Quote from article: " Has MS stuck Halo Wars with a PR Plasma grenade..."
For those of you who didn't catch the news, Ensemble Studios, Age of Empires creators and current developers of the forthcoming Halo Wars, was officially closed down yesterday by Microsoft. That's right; some genius at Microsoft has announced the closure of a developer developing one of its key titles BEFORE their last game has even been released. Smooth moves indeed.
Details are fairly scarce at the moment, but amid the chaos, two important questions arise: why was this awesome, pioneering studio shut down, and will this decision ruin the still incomplete Halo Wars?
Did Bungie actually hate Halo Wars? Why wasn't Master Chief in the game? Lead designer Dave Pottinger reveals all.
Halo Wars is still widely considered one of the best and most accessible RTS games around, and that formula could work with other Microsoft IPs.
I think Crackdown would fit in a more turn-based tactics system via Xcom then a RTS type game play. Being able to customize multiple agents, deploying that group in an crime infested urban zone, going against other super powered enemy and fodder type thugs. The potential for that is huge if they won't do another successful, ground breaking, GOTY open world outing like Crackdown 3....
NoobFeed Editor Joshua Burt writes - There are many games in the famous Halo Franchise that are stellar titles and need to be revered. And some that do not. These games stand out from the crowd and deluge of colossal Halo titles. Games that made Halo great. We do need to iron out what qualifies the game for this list. They have to be in the Halo franchise… Obviously.
Replies(2)
Halo 3 at the top is correct the only thing id change is swap infinite and halo ce around.
Halo 4 has the hottest Cortana too which explains why the MC is the hardest in that campaign and why H4's multiplayer is the illest. Chief ain't afraid to take on teleporting enemies that can one hit melee kill.
excusssssssse me....are we talking...the stuido that made Age of empires??????
It`s doesn`t look good losing so many studios, it doesn`t HELP your image.
Especially Bungie/Emsmeble, not being 1st party anymore
i really dont care
but
Halo Wars must not be all that great for them to do this!
i guess we will see next year
Ok...so MS closes the studio down. The bigger question is where are these developers going? Are they leaving to create a new company, going to a competing company, or....is MS absorbing them into some new internal MS development company yet to be announced?
Edit: Ahh...didn't get page 3...pretty much explained there.
Did MS want to close the studio? Or did the developers simply want to go their own way?
Although MS "own" them there are still opinions available to the studio if they decide they no longer like where your at. MS have said that some of them want to set up their own indie studio. Either way, this isn't suicide by any means. It maybe big news now, but like every internet interest, something bigger and better will come along tomorrow and all this will be forgotten. MS and Ensemble going their separate ways is in no way the end of either of them (even if Ensemble are under a different name).