Bungie Jump

[Matblack]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7030513.stm

MB

[Daz]

Been rumoured for a couple of weeks now. Seems more amicable than the rumours were suggesting though.

It's interesting really. It's obviously been driven by Bungie not MS, but it looks like MS will remain majority share holder (and with it a large degree of control), and keep a seemingly exclusive publishing agreement (ruling out developing for third parties as a driver). So why bother?

Probably just politics.

[edit]Ah, not majority share holders. So it's purely about control.

[Davey_Pitch]

Seems fair to me. With the huge success of Halo Bungie's name has never been bigger. A new IP developed for both Xbox 360 and PS3 could prove hugely profitable for them, and the move away from MS means they can do that if they want to.

[Daz]

Not if MS are the sole publisher though surely? MGS only publish for GFW and 360 I thought.

This gives them the flexibility to set their own internal priorities though, I imagine MS were blocking them from working on anything except Halo/Halo Wars.

[Davey_Pitch]

MS only own the publishing rights to future Halo titles, the article suggests that the move opens up the chance for Bungie to develop on other systems :)

[Daz]

Sorry, I'm going from the Eurogamer article:

http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=84829
It will also continue to publish games based on the Microsoft-owned Halo IP and other future properties developed by Bungie.

[Mark]

I'm reading that the same way as Davey ('that' being both the BBC and Eurogamer articles).

[leowyatt]

Interesting move, I could be wrong but wasn't it a big coup when MS got bungie?

[Davey_Pitch]

Interesting move, I could be wrong but wasn't it a big coup when MS got bungie?
I might not have seemed so at the time (they'd been primarily a PC developer so people had no idea how good their console efforts would be), though obviously looking back it was a huge coup and probably the main reason the Xbox/360 is as popular as it is.