Dream: Rare Reveals Footage of Unreleased RPG

Game developer Rare unveiled some “rare” footage that will certainly get the gears turning and have the fans of the company’s game salivating. During the development for the Rare Replay compilation that was released this year, the company unearthed some footage that had been sitting in the archives of Rare’s unreleased RPG project, Dream: Land of Giants. This Rare game is the fabled precursor to Banjo-Kazooie. Rare also recorded new interview footage with the Dream and Banjo-Kazooie developers for the video, which you can also check out in the player below.

Dream followed the boy hero Edson and his dog Dinger. The project eventually morphed into what became the hit game Banjo-Kazooie. The attempt with Dream by the Rare team was to try and make an RPG for the Super Nintendo console using the then high-quality rendered graphics of the Donkey Kong Country series. The footage shows a more isometric type of game and a boy hero with his sword.

Ultimately, Edson became Banjo the bear, who was transplanted to Banjo-Kazooie. The developers later decided that Dream: Land of Giants was just too ambitious and decided to create a new platform game that became Banjo-Kazooie. According to designer Gregg Mayles, “We really liked the bear. We just kinda took Banjo out of Dream and put him in the game that eventually became Banjo.”

It’s interesting to see this footage of Dream finally come to light. The graphics definitely looked impressive, considering the game was being developed for SNES. The pirate theme looked interesting, with crocodile pirates that resembled the baddies in Donkey Kong Country. It’s fun to imagine what could have been with this title. Still, Banjo-Kazooie is an enduring classic too.

Rare’s next project is Sea of Thieves, a new multiplayer game featuring pirates that’s being developed for Xbox One and Windows PC. The game is expected to be released later next year.