Rare hoping to develop Natal-based FPS

Developer Rare has revealed in an interview with MCV that it is "hopeful" of creating an FPS for new Xbox platform Project Natal.

The firm, best known for its work on GoldenEye, Banjo-Kazooie and Perfect Dark told MCV that it is focused on Natal – which it saw as a "great opportunity".

“Right now our sights are trained on Natal, which is a great opportunity to break new ground with content and gameplay," said Rare’s head of studio Mark Betteridge.

The revelation follows previous hints from inside Rare that Natal was being used to reinvigorate old IP.

“One [IP] I think we can do an absolutely phenomenal, absolutely phenomenal version on with Natal," the studio said in August.

"The interface, the way you interact with it… it would be an absolutely world-beating product. But we need to explore a little bit more in that direction.”

Speaking in MCV’s special feature on the evolution of the FPS genre, Betteridge said that Natal was "an opportunity to exercise some genre evolution, so hopefully we’ll be able to develop something on that front.”

Betteridge also discussed the creation of GoldenEye on N64, which broke new ground in terms of the populairty of FPS games on console.

“The final product was a more traditional FPS than we’d first planned – it’s well-documented that the original design was all on-rails,” he added.

“As the work progressed we realised that it made sense to shift development in that direction, both as a game and as a potential asset for Nintendo.

"It turned out to be a great tool for attracting a different type of gamer to the N64. Up to that point the consoles had never been able to field many serious competitors to the PC FPS market.”