Rumour control: Microsoft to sell off Bungie (Halo developers)?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Agathon
I love how Asher just makes **** up. And you can always tell when he's losing, because he has to bring his ignorant, and uninformed opinion on philosophy into it to make himself feel better, even though it has absolutely nothing to do with the topic at hand. So you pretty much know from that when he's got nothing.

What the hell? I speak complete truths -- Bizarre Creations and FASA are no longer MS 1st parties in the last month. You counter with a simple statement saying I "just make **** up"?

Then you counter with a statement you've pulled out of your ass that "Bungie can 't stand MS"?

You're the one making **** up here, Aggie, and we can all see that.

This "deal" is like Jonathan Ive leaving Apple. To lose your premier developer for your struggling console is a major loss.

The Xbox 360 is struggling??
Bungie has been lost??

You're making more **** up. Every Bungie game must come out on the Xbox 360. Halo games are and will always be Xbox exclusive. Who lost what?

You are unbelievable.

And the pathetic attempts of unbalanced fanboys to pretend otherwise is just amusing.

This is the only true statement you've made, and you apparently don't know it applies to you here.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
I would think owning the studio that makes you massively successful games would be better than signing an "exclusive deal" with an independent developer.

Why is that? There are pros and cons. The pros are you get complete control over the company (but still not the developers -- they can leave), the cons are you have very high fixed costs.

People are losing perspective here. MS fully owned Bungie. They have been spinning off and/or closing first party studios this month, Bungie is just one of them. It's a clear case of adjustment of business strategy, and nothing more.

I find it fully believable that developers may get sick of making Halo games and want to try something new. That's the same for any game company that strikes gold with a hit. But they also know it is their cash cow and permits them to try other games now that they have the name and the money. This clearly isn't the reasoning behind it, if it was Bungie would not have agreed in contract to at least two more Halo games. Agathon's theory is puerile, and frankly, ridiculous stupid and fanboyish. He says the 360 is struggling, but previously said the Wii and the 360/Ps3 don't really compete -- so is the 360 struggling vs the mighty PS3 (which is tracking sales less than Gamecube a year in)? Ridiculous. No other word for it.

But this, this is strictly a business decision because those of us capable of seeing the bigger picture at MGS can see there's some massive realignment going on. Remember that it was J Allard who was all gung ho with first party games (remember Microsoft Sports games?). After he moved to another project, his replacement clearly prefers 2nd/3rd parties. He secured an exclusive from Epic in Gears of War, and with the success there he's been spinning off or closing the remaining 1st party studios that Allard had brought in.

[Wiglaf]

I find it fully believable that developers may get sick of making Halo games and want to try something new. That's the same for any game company that strikes gold with a hit. But they also know it is their cash cow and permits them to try other games now that they have the name and the money. This clearly isn't the reasoning behind it, if it was Bungie would not have agreed in contract to at least two more Halo games.

Er..what??

They are owned by Microsoft. They want to leave. Microsoft says ok, you're independent, but only if you make games for us. They say, fine, as long as we aren't shoveling your derivative crap on people all the time.

People are losing perspective here. MS fully owned Bungie. They have been spinning off and/or closing first party studios this month, Bungie is just one of them. It's a clear case of adjustment of business strategy, and nothing more.

According to the source Agathon quoted, there's a bit more to it than that.

[Asher]

You mean the unlinked "anonymous" source Agathon links to that sounds like it was written by a 9th grade fanboy? Yes, let's ignore clear business strategy that is more than the scope of just bungie and trust an unlinked, anonymous source that clearly has an axe to grind with MS.

Agathon also didn't show the entire quote. Probably because it discredits the source.

Apparently MS just wants Bungie to make Halo for the rest of their natural days, and Bungie doesn't like how MS is constantly trying to "handle" everything they do; the way they market their games, the way they interact with their fans (basically the fact that they do appreciate their fans), and how stingie they are with the profits (comparable to the rest of the industry). So as of today they are their own independent entity.

Which, aside from the obvious bias and grammar issues, is factually incorrect. Bungie is not its own independent entity when MS controls their board room (like the Ford Family does to Ford), their financials, and requires every game to be published on the Xbox platform. It sounds to me like some kid got wind of what was happening it from a real source (with clearly vague details, as he is wrong on most counts), then invented reasons why.

According to this source, one of the reasons Bungie left is MS hates how Bungie "appreciates their fans". Can we stop quoting this as unequivocal truth now?

[Wiglaf]

No, because your line of reasoning makes substantially less sense. Getting rid of an internal studio that is more profitable than any other game studio ever simply makes no sense. Yes, they still need to make games for the 360, but they can also develop for other platforms now. Exclusivity is huge in the industry. It is why the 360 is doing well this quarter.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
No, because your line of reasoning makes substantially less sense.

It does? I didn't know you were so involved in the economics of game development, considering you didn't know what a second-party game dev was until I told you.

MS is copying Sony in its structure of game development now that they have a new head of MGS. Nothing more, nothing less.

Getting rid of an internal studio that is more profitable than any other game studio ever simply makes no sense.

MS always had the choice to keep the developer. They looked at it, and determined this arrangement is better.

Yes, they still need to make games for the 360, but they can also develop for other platforms now. Exclusivity is huge in the industry.

And since MS is, by terms of the agreement, their publisher...guess who dictates exclusive features for each platform?

And since it does allow them to publish on other consoles, and MS still makes royalties on the games sold on other platforms, is this not just another way for MS to expand the install base of games they publish? Now they can make royalties on all platforms, not just their own. So there's potential for more money to be made by MS, without the constant overhead and inherent risk involved with having a development house. Am I the only one thinking MS feels they got burned by Rare and don't want a repeat of a costly development house developing games not selling too well once they deviate from their "bread and butter"?

I think it makes a whole lot of sense -- a lot more sense than MS "hating that Bungie appreciates its fans" or Bungie hated making Halo games so much that they agreed to develop 2 more in a contract. MS spun Bungie off, Bungie didn't "leave". There are very huge differences there that I don't think you nor Agathon understand.

[Wiglaf]

Don't be a dick. I asked how Rare differed from Bungie, not the definition of a second party developer.

And since it does allow them to publish on other consoles, and MS still makes royalties on the games sold on other platforms, is this not just another way for MS to expand the install base of games they publish? Now they can make royalties on all platforms, not just their own.

THEY COULD ALWAYS DO THAT. Even with Bungie as a first party studio. The reason they choose not to is because exclusivity is what sells hardware. Notice how 360 sales doubled this month? Wonder why?

[Wiglaf]

MS always had the choice to keep the developer. They looked at it, and determined this arrangement is better.

I think they had to choose between a decent option (letting Bungie go) or a terrible option (having them leave and retaining only the name of the studio).

[Asher]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
THEY COULD ALWAYS DO THAT. Even with Bungie as a first party studio. The reason they choose not to is because exclusivity is what sells hardware. Notice how 360 sales doubled this month? Wonder why?

Because the Wii couldn't handle Halo 3 and the PS3's online network sucks so much ass it also couldn't handle Halo 3.

Yes, exclusivity is big. But you don't seem to understand. MS is their publisher. If MS agrees to publish a game, it determines which platform it can go on. Only if it agrees NOT to publish a game can it go on other platforms, but even then it has to go on the Xbox platform.

This way MS isn't forced to invest or publish in games it doesn't think highly of (like Perfect Dark Zero ) and Bungie can feel free to experiment more. This is why most industry followers are calling this a win-win situation.

This means Bungie can go back to making a second studio that can make its crap games like Myth and Oni, which I doubt MS would agree to publish. Oni was a Bungie PS2 game BTW.

For all the talk about Bungie, its only worthwhile game franchise it's ever made was Halo. Marathon was decent, but basically Halo is Marathon++ and the Marathon franchise is now obsolete.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
I think they had to choose between a decent option (letting Bungie go) or a terrible option (having them leave and retaining only the name of the studio).

The key Bungie folk from Halo 1 had left a while ago, Wiggy.

[Wiglaf]

You are just of your mind. If Microsoft was worried about Bungie making crap games, they would not have let them go. If they ruin their image and make bad games, they don't get good royalties and start to look bad. It'd be much better for them to control Bungie's development rather than let them make a few "Perfect Dark Zeros".

[Asher]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
You are just of your mind. If Microsoft was worried about Bungie making crap games, they would not have let them go. If they ruin their image and make bad games, they don't get good royalties and start to look bad. It'd be much better for them to control Bungie's development rather than let them make a few "Perfect Dark Zeros".

Heh. You didn't even get the reference, how cute. PD0 was a Rare game (fully owned by MS). Rare was given development autonomy as part of the purchase agreement, and look what happened there. Bungie would clearly want the same (which studio wouldn't?).

Rather than giving them development autonomy and being forced to publish their games, like MS still is with Rare, it cut them loose and structured it so they can cherry pick which Bungie games to make Xbox 360 exclusive and still guarantee they get all Xbox 360 games -- without paying the development cost.

See how this makes more sense now?

[Wiglaf]

A) Why doesn't MS get rid of Rare then, as part of their "strategy"?
B) No, I got the reference, you didn't get my response. Allowing Bungie freedom to make bad games is stupid because it taints the studio's image, which hurts sales. Microsoft would be better just prohibiting them from trying to make games like that.

[Asher]

I tire of beating up Wiggy in this debate.

Simply put, MS is in a position now to get "first dibs" on any and all Bungie games for publishing rights. MS chooses which games to invest in and make Xbox 360 exclusive, otherwise Bungie can choose any other publisher they want and put the game on any other platform they want, but it also still has to be published to the Xbox 360. Further, MS would still get royalty payments out of the games not on the Xbox 360.

Thus, this is a win win. Bungie gets development autonomy, MS gets its Halo games and first-dib on publishing rights for all other Bungie games.

Spinning this any other way is ridiculous. This isn't about Bungie hating making Halo games (they agreed to do more!), nor is it about Bungie hating MS (they agreed to make MS their publishing partner). It's about MS shedding its first party studios in favour of agreements with other companies to publish the games instead.

[Wiglaf]

Rather than giving them development autonomy and being forced to publish their games, like MS still is with Rare, i

They're not forced to do anything. WTF?