Ex-Ensemble Studios Team Open New Studio

Robot Entertainment announced today the formation of its new game development studio in Plano, Texas. Founded by many of the original founders of Ensemble Studios, Robot has a staff of 45 comprised entirely of former Ensemble employees. Robot's team developed the hit franchise Age of Empires, selling over 20 million units worldwide, and the soon-to-be released Halo Wars for Xbox 360. Tony Goodman, the founder of Ensemble, is the CEO of Robot.

[GWAVE]

I wonder if this company will support Microsoft after they cut them loose. These guys would be awesome making multiplatform games.

[Johandevries]

Age of Empires IV: Back to the Middle-Ages :D

[green]

The answer to your question is an article awaiting approval. http://www.n4g.com/industry...

[BRG9000]

Thanks for the link Green. Bubbles. :)

I'm excited that this team is staying together, they are very talented. I'm happy about the news that they're working on Halo Wars content too, since I plan to buy the game and the RTS genre is great for DLC.

It sounds like basically the same people are going to be working on similar projects, but without the same contractual obligations they once had to Microsoft. Sounds like good news for gamers all around.

[Rock Bottom]

Haven't they already said that they will be creating two smaller studios from Ensemble's remains, one will be taking care of Halo Wars, and the other will handle other Ensemble title(Age of Empire), they wont be releasing new games for a while though, the teams are there just to keep their previous projects online experience going.

[BattleAxe]

These guys must be pissed off with MS. What better way to show their worth then to make a good PS3 exclusive game.

[InfectedDK]

"I wonder if this company will support Microsoft after they cut them loose. These guys would be awesome making multiplatform games"

Or PS3 exclusives?

[Bnet343]

Nice, they're going to be making HW DLC. That's a good start. Make some DLC to get everyone warmed up for a full game after.

[HWG]

That's crazy! I used to live in Plano, Texas. Great place to open a dev studio!

[snakebite36]

I liked the name "Ensemble Studios".

[kickaski]

FOR GREAT JUSTICE! i love the age of series so much, i hope their next game will have atleast as much love and quality! :-D

[onomix]

Ensemble means ''Together'' in French.

[hippo24]

ironic, no

[ThatCanadianGuy]

Good for them.Great studio! I loved all their games.

Age of Mythology was my fav!

[Foxgod]

I Wonder what the second studio that formed from Ensemble will be doing.
Since we now know that Robot entertainment will continue on Halo wars, the second studio will obviously not be the one working on Halo wars like previous rumors suggested.

This is part of the MS strategy, they are reviewing their studio's and hiring new talent and splitting the studio's up.
This way there will be more third party support for the 360.

[Jinxstar]

now hopefully they go back to making decent PC games.

[ravenl0rd]

I didn't understand Microsoft closing Ensemble before Halo Wars even came out. The studio had no chance at redemption. Anyway, good news here. I don't have an XBOX, but I absolutely love the Age series. I played the hell out of Age of Mythology. I still pick it up and did in fact play a scenario from the campaign a couple days ago.

[Microsoft Xbox 360]

Expect their next game to be multiplatform or maybe exclusive to the PS3.

[Diselage]

Glad to see these guys are going to be making great games again but Microsoft still owns all the IP rights to the games they made so it still sucks. Won't be any Age of Empires any time soon.