I enjoyed SFA a lot (at least more than most), but even I don't think it felt like a game that had been worked on for years upon years. On the opposite end of the spectrum, look at Eternal Darkness- it was in the works for some 6 years or so, but it's obvious they used every second of that time to polish the game.
I'm still a huge Rare fan- I've loved nearly all of their games, regardless of time periods. That doesn't mean I don't think Nintendo's decision to drop them was without reason, though, and that doesn't mean I'm interested in every Rare title that's coming out for the XBox. PD0 intriuges me, but I'd pass on Grabbed by the Ghoulies even if it was a Gamecube game.
Ymeegod: Compared those average/POS games to the wealth of great games those companies make- the good vastly outweighs the bad. Compare that to Rare, who takes forever to make any game, much less a good one.