No of course you were not talking about it, as that bit of history puts holes into your construction of microsoft as a more benvolent publisher/games company that looks after it's ips through to the end of time, you know like all those dead ages games, the mech warrior games, rise games, close combat, myth marathon ect ect. Plus there is the more shortsighted actions as killing there sucessful first party studios that they brought then axed.

But hey instead change the boundries of your argument and bring up your facination or distraction with plushophilia, that's always pertinant in your dealing with the world I'm sure.

Benevolent? Microsoft is benevolent? Huh? But as a correction, Close Combat was also published by SSI and Mech Warrior games are still being made. Myth is I.P. owned by Take two and Marathon was self published by Bungie themselves.

In any case I will repeat.

There are both pros and cons for both strategies of pushing exclusivity. Microsoft generally does not take control over the work of a developer. So once the 6-12 months are up the game developer is free to to whatever they want with the I.P. and infact it may lead to a better result for the game developer because it may put them in the position to control their own I.P. which is very important to a lot of companies. Sony on the other hand does, so any smaller time I.P. they get their hands on from anything they published can tend to die once they lose interest. That means if you love a game series, the chance of it continuing under Sony are smaller than Microsoft overall because the developers have fewer options. I personally believe that the control over I.P. should be in the hands of the people who love the I.P. and not some large multinational.

P.S. Ensemble closed down but the two teams which made up Ensemble are not dead. Infact this is one of the better results because these two companies are now free and they can be much more effective than they were at Ensemble.

Well, it remains to be seen if they can be more effective. Ensemble wasn't "ineffective", they were one of the top strategy developers in the world.

Personally, a development studio's biggest asset is the people, followed by the IP. I would never, ever, give my IP to a big publisher in exchange for funding. That just leaves you open for closures and bad financial situations, because if you have owned IP, you can leverage that financially in the future, to get out of tight spots or have better contracts.

Of course, if I was a big studio, I would try to get the IP no matter what. IMO MS has made some mistakes by not buying Bioware, and not owning the Mass Effect and Gears of War franchises, after having put so much money into them. Heck, I don't care it costs 2 billion, I would buy Epic Games, they are a great creative and technology studio which would be a massive asset. But, as shown by Microsoft's actions the last 2 years, they are going the opposite direction - closing down 4 or 5 studios, letting Bungie go, etc.

Ensemble was ineffectual in that they had two full development teams and yet produced a game only about once every 3 years. Not as a developer but as a business. Personally I wish that Ensemble, Flight sim guys, FASA etc were cut loose ala Bungie rather than closed down.

As for Bioware, they are a HUGE company. You couldn't justify a 500 strong developer for a single console manufacturer. Bioware would have essentially made up over half of Microsoft game studios by themselves. They'd need to sell something in the order of 2-2.5M copies of games per year in order to break even and a console manufacturer cannot always ensure that as theres always a couple of years with every console transition where game sales are lower on the mainline console.

Lastly, Epic is worth money because they are independant. As soon as they are owned by one of the big publishers their value is diminished as they cannot sell their engine as easily.

Ensemble had shipped games in 2000, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2009, that's not once every 3 years. The second team also did a lot of R&D, and was in charge of the proposed Halo MMO. Regardless, the factory line mentality is what you seem to like more, I don't support the "1 game per year or per 2 years" mentality, you do a game with maximum quality and without rushing it. The only way you do AAA games yearly or every 2 years is with huge budgets and huge teams, which just increases the cost, which is the whole point, not having insane costs.

Bioware are a huge company NOW, they opened a third location and were put in charge of Mythic after EA bought them. MS has still supported (in a limited way) PC publishing, can you imagine Mass Effect (without the constant rumours), Dragon Age, and The Old Republic, all 360-only or PC360? That would be insanely huge for MS! ME has done great without the PS3, and Dragon Age has sold worse on the PS3, so I don't see what profitability problem there is there. Maybe you are referring to the 42 million KZ2 cost (plus marketing), or the 60 million GT5 is costing (plus marketing)?

As for Epic, yes, that's what has stopped anyone buying them, they make a lot of money out of selling the engine. But it could still work, initially there was no easy PS3 Unreal until Epic ported UT3, and MS could easily make Unreal Engine the "xbox engine", available at competitive pricing to people developing 360 or PC360 titles, which would make a lot of devs really consider if it was wise or not to develop for PS3. Don't underestimate pipeline advantages, i've worked with Unreal on more than 1 occasion, even if MS only bought them now, several companies have an entire pipeline or franchise based on the UE technology.

Anyway, it's not like MS cares, Gears and now Shadow Complex are 360 exclusives anyway. I would just do it diferently.

while of course sony's is being very hypocritcal, cause they do buy timed exclusives alot, especially last gen. however he is trying to highlight their different strategy, microsoft first party is much non existant, i mean lionhead, turn10, 343 games,rare, and the lips people, is that it?

left 4 dead, mass effect, gears of war, splinter cell, ninja gaiden 2*, tales of vesperia*, last remnant, all third party exclusives.

where sony has locked up a huge profile of first and second party developers:
sony santa monica, naughty dog, liverpool,japan studio, polyphony digital, zipper,team ico, san diago, sony bend,geurilla games, london studio,... a few more lesser known ones plus a nice variety of second party, media molecule insomniac, level 5, sucker punch to name a few.

So the money MS gives to developers just gets thrown away? Or do the developers use the money to enhance their product, via more employees, or higher quality employees? It must be going somewhere? Possibly to another game down the line for all platforms to enjoy?

My statement was based off the after report of one of the ensemble employees giving the reasons why they may have been shut down. It was their words and not my own interpretation of events.

It might have been huge for Microsoft to buy Bioware, however they are looking to shed a lot of their fixed costs so it doesn't look like it would fit within their strategy. Look at Sony, they have had a huge development enterprise as a weight around their neck since the start of the generation. I would suggest a significant proportion of their losses was from the fact that their developers had to fulfill their 'powerful' console image and the low console sales. I don't think Microsoft is keen to put themselves that far over the line and risk losing money like Sony has.

Yes I agree there are positives from aquiring Epic, however the company would lose the incentive to really innovate with their engine once they get a captive audience.

No the developers close down so that noone can have their gamez after they got the ca$h from M$$$$$$.

What's your point?  Im talking about Microsoft's very low strategy of taking other companies stuff by buy it out.