mousy, Rare was dropped because they don't make games anymore. It took them like 2 years to make Star Fox Adventures, and from the looks of it, Xbox might never see a Rare game. Rare can't make games in a timely fashion, and they were becoming a large stone around Nintendo's neck. Rare did make some pretty spectacular things, and I am not debating that.
But really, you have to wonder just how much of Rare is really left? Rare was falling apart before they were bought by MS, and afterward, I remember reading a report that said that over 25 people left Rare after they were sold. How much talent really remains in Rare is the big question of the day. To this point, NOBODY can answer that question. So far all we have seen is the laughing stock of E3, a remake of Conker, a few screenshots of a cel shaded Perfect Dark that IGN speculates will never see the light of day on Xbox (and I tend to agree), and Kameo, which was first promised to US as a launch title on GameCube.