MS closing Ensemble (AoE, Halo Wars)
- Thread starter Acert93
- Start date
They have new internal halo teams staffing up. Including a next gen one.
I doubt this means anything.
Most likely, theres not a reason to carry an RTS developer on the console side (Sony certainly doesnt have one) and I guess they deemed the PC aspect of ensemble expendable (again reasonable, not like PC gaming is in great shape).
I dont get all the crying over MS RE their first party. Well, thats not true, I do get it, but I think, there overall strategy of outsourcing that stuff is probably the way of the future, and a flow of high quality exclusive/MS published games has certainly been achieved on 360, regardless whether they come from rented third party or first party. Ninja Blade is I think just the latest example.
Frankly, I wouldnt be surprised to see Sony aping this strategy soon enough. Is it really cost effective to carry a large amount of first party staff? Does it deliver the best quality games? It's certainly something that could be argued about.
It's hard to decide. Insomniac's third party, but they're not just a subcontract studio. It's the same, to a lesser degree, for Sucker Punch. Lair was panned, Heavenly Sword wasn't a great hit, and these were outsourced. And Team Ico, Santa Monica, Naughty Dog, Polyphony Digital are all internal. Singstar, which may be Sony's greatest hit, was also internally developed.
Oh... I was simply replying to the notion that MS is going for profitability now. It would be nice, but I think MS has a bigger appetite than the current audience they have today.
As for outsourcing, there are different ways to do it (First parties can outsource parts to save $$$ too, or simply have your internal resources in low cost areas like what Sony seems to be doing in India). It's probably case by case, and depends on Sony's and MS's business model. This is especially true if emerging markets become more important. Having native developers on your own team and localized content can be a strategic advantage during initial market development.
EDIT: Both Nintendo and Sony have been very hardworking in developing new markets. So it's only natural that they are more content heavy in comparison.
As for outsourcing, there are different ways to do it (First parties can outsource parts to save $$$ too, or simply have your internal resources in low cost areas like what Sony seems to be doing in India). It's probably case by case, and depends on Sony's and MS's business model. This is especially true if emerging markets become more important. Having native developers on your own team and localized content can be a strategic advantage during initial market development.
EDIT: Both Nintendo and Sony have been very hardworking in developing new markets. So it's only natural that they are more content heavy in comparison.
Excpet recent noise isn't that they're outsourcing, but they don't care for exclusives! I can see their thinking - 90% of games are cross platform and they offer the cheapest entry to those games, so why not sell on the strength of a huge, strong library and the overall system and extra-game functions than try to woo people with a few exclusive titles that, historically, haven't been that effective overall. How many XB360s were sold on account of Viva Pinata, for example? You probably need to sustain a large developer base to get enough chance of a Big Hit, with most of their output being limited interst niche titles or just competing with the 3rd parties.
Considering there are publishers out there making a profit from creating games, I can't see a publishing arm being a bad thing. If EA can produce billions writing and selling games, why shouldn't MS or Sony be able to get a bit of that action too? Only if the in-house studios lost money overall is it financial a reason to cut them off. And in Sony's case it works, having managed to find a few big successes such as SingStar. Again though, I think if you're going this route, you have to go whole-hog. A few developers creating a few titles isn't going to do much for your platform. But if you have lots of output, you'll have both increased chance of getting a big hit (think of studios as lottery tickets - the more you buy, the better your chances!) and the benefit of a diverse library to help with broad appeal.
TBH I'm surprised MS, the ultimate software house, is shying away from creating software! They above all others must know how lucractive it can be. I feel as though this is MS saying 'we don't really get how to make games, so we'll leave it to everyone else and focus on the tools and services instead'.
Quite possibly cyclic too. I was big into RTSes in the 16 bit era, but have little interst in them now. 2D platformers had died out, but now they're coming back. I guess people are just all RTSed out, need a break, and in some time they'll be bored of FPSes and wanting to revist some cerebral challenges?
We don't know that they will stop creating software. What we do know is that MS was dissatisfied with their first party studios.
They still have first rights of refusal on anything Bungie makes, so Bungie is still effectively first-party. Effectively the Bungie dev team was merely rewarded with a stake in its future success.
Perhaps all other MS dev teams will be consolidated under the Rare banner.
mister slim
Newcomer
My impression was that Lionhead was having cash-flow problems and the VCs want to sell, so Molyneaux had to find a buyer. Not totally sure, but I assume MS bought in because they had a relationship with Lionhead and they wanted to keep Fable 2 on track. Also I think it was a pretty cheap purchase.
I feel as though this MS saying "Our past strategy for game software development proved to be too costly for our taste. In a bid to reduce cost we are restructuring ourselves to maximize profitability by becoming leaner and narrowing our focus to genres that have proven profitable in the console arena".
I'd bet would Sony would pull similar moves given similar circumstances. Sony has more studios than MS, bit luckly it has three platforms to support.
However, Sony lacks individual first party titles success of a Halo or Gears of War and its console is no where near the behemoth called the PS2. If GT5, KZ2, GOW3 don't have monster sales and titles like LBP, Infamous, Motorstorm2, Socom don't become 1-2 million salers, I'd bet Sony will shrinks its # of dev houses to cut revenue costs.
scooby_dooby
Legend
The bottom line is MS's biggest commercial success's this generation have been from 3rd party exclusives, COD2, Bioshock, Gears of War, Fight Night 3, Oblivion, GRAW, LOst Planet, Dead Rising, Mass Effect etc. It's these titles that have made the 360 software library so strong.
Apart from Halo, the 1st party studios haven't done much to write home about, and their platform's success has in large part been built on these 3rd party relationships. Forza was ok, but ultimately a let down, Rare's games have been ho-hum, Shadowrun was the pits..the list goes on.
I can see why MS would be shifting strategies, it only makes sense given the track record of their internal studios over the last 3 years. It seems as though they're keeping the best, Turn 10, Lionhead...Rare(?) but losing the rest. As long as they continue to be aggressive with their 3rd party relationships, and continue to make their platform easier and cheaper to program for than the competition, MS is on the road to a winning strategy.
Apart from Halo, the 1st party studios haven't done much to write home about, and their platform's success has in large part been built on these 3rd party relationships. Forza was ok, but ultimately a let down, Rare's games have been ho-hum, Shadowrun was the pits..the list goes on.
I can see why MS would be shifting strategies, it only makes sense given the track record of their internal studios over the last 3 years. It seems as though they're keeping the best, Turn 10, Lionhead...Rare(?) but losing the rest. As long as they continue to be aggressive with their 3rd party relationships, and continue to make their platform easier and cheaper to program for than the competition, MS is on the road to a winning strategy.
You're lumping in 3rd party exclusives with 1st party games developed by outside studios. Not only that, you're counting 'timed exclusives' like Oblivion that came out when there was no competing next-gen console, and some games that weren't exclusives at all, like GRAW or FN3.
How's MS' 3rd party exclusive library look now, in 2008? 3rd party exclusives are going to be rarer and rarer. Sony's been saying it for a while (usually in reaction to news about them losing this or that exclusive) but even Mattrick has been saying it lately.
First-party games are the key, but MS' strategy seems to suggest that devs are interchangeable when there's plenty of indication that they're not. When Activision lost Harmonix and had Neversoft work on GH3, it was widely considered to be the inferior game when compared to RB. CoD3 wasn't as good as CoD2 or 4. Hell, with Sony, people watch for the output of Team Ico. It doesn't matter what the next game is, people already love it. (Note: I'm speaking as a gamer here. Activision's dev-rotation strategy certainly paid off in terms of sales, so MS may be successful as well.)
If Forza was disappointing, why do you Turn 10 as one of the ones they're keeping? Same for Rare. Halo was a huge success, but Bungie left regardless. Age of Empires was profitable, but they trimmed Ensemble down. I'm not going to judge MS' strategy as successful or not, but there's a contradiction in what you're saying.
Because they didn't own Bizarre, and the price for buying them would wipe away years of potential PGR sales.
PGR4 didn't do that great either. And the question is why MS should keep internal studios, especially those that may be underperforming, since that's the excuse for getting rid of Ensemble.
scooby_dooby
Legend
No, I'm lumping all games developed by studios not owned by MS, since the discussion is about the fact they are selling the majority of their studios.
Whether MS published the game or not is not really important, as they can continue to publish 3rd party titles in the future. So, if you want to call that 1st party, be my guest, it's nothing but semantics.
As for FN3, and Oblivion, they were exclsuive console titles, and they are perfect examples of MS's ability to secure exclusive through their timing, development environment, and close relationship to PC. These are all elements that I described as strengths in their strategy.
To me it's an obvious trend. At the beginning of a genration you see more 3rd party exclusives, as the install bases grow you see less of them because there is more incentive to develop multiplatform, but at the same time exclusives become less important late in the life-cycle because momentum has already been established, and there are large backlogs of quality titles.
Sure, I'll agree that their 3rd party exclsuives are on the decline, but I anticipate that when they launch their next console they can repeat what they did this generation: launch first, attract developers with a relatively easy development environment with strong tools, and capitalize on close similarities to PC architecture.
No, quality developers are the key, it does not matter whether their 1st party or 3rd. What MS has done this generation is identify key games from strong developers, and secure timed exclusivity for those titles. It's worked extremely well.
Actually I didn't pretend to know MS's reasons for keeping T10. Turn 10 is being kept for whatever reason MS has internally, probably because Forza is one of their strongest franchises, and they need T10 to develop both Forza and PGR. Bungie left of their own accord, there was nothing MS could do about it.
Fair enough, but keep in mind that many of these weren't exclusive games.
Well, I think it matters because 3rd parties are just more prone to releasing non-exclusive titles. As we've seen this gen, non-exclusive titles aren't going to convince anyone to buy consoles, not without something else to differentiate.
FN3 was released on PS2. Oblivion wasn't, but the only other console that could handle it wasn't even out by time of release. Fallout 3 is multiplatform, if that's any indication.
I'm not really seeing this winning strategy from MS. There's just no pattern. Gears of War was a success, PGR4 wasn't, Too Human wasn't. Halo 3 was a success, Viva Pinata not so much.Sony's had mixed luck with 'quality' studios as well. Factor 5 is/was a quality studio and produced a flop. There's speculation that Level-5, the studio behind White Knight Chronicles has been too busy with all their OWN IPs (and there's been a LOT) to really give WKC the attention it needed.
So it's really not that clear that this is a winning strategy. Maybe more fiscally sound, but there is the risk of having these companies work for competitors, which is especially true since the only IP MS owns that it's not developing internally is Halo.
MS can't control wholly-owned subsidiaries?
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mister slim
Newcomer
They can't control the individuals that make up those subsidiaries. The staff of Bungie was leaving, MS couldn't do anything about it, so MS let them take the not-very-valuable name in exchange for goodwill.
Are you sure that that's what happened? The news I've read doesn't quite say that, and we in the peanut gallery as usual can only speculate wildly (just as we did with Ensemble, immediately concluding that it was a Bungie-type deal when it wasn't at all).
