Ah I see.

but isn't halo pretty much always a sucecss? The last few Halo have sold extremely well so what difference does another Halo success make for Micrososft in their risk taking analysis?

Taking a risk in 343. It really isn't if Halo succeeds, but if 343 developes another juggernaut.

Im not saying Gears wont last through til the end of this generation. I am saying it dont think it will get past it and if they do Microsoft would have to pay them a large sum to force a hole in the finite story they already have (In the game that is) which has already reached closure much like God of War. The difference as well between Sony doing it and Microsoft doing it is they are standing in the way of Epic focusing on larger new IP's. If they bought Epic then by all means, its not like Epic didnt say they wanted to focus on PC games next gen (Yes...yes they did). They gave closure to the story of Marcus Fenix and come on Marcus was the heart and soul of the franchise. His leadership helped the supporting characters. Milking has everything to do with the validity of the storyline. Super Mario and Zelda have been milked to death in this case, but why does no one care? Its because it has no story arch or ending moment that retires the character. It is just not provided...those characters can last forever. In the same vein Nathan Drake can have hundreds of missions and adventures because this world clearly has so many historical myths, legends and archeology stories. They could even make up one but have used historical ones as well. Nathan Drake has clearly become a staple mascot for Sony.

The pendulum wars bit makes sense though, but it seems like Epic is content unless Microsoft pays them. Closure has been brought to the story and Halo never had closure, because everyone knew Master Chief would be brought out of cryo sleep whenever Cortana needed him. This was hinted at earlier in the gen. Again, Cliff Blezsinski has said that Gears will last as long as Microsofts pockets run on Gametrailers numerous times. Judgement may be cannon but the media regarded it as a spin-off, especially being that it was handed to People Can Fly. I am sure Epic has bigger fish to fry with the PC crowd next gen as they've said before.

Again there is much room for prequels alone. People Can Fly is making Judgement.....freeing up Epic as we speak. You know this and yet you still said that Epic resources would be tied up with gears when clearly those reigns have been handed off now.

Multiplayer is the heart and soul of the franchise. Most people dismissed Gears as a good story (which is disapointing).

I agree with you mostly here. You're right, in the gaming realm the heart of these games is the gameplay. The problem with the perception of the Gears story is actually Epics fault when dealing with the script . Trust me I love the Gears franchise, just never read any books. The only game this gen that has warrented me to extensivel buy its books is Mass Effect. Anyhow, Epic had the script written based on the three game contract they had with Microsoft which gimped the validity down to three games. Its like how I love the anime series Gantz but the main story only lasted 26 episodes in the DVD set but was continued in the Manga. Halos story wasnt conveyed very well by Bungie in the games which is why I felt barely anything in what should've been the "last stand" of Reach. I had fun in the games but the storyline was only a briefing point for me before the multiplayer. With what 343 is doing and it seems they took a lot of former Sony members, but they are actually focusing alot on fleshing out the story of the dramatic realm within Halo, which how I think the books always meant for it to be treated. Even the anime of Halo was more emotional than the game.

As for the Epic resources bit, yes I agree that People Can Fly is handling the same engine and structure Gears of War 3 was built on now with Judgement, but IF Gears lasts til next gen you know who is making the next gen version. 

So thats why Halo 4 will outsell everything this year from others 1st parties Console manufacters?

Do you really believe Nintendo will sell less than 10M of software this holiday? Really?

Think he means just Sony. We all know Nintendo 1st party sells like crazy.