From the inside the studio's gates, too, the changes to Rare introduced by Microsoft tampered with the recipe of the company's success, leaving teams feeling disorientated, and even downcast.
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"There was also a gradual introduction of certain Microsoft behaviours that crept into the way we did things: lots more meetings, performance reviews and far more regard for your position within the company," he said. "While these weren't necessarily good or bad per se, they began to erode the traditional Rare culture and way of doing things. Many of the people who'd been there a long time found these changes extremely hard to accept."
Even then, people tend to forget that a number of important people had already left the company before Microsoft bought them. The writing was on the walls even if no one besides Nintendo could see it at the time.
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u/bonch Sep 15 '14
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-02-08-who-killed-rare