You can trust VideoGamer. Our team of gaming experts spend hours testing and reviewing the latest games, to ensure you're reading the most comprehensive guide possible. Rest assured, all imagery and advice is unique and original. Check out how we test and review games here
Following recent news that Halo Wars developer Ensemble is to close, studio boss Bruce Shelly has made a lengthy and honest blog post detailing why his studio is being forced to shut up shop.
“I have mentioned with regret the closing of several quality game studios over the past several years but I never considered that ES would join the list,” said Shelly. “Everyone at our studio was shocked, and I think remains very disappointed that this is going to happen. I believe we thought we were immune to shut-down talk because our published games have done so well and have been so profitable.”
He continued: “… we felt we had built a really stable (low-turnover), talented, hard-working, and creative team, which is not easy to do. We thought we were among the best studios in the world, and that may be true, but we don’t fit in the future plans of MGS as an internal studio so we’re out.”
Shelly wasn’t able to go into much detail on why Ensemble is closing, but did outline a few major points as laid out to them by a senior Microsoft Game Studios executive in early September.
“… basically the decision, as I understand it, was based on several major factors. First, they want to divert the headcount tied up in ES and the costs that are expected to be required to run ES for the next few years into other projects. Second, it sounded like it cost more to run ES on a per person basis than other first party studios (Rare, Lionhead, Forza, Flight Sim) putting us at a disadvantage. (Plus they avoid the expense of a new office that we were planning.) And third, games those studios are expected to deliver in the next few years are expected to be more strategic and profitable to the company than anything we would be finishing after Halo Wars.”
Shelly also noted that he does “not expect to be part of the new company formed after ES is shut down”.
Halo Wars is scheduled for release exclusively for Xbox 360 early in 2009.
About the Author
