The long, sad tale of bringing the groundbreaking shooter Goldeneye to Nintendo's Virtual Console, or Xbox Live Arcade, appears to have ended long ago, with a whimper.
Addressing a reader question about Goldeneye ever getting an agreement between Nintendo and Microsoft, releasing it to current generation consoles, Rare said, alas, no.
That was some time ago, my friend. Fate was against us that day. Destiny conspired to raise the hurdles even as we attempted to clear them, resulting in unpleasant groinal injury. I suspect we're long past the stage where an agreement was on the cards, but you never know. Stranger things have happened… somewhere … probably.
Dead is how we'd characterize it for now. It's a shame. It'd be a no-brainer moneymaker, but because Nintendo and Microsoft can't figure out who gets paid first, or the most, a re-release of Goldeneye is not meant to be. Not many things were.
GoldenEye 007 for Wii VC, XBLA "Long Past the Stage Where an Agreement was On the Cards" {Nintendo Everything]