I'll never forget what they did to Ensemble Studios and Bruce Shelley...

Is http://www.microsoft.com/games/flight/ their only current PC-only game in development?

oh look,some people starting to want MS make PC game again,and i guess if they do that(every game on PC+360),they will say "where is my 360 exclusives?",and if MS make many game 360 only,they will say"where is my PC games?"

never change

Mr Puggsly said: Lucas-Rio said: Microsoft has by far the worst first and second party studio among the 3 manufacturer. They don't care about developping games. They closed their best studio, Ensemble Studio without any reason. They turned Rare into a joke. It will take a very long time until they are taken seriously as a developper. Nonsense, Halo a lone puts them above Sony in my book Rare has played a pretty big roll in the 360 appealing to casual audiences. Something PS3 has been struggling to do. So I'd hardly say Rare is a joke.

It's not really nonsense. When you try to look at it from a hardcore gamer's perspective, assuming Lucas-Rio is a hardcore gamer, then it's quite reasonable for one to make the claim that MS 1st & 2nd party lineup is the weakest. Opinions aside, one can objectively make the case that Microsoft makes the least amount of games for the hardcore gamer. Of course these games are good, maybe better than all of Sony's lineup combined, but for the sake of the argument, objectively, Sony trumps Microsoft in the quantity department.

As far as quality is concerned, that's all subjective. However, if someone makes the claim that Sony's lineup is superior on the basis of quality and quantity, then their opinion is at least backed up by some objectivity, and it certainly shouldn't be deemed 'nonsense'. Compare that with your opinion, which is based solely on quality alone, literally. You say the quality of ONE game trunps the quality AND quantity of the opposing console's ENTIRE lineup. Your opinion is much less objective than Lusas's. In fact, I'd say Lucas Rio's opinion makes a lot more 'sense' then yours, objectively.

Also, I'd say Kinect as a device was a much bigger 'role' at attracting casuals. Rare is the dev of some successful Kinect games, yes, but those games sold more on the basis of being Kinect games, Rare really didn't have to do much. If your talking about standard games for the casual audience, then I point you towards Media Molecule as a Sony dev attracting the casuals as much as Rare.

NotStan said: Lucas-Rio said: Mr Puggsly said: Lucas-Rio said: Microsoft has by far the worst first and second party studio among the 3 manufacturer. They don't care about developping games. They closed their best studio, Ensemble Studio without any reason. They turned Rare into a joke. It will take a very long time until they are taken seriously as a developper. Nonsense, Halo a lone puts them over Sony in my book. They closed down Ensemble because they didn't need them. Ensemble's best days were behind them. If MS feels the need to put out more strategy games I'm sure Robot Entertainment would be glad to help. Rare has played a pretty big roll in the 360 appealing to casual audiences. Something PS3 has been struggling to do. So I'd hardly say Rare is a joke. It only takes one great game to be taken as a serious develeloper. Rare is a joke. They went from an universally acclaimed  developper on Suoer Nintendo and Nintendo 64 to a very average developper to xobox, to a bad developper to Xbox 360.Now they are done. They are doing some Wii sport copies that any studio could do. They are dead. Halo is a big franchise, but Bungie is not even with Microsoft anymore. And the diversity of Sony developpers annilates Microsoft. Ensemble Studio was better than any studio Microsoft still has. The way they threated them was digusting. They forced them to make a dumbed down RTS for 8 years olds kids (Halo wars) then they closed them eventough it outsold pretty much all of the Rare shovelwares titles. http://kotaku.com/5157029/so-why-did-ensemble-studios-close-up I like strategy games as much as anyone, but it's one of the genres that has really decreased in following over the last years, it doesn't make sense to make strategy games when the audience just isn't there, and when you specialize in strategy games.. I hope you're not stupid enough not to guess the outcome of that scenario. Halo Wars sold on the basis that it had the word HALO in it, just like anything that does sells better than most PS3 exclusives - if you want to play it that way.

I suppose Starcraft 2 selling 1 million in a day doesn't count? Or the fact that as of October 2007 Age of Empires 3 had sold over 2 million copies. RTS games are still pretty big.

Lucas-Rio said: Mr Puggsly said: Lucas-Rio said: Microsoft has by far the worst first and second party studio among the 3 manufacturer. They don't care about developping games. They closed their best studio, Ensemble Studio without any reason. They turned Rare into a joke. It will take a very long time until they are taken seriously as a developper. Nonsense, Halo a lone puts them over Sony in my book. They closed down Ensemble because they didn't need them. Ensemble's best days were behind them. If MS feels the need to put out more strategy games I'm sure Robot Entertainment would be glad to help. Rare has played a pretty big roll in the 360 appealing to casual audiences. Something PS3 has been struggling to do. So I'd hardly say Rare is a joke. It only takes one great game to be taken as a serious develeloper. Rare is a joke. They went from an universally acclaimed  developper on Suoer Nintendo and Nintendo 64 to a very average developper to xobox, to a bad developper to Xbox 360.Now they are done. They are doing some Wii sport copies that any studio could do. They are dead. Halo is a big franchise, but Bungie is not even with Microsoft anymore. And the diversity of Sony developpers annilates Microsoft. Ensemble Studio was better than any studio Microsoft still has. The way they threated them was digusting. They forced them to make a dumbed down RTS for 8 years olds kids (Halo wars) then they closed them eventough it outsold pretty much all of the Rare shovelwares titles.

Ensemble were closed because they started to cost too much money. They were due to create a (rather expensive) Halo MMO which was canned. With MS shifting focus onto 360 development they felt Ensemble were less relevant and didn't bother to wait for Halo Wars to be released before announcing the closure.

MS handled the whole affair wrong. They could have made some changes to the studio, cut the staff etc. but they just shut them down in a knee-jerk reaction. A pretty stupid decision imo as they then decided to make Age of Empires Online (which is quite good actually) and ended up using the ex-Ensemble guys at Robot Entertainment anyway.

OMFG. I cant believe some sad people on this site.

The OP is pointing out that M$ are heavily investing in 1st party. Which WILL benefit Xbox in the new generation.
Halo, Fable, Forza are all games at the top of their genres in quality and reviews. In fact Fable doesnt have any real competition.

The fact that M$ have teams and studio in place to produce core games for new generation is fantastic.

IMO I dont particularly like Nintys direction of its first party games, and Sony's are not focused enough on gameplay IMO. Ive never been enthusiastic about Sonys FP. To much riff raff imo.

I hope M$ adds to its current FP franchises with series of the same gameplay quality.

Halo is the best story in videogame history along with Mass Effect IMO. Much better than the over generic undertones of other series or the twisted mess that is Metal Gear series.

M$ already win for me, because they have less but more involving games. IMO

Yes Sony fans and ninty fans wont understand how can I can say that. But the only games that remotely interest me on other platforms are Uncharted, Killzone and OOT 3ds. Other than that, the rest couldnt exist for all I care.

Halo, Forza and Gears are in a diferen league of involvement and fun IMO.

More of that quality and friend focus please M$. ALso Please dont follow Sony down the take player control away to do x,y,z scene look good. Thats where Uncharted is really frustrating.

I prefer M$ angle on game develpment.

IN MY OPINION.

Over.

Lucas-Rio said: Microsoft has by far the worst first and second party studio among the 3 manufacturer. They don't care about developping games. They closed their best studio, Ensemble Studio without any reason. They turned Rare into a joke. It will take a very long time until they are taken seriously as a developper.

And they sold Bioware

Compared to what they lost since this gen started tgat investment is nothing.

And I have a suspicion all those new studios will be kinect oriented.

they better invest, because halo 4 is probably the only heavy hitter exclusive they have on the horizon.

Zlejedi said: Lucas-Rio said: Microsoft has by far the worst first and second party studio among the 3 manufacturer. They don't care about developping games. They closed their best studio, Ensemble Studio without any reason. They turned Rare into a joke. It will take a very long time until they are taken seriously as a developper. And they sold Bioware Compared to what they lost since this gen started tgat investment is nothing. And I have a suspicion all those new studios will be kinect oriented.

wtf,they never own Bioware
some peoples really don't know anything about MS

不懂裝懂

They've never owned Bioware , although it would definitely have benefited them, if they had purchased them.

Some thing to keep in mind though when talking about their letting studios go at times, sometimes they just want something new like Bungie, Bungie wanted to do new things, Microsoft wanted Halo, they both got what they wanted in the end.

So hopefully 343I will be a suitable replacement, tough shoes to fill...