Even though the gaming world-renowned name remains with the company, Rare as we knew it is dead and everything we ever knew and loved about them was laid to rest years ago. I can already hear you now: why is this a big deal? Why does Microsoft purchasing a company that was actively seeking a buyer mean that the old Rare as we knew it is gone? They're still around making games for the Xbox One, with Sea of Thieves on the way, but a huge chunk of their creative development team was lost during the transition from Nintendo to Microsoft and it shows. After founders Tim and Chris Stamper quit in 2007, they were replaced by Gregg Mayles, the current Creative Director for Rare.

Now the current occupation of creative ship Design team members in the company rely on one thing and one thing alone to sell their games: nostalgia. The current Rare as we know it relies heavily on gamer's nostalgia of IPs of gaming’s past. It's no coincidence that Rare Replay (an amazing collection of old Rare Games) was released during the same time Microsoft was announcing that Rare was going to be making more "Traditional" games again. Don’t be confused; even though Rare Replay was released on Xbox and marketed as Rare titles, these are in no way a reflection on the current company. The majority of the games seen in Rare Replay were done by employees that no longer exist at the company.

First announced back in 2015, the swash-buckling action title Sea of Thieves looks to serve up plenty of daring adventure on the high seas later this year on Xbox One. While developer Rare has revealed quite a bit about the game already, there are still quite a few details still under wraps at the stu

The beta for Sea of Thieves happened recently, and to not many people's surprise, dataminers got a hold of the game's data. What perhaps was not expected is what they found hidden beneath the sea of c

"When we talk about visual effects in games, we normally mean particles. That's what we're using to create all of the cannon effects for example, like the different explosions. You want to give the player strong feelings when they're playing the game... You should just feel like you're really part of this beautiful wor

As expected, Sea of Thieves is an online multiplayer game in which players will cooperatively and competitively partake in traditional pirate activities. Those include running a ship by weighing anchor, unfurling sails, and laying down cannon fire on other ships, and island life -- though that was left merely teased. Oh, and don't forget drinking ale. There's plenty of ale to be drunk as well. Mostly though, there was a lot of sea battles with other pirate sh

The "new" Rare, as well call them, just made a compilation of "Old" Rare’s successful games. The creation of "old" Rare titles in a single compilation was an intentional move created by Microsoft’s very talented marketing team in order to make gamers remember how awesome Rare used to be back in the day and then, Oh wow! A new game by Rare is coming out.

The relative lack of gameplay shown compared to ways players can interact in basic ways was intentional, however. Rare would later state that the game is still mid-development on many gameplay systems, but that the team is so excited to show the game that everyone wants to show what's reasonable. For example the island adventuring, the customization features, and most important perhaps -- the loot, are still in-development systems. Those features will be shown as soon as they're ready, as Rare intends to be as transparent as can be going forw

The reveal of Rare Replay and the teaser for Sea of Thieves was a marketing poly to get gamers excited to play Rare games again, even though the game will not be anywhere near the same quality we have come to expect from "old" Rare titles during their run with Nintendo. This isn’t to say the game has no chance, but the point is that "old" Rare is officially dead and this new incarnation is building up hype off of titles they had no affiliation with.

Rare was a legendary developer back in the golden age of gaming. When the beloved company was perfectly partnered with Nintendo, the partnership went as well together as peanut butter and jelly and through 1994-2001 everything was fine and dandy until game development cost began to gradually increase and Nintendo decided not to provide the company with more capital nor did they buy up the remaining stake that was leftover, forcing the company to search for a potential buyer to stay in the game. In the end we all know that Microsoft purchased the company for $375 million and from that day on Rare was a first-party developer for Microsoft.

Rare's Short Haul trailers are just one way the developer is continuing to communicate with its audience, whether they're excited for Sea of Thieves or not. There are several other short video series that are ongoing, like the Inn-side Stories series or one-offs created for special events, like Talk Like a Pirate Day. Perhaps this extensive amount of developer-to-player communication is another strategy to help bring players closer to the experience that Sea of Thieves will provide . Perhaps in knowing Rare, players will better know their ga