Sony is going down the wrong path with their game development?

[slowmo]

psrock said:

jarrod said:

psrock said:
Gears is as first party as MGS4 is first party.

That's pretty much nowhere near the case.  Gears was 100% funded, promoted and published by Microsoft.  They don't own the IP (somewhat shockingly, as that tends to be what happens when one funds, promotes and publishes a game), by they were involved in pretty much every step of the game's creation and even had some of their own R&D staff on it.  

Funding money to keep a game exclusive doesn't make it first party, and trust me I am pretty sure Sony paid money to keep this game as well.  Gears 1 and 2 are a 3rd party game.

Would Epic not actually come under the 2nd party umbrella when working so close to Microsoft on the Gears franchise in fairness?  Obviously Epic are a 3rd party company given they are not owned by Microsoft but when a publisher funds so much of a game and has the input Microsoft did then it is probably more accurate to call them a 2nd party developer in the instance of that game. 

One thing thats for certain is Gears is not a first party game.