Those were independent studios.  Microsoft didn't step in and prevent them from being purchased, though.

Have you seriously never heard of Age of Empires?  The best friggin' RTS series out there?

Only the Battle for Middle-earth II and Supreme Commander touch the masterpieces that Ensemble has made (in my opinion - games like Company of Heroes are up there as well).

Bizarre is part of Sega?  I thought they are now part of Activision, or do freelance work for different companies.  Bizarre did do Metropolis Street Racing (became Project Gotham) for Sega.

Yes, they were bought by Activision.

I'm not sure why I didn't notice that when I first read his post. 0_o

I heard "of" it...but I never knew who was behind it or that Microsoft was even involved. Mind you the only RTS I ever played was starcraft...for about a 2 week perion on my PC so its not my genre of choice.

Well it's the best genre there is!

Speakign of that, I need to upgrade my PC.  >_>

I'll be honest and say I've never played any other RTS games, but I can say that the Age of Empires games (and Age of Mythology) are among the best games that I've ever played. And believe it or not, I've played a lot of games.

I'm a ps3 fan and I've been playing ES games on and off from 1999 to 2008, so of course I'm saddened by their closure. I would very much like to see a sequel to AOM or AOE4 but that looks more like a pipe dream than a reality now that ES has officially closed.

From the Age of Empires III Collector's Edition:

:'(

Yeah. Also these few:

Wingnut Interactive-Making Halo: Chronicles which is the Halo project Peter Jackson is involved in.

Xbox Live Productions-Working on South Park. Formely worked on Fable II Pub Games. Key members were from another studio MS folded called Carbonated Games.

It should be noted that some of the Ensemble staff is getting gobbled up. We don't know whether a new studio will form around them or if they are joining a pre-existing studio and project.