Microsoft Now Owns Gears Too?

On 01/30/2014 at 02:09 PM by KnightDriver

First it was Halo now Gears. What other game franchises does Microsoft own now? Well, a lot. Just to name a few are: Age of Empires, Crackdown, Fable (‘cause they own Lionhead), and all the games by Rare and Twisted Pixel (‘cause they own them too). Microsoft has partnered with many developers as well including formerly Sony exclusive Insomniac Games who are now going to release Sunset Overdrive later this year for Xbox One.

This seriously makes me think of Crackdown

Canadian developer Black Tusk Studios will do next Gears game. They’re have not done any game previously that I know of. Only this 2013 E3 teaser which I guess is not going to be a game now that they are doing Gears.

Lookie here! We're a serious game studio. Just not this game.

On Major Nelson’s podcast today he interviewed Rod Fergusson, the director of production on the first three Gears games, who will now lead the Black Tusk Studios team. He was also put at the head of production for Bioshock Infinite in its last year to help it get out the door after several delays. I guess he’s the right guy to get a Gears game done and out the door on deadline.

I played the heck out of Gears 1-3. I was late to the party, but when I got there, I loved it. Co-op was such a blast especially in Horde mode. I still have to get Judgment and play that. I’ve always been a fan of the developers of Judgment, People Can Fly (now Epic Games Poland), because of Painkiller on original Xbox.

Super Step Contributing Writer

01/30/2014 at 02:12 PM

Monopolysoft or good for the consumer? Too tired to decide.

KnightDriver

01/30/2014 at 02:19 PM

They closed Ensemble (Age of Empires, Halo Wars), boo! They made Rare do Avatars and Kinect games, boo! They have Lionhead doing Kinect, XBLA, and now a multiplayer game, boo! They gave Halo to 343 Industries and they teased MC about his age and possible sociopathic tendencies, boo! Tell me I'm wrong, please, but man, this doesn't look good.

01/30/2014 at 10:33 PM

I can't tell you either way, having sat out last generation until getting Steam installed on my laptop last winter ... which is actually this winter, just technically last year. In December.

transmet2033

02/01/2014 at 10:03 AM

This wonderful little list is why I prefer Sony and have very little problem saying goodbye to Microsoft. Hopefully Halo won't lure me back into their unloving arms...

02/02/2014 at 03:03 AM

On a good note. Remember EA buying Pandemic Studios, makers of one of my favorite series Destroy All Humans! (also Mercenaries and Star Wars Battlefront) and then shutting them down a year later? I was so pissed that DAH was going to end. But now there are over a dozen former Pandemic developers working at 343 Industries who worked on Halo 4 and Halo Anniversary (I fault Halo 4 for it's story but it is a beautiful and smart playing game).

MS knows who to hire for their projects, but why do they and other companies always buy development companies and then close them? To eliminate competition?

C.S.3590SquadLeader

01/30/2014 at 03:04 PM

I don't know how to feel about this since I haven't played a Gears game, but hopefully it won't be treated as badly as some of Rare's properties have been.

01/30/2014 at 03:50 PM

Who's Rare? I mean, what happened to Rare? Since 2010 all they've done is Kinect Sports. OMG!

Alex-C25

01/30/2014 at 03:23 PM

Huh, I thought Gears was already part of Microsoft because of being always an exclusive franchise.

01/30/2014 at 03:52 PM

They had a deal with Epic Games to release exclusively on Xbox, but Epic owned the IP, until just recently. Now MS can assign whoever they want to do the next game, even to a studio that hasn't proven anything yet like Black Tusk.

Aboboisdaman

01/30/2014 at 04:59 PM

Sunset Overdrive looks pretty cool. I missed out on Gears since I've never owned a Xbox. This is a dumb question... but, did they ever release those games on PC?

jgusw

01/31/2014 at 11:09 AM

I think only the first game got a PC release.

01/31/2014 at 12:33 PM

That's right. Only the first one made it to PC. Thank you wiki.

Blake Turner Staff Writer

01/30/2014 at 05:03 PM

Hasn't Gears always been owned by Microsoft? Like... always? And yeah, it sucks that microsoft owns Age Of Empires. They'll probably bring out a new one and make an xbone exclusive.

01/31/2014 at 12:38 PM

Epic owned the Gears IP until this news hit. MS just had a contract with them to release it only on their system.

They did Age of Empires Online in 2011. I wanted to play that. I was kinda hoping it would make it to Xbox 360. It looked a lot like Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution.

F1r3inth3H0L3

01/30/2014 at 06:24 PM

I think it kinda sucks that Microsoft purchased the IP. Maybe we would have seen a Gears game on PS4...oh well. I think I have played enough of the series anyways.

01/31/2014 at 12:46 PM

Gears 3 was a amazing. I'll play Judgment sometime soon I think. The co-op is so darn good. I could care less about the story and characters though. I wonder what Epic is going to do now?.... working.... Holy Schemolie! Have you head about this Chinese company Tencent Holdings buying up almost half of Epic's stock? Soon after that happened in 2012, Cliff Bleszinski left as well as prez Mike Capps and a whole bunch of key people. Now the Gears IP is sold off too. Looks like Epic might be done. I wonder what Tencent gets out of all of this? It seems like they just ran Epic into the ground.

02/01/2014 at 01:03 PM

I played the hell out of the Gears of War games, great games. I too wonder what Epic will come up with next. Was it them that produced that "Good Samuritan" video? Cannot remember at the moment.

02/02/2014 at 03:53 AM

I wonder who's left at Epic? At least there's still People Can Fly (now Epic Games Poland). I want to see their Fortnite game.

daftman

01/30/2014 at 09:12 PM

I heard about that. I bet Epic made a ton of money in that deal.

01/31/2014 at 12:51 PM

I guess, but I just read that this Chinese company Tencent Holdings has half of Epic's stock. I wonder if they came in just to sell everything off and ultimate close the company. They came into Epic July 2012 and soon after all the key people at Epic left the company. Now it's a fire sale. I wonder if was all planned by Epic or if this constitutes a hostile takeover by Tencent just to profit from the sale of all Epic's properties?

NSonic79

01/31/2014 at 01:32 PM

I know how "awesome" is that! Just wiat and we'll soon see a cross over game between Gears and Halo. I can see it now: "Gears of Halo Wars" or "Halo: War of Gears".

The MC weilding a Lancer? I quivver with anticipation....

01/31/2014 at 01:56 PM

Ryan McCaffrey on IGN's Podcast Unlocked yesterday was talking about MS doing something like Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale with all these IPs they now own.

goaztecs

01/31/2014 at 04:46 PM

I don't know if this is a good or bad thing. One one hand Microsoft is assembling a good lineup of Exclusives but on the other hand they could push the franchises in directions that their fans might not like or turn them the games into commercials for Windows.

For someone like me who isn't a big fan of the games listed, it would be like Nintendo's or Sony's lineup of exclusives. It is interesting to see if they do what NSonic said about crossovers within their licenses (I saw that you said something about their version of All-Stars Battle Royale, can you imagine a Microsoft version of Mario Kart?)

02/01/2014 at 01:58 AM

Ha! They could do Forza but with big head characters sticking out of the cars.

PixlBit