Agreed, Rare haven't seemed to be churning out the amazing games they used to. Starfox, 'Grabbed by the Ghoulies', Kameo wasn't as good as I'd hoped. They've passed their golden era.
As far as goldeneye v perfect dark. I prefered perfect dark becuase it was newer, that's quite a shallow fact, but recently I've been playing Goldeneye again and it's truly awesome, mostly becuase it's completely new compared to anything made before it.
Perfect dark is pretty much just the revamped goldeneye. I also found it much harder (still haven't done half the levels on perfect agent , though I got 100% on goldeneye when I was just a lad)