potreste rimanerne innamorati all’inverosimile. Oppure odiarlo. Qualunque sia il vostro giudizio, sarete daccordo nel cosiderarlo un titolo davvero originale.

Durante il suo sviluppo, il design dei mezzi a disposizione del giocatore, si evolse in diverse fasi. In alcune immagini e filmati beta, possiamo infatti vedere che in origine erano stati inseriti una serie di macchine e mezzi robotici molto stravaganti e particolari. Possiamo infatti notare una specie di Mech Scorpione, una strana macchina tira-pugni, un armatura meccanica ed un piccolo trattore con pala anteriore. Tutti questi mezzi sono stati rimossi dal gioco.[/spoiler]

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