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[CamHostage]

Yeah, I'd much prefer Xbox to have bought Eidos Montreal and Crystal Dynamics. It is interesting that those two studios are both now working with Xbox first party studios on 2 different games. I would love for Xbox to buy both of these studios from Embracer after A/B/K goes through.

I don't really like MS's purchase of Activision either (it feels like pulling ringers into a big match you were looking forward to watching play out, and I don't usually see good things for consumers when a market consolidates,) but the one easy silver lining is that at least there's a good chance with how things worked out that both companies will be returning to their hits / making new titles.

Activision (if you remove Blizzard from the equation) was quickly becoming CoD Corp. and canceling even its generally-successful product lines like THPS and Crash Bandicoot because they were only making millions, not billions. And Square Enix was never "Square and Enix and Eidos" (it has a hard time enough remembering the Enix part of its business, and Enix reportedly was the cash holder who took in Square at the time, I assume the bigwigs are still proportionately Enix people?) Eidos never fit, and I don't know if their brands would have flourished if they were still a standalone publisher (Eidos might have just fallen off the map and sold its brands to THQ Nordic a long time ago.... which would be the Embracer situation we have now anyway, except the studios managed to make it out alive) but if you were an Eidos studio and your game didn't star Lara Croft, you had an uphill battle to fight.

With this situation, Embracer will for sure try to mine the brands for all that they're worth since that's their business mechanism, and MS has indicated that it'd be happy to see Activision dig deeper into its toybox than it has in recent times. So if you like Legacy of Kain/Soul Reaver, Thief, Crash, Spyro, maybe Gex or Prototype or stuff like that, now's not the time to hold your breath but at least there's more than a 0.00% chance that you might see these titles return now that business-as-usual has broken up a bit for these companies.

 

[Black_Stride]

It’s interesting that Xbox don’t feel confident enough in their talent, or have enough talent, to develop Perfect Dark and Fable internally in a traditional sense. All big AAA productions outsource, but they don’t usually outsource much outside of art and asset development. Xbox are using full ‘AAA’ studios owned by other publishers to help get their games over the line.

It’s an interesting strategy.

Crystal and Eidos werent doing much work.
They are a known quantity, best use them.
Its not like MS have a bunch of other studios who currently arent working on something big they could call on.

(But they acquired ZeniMax....who already had projects and likely need more support than they can offer)

Death Stranding had Bend, Insomniac and Guerilla as support studios.
All three of them are AAA studios.

The new landscape of AAA development means studios even AAA studios will have support roles for other games.
As long as the studio has talent and time to spare dont be shocked if you see more big studios in the credits of another big studios game.

MS is likely just ahead of the curve giving full credit to co-developers.

 

[FalsettoVibe]

Yes. SE has had nothing but bad news, they are a failed publisher.

1. Underwhelming sales across the board
2. Committed to blockchain
3. Sold their talented western studios and IPs for dirt cheap
4. Admitted they are squeezed out of the Japanese market
5. Selling stakes to their studios
7. Final Fantasy 14 back on the decline
8. Forespoken looks underwhelming

The only good news about square enix is that final fantasy 16 looks promising, But that’s one game.

Are you joking?

1. Underwhelming sales across the board
Underwhelming sales according to who? You? Have you seen the latest financial report?
https://www.hd.square-enix.com/eng/ir/library/pdf/ar_2022en.pdf

2. Committed to blockchain
I don't even know why this is a part of your argument. I means nothing but they want more money.

3. Sold their talented western studios and IPs for dirt cheap.
Has nothing to so with them being on the decline or a failure. Those studios were simply not profitable to them. Why do you think they were so cheap??

4. Admitted they are squeezed out of the Japanese market
Again, not even sure why this is a part of the argument. They are still profitable. They simply recognize they can do better.

5. Selling stakes to their studios.
This creates less risk for them. Win for SE and whoever buys stakes.

7. Final Fantasy 14 back on the decline
Source?

8. Forespoken looks underwhelming
According to you.

 

[SenjutsuSage]

I fucking knew it! Microsoft has always been interested in Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal, and when Embracer bought them at that super low price, combined with Crystal being on Perfect Dark, I knew something was up. I said back in August Embracer possibly bought those studios to eventually flip them to Microsoft. Or that Microsoft might want Embracer as a whole, which would net them Metro IP, Gearbox and a bunch of other things Microsoft might find to be of value, but in all honesty, I prefer they get crystal and eidos in a package deal that doesn't include the rest of embracer and go for CD Projekt and in house Cyberpunk (still release on Playstation for the Cyberpunk sequel and their next witcher game).

 

[CamHostage]

It’s interesting that Xbox don’t feel confident enough in their talent, or have enough talent, to develop Perfect Dark and Fable internally in a traditional sense. All big AAA productions outsource, but they don’t usually outsource much outside of art and asset development. Xbox are using full ‘AAA’ studios owned by other publishers to help get their games over the line.

Another case where I'm more on your side than I am the counter-argument I'm about to make, but PD and Fable are being developed by first-time studios still building out their structure. Bringing in help isn't a bad thing if the production cycle actually was designed this way and if staffing up made less sense than contracting an experienced team already put together. (And actually, The Initiative itself was supposed to be sort of a gas-starter little studio with big brains up top that would not necessarily build the whole thing by themselves, though that was always confusing messaging and a lot of the big brains have left recently so it's not looking from the outside that the gameplan is working as drawn up?)

Once a project ships, these external teams tend to have tons of added-on manpower sitting around if the studio schedule mucks up and they don't have a second project to transition people to afterwards, so they either lay people off or figure out some other way of keeping work going. Outsourcing is a smart way to handle it, if it works out. Now, outsourcing usually stays in the family, not to an "rival" publisher (albeit one of the console manufacturers,) and usually not to studios who seemingly are far from ramping up for additional manpower (we don't know much about Fable's progress yet but PD is supposedly being led by Crystal D, not assisted by.) Usually you'd contract a fully independent studio like Certain Affinity or Sumo Digital or High Voltage Software instead of calling up major publishers and asking, "Hey, can Crystal Dynamics come out and play with us?", but if it all works out in the final games then whatever works, works.

 

[ANIMAL1975]

 

[Black_Stride]

Pretty sure CD is lead developer on Perfect Dark now

When the banner changes Ill be sure to amend my statment.

I fucking knew it! Microsoft has always been interested in Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal, and when Embracer bought them at that super low price, combined with Crystal being on Perfect Dark, I knew something was up. I said back in August Embracer possibly bought those studios to eventually flip them to Microsoft. Or that Microsoft might want Embracer as a whole, which would net them Metro IP, Gearbox and a bunch of other things Microsoft might find to be of value, but in all honesty, I prefer they get crystal and eidos in a package deal that doesn't include the rest of embracer and go for CD Projekt and in house Cyberpunk (still release on Playstation for the Cyberpunk sequel and their next witcher game).

You what love?

What are you on about mane?
Embracer closed a mobile developer as they dont want to focus on mobile games.
Said mobile dev was a package deal with Crystal and Eidos.

You took that as a ploy by Embracer and Microsoft working on some back ass ward scheme to get Crystal and Eidos to become Xbox Games Studios by closing Onoma, then MS buys the entirety of the Embracer Group or just buys Crystal and Eidos from Embracer?


Why wouldnt MS skip the middleman and just buy Crystal and Eidos if this was the plan all along.
MS was already working with Crystal and Eidos, they might not have known SE was planning on selling, but good chance they would have heard before Embracer being that they were already working closely together.
Why buy the whole Embracer group?

 

[SenjutsuSage]

It’s interesting that Xbox don’t feel confident enough in their talent, or have enough talent, to develop Perfect Dark and Fable internally in a traditional sense. All big AAA productions outsource, but they don’t usually outsource much outside of art and asset development. Xbox are using full ‘AAA’ studios owned by other publishers to help get their games over the line.

It’s an interesting strategy.

You're seeing bad news where there isn't any.

Playground Games as a studio has no such experience in the RPG department. They may have members who are familiar, but the team has never done it. Eidos has a likely set of tools and experiences that will come in handy for the team. What's bad about one of the top studios in the industry, that just recently made an action RPG title, helping them with Fable?

As for Perfect Dark, Crystal Dynamics literally has a history with the head of The Initiative, and have experience rebooting an iconic franchise with a female lead. These are two perfect matches. Also, 'The Initiative' is not and has never been a full development studio. They're more like a creative design and pre-production team that sets the vision, and then has a partner that helps them with that. This doesn't mean the partner coming in won't have some better ideas, but that's what partners are for. The Initiative always intended to have a development partner. Better they have an outside partner as opposed to tying up another important internal xbox studio.

 

[SenjutsuSage]

When the banner changes Ill be sure to amend my statment.

You what love?

What are you on about mane?
Embracer closed a mobile developer as they dont want to focus on mobile games.
Said mobile dev was a package deal with Crystal and Eidos.

You took that as a ploy by Embracer and Microsoft working on some back ass ward scheme to get Crystal and Eidos to become Xbox Games Studios by closing Onoma, then MS buys the entirety of the Embracer Group or just buys Crystal and Eidos from Embracer?


Why wouldnt MS skip the middleman and just buy Crystal and Eidos if this was the plan all along.
MS was already working with Crystal and Eidos, they might not have known SE was planning on selling, but good chance they would have heard before Embracer being that they were already working closely together.
Why buy the whole Embracer group?

The news here is that the OTHER studio of interest to Microsoft surely, Eidos, is now working with a Microsoft first-party studio, Playground Games, on Fable.

And as to why Microsoft doesn't cut out the middleman? There are 68.7 billion reasons why. That's your answer.

 

[CamHostage]

Crystal and Eidos werent doing much work.

Wait... what?

Crystal Dynamics had just launched a major GAAS under the Marvel brand which was floundering under lack of content and frustrating design limitations (and still had and has DLC to come) when they took the Perfect Dark job; normal business would have had their groups all-hands-on-deck to save Marvel Avengers if possible ala FFXIV instead of taking on moonlighting on projects for another company. (They also have the next big Tomb Raider in the works, and probably other projects and supervision work of external uses of TR and its brands, knowing how busy that studio is.)

And Eidos Montreal had just finished GotG so they may have had more floating staff when Fable came across their desk, but according to this rumor they had at least four project in various stages of development (the canceled "Stranger Things on Bikes", another new IP, early work on a new Deus Ex, and co-development on Fable; maybe even more than that.)

Where'd you get the idea that either Crystal D or Eidos Montreal were loafing?

 

[Captain Toad]

So another SE third party developer working on MS's first party IP?

Good thing they spent billions adding tons of more developers to their payroll.

 

[StealthGoblin]

You're seeing bad news where there isn't any.

Playground Games as a studio has no such experience in the RPG department. They may have members who are familiar, but the team has never done it. Eidos has a likely set of tools and experiences that will come in handy for the team. What's bad about one of the top studios in the industry, that just recently made an action RPG title, helping them with Fable?

As for Perfect Dark, Crystal Dynamics literally has a history with the head of The Initiative, and have experience rebooting an iconic franchise with a female lead. These are two perfect matches. Also, 'The Initiative' is not and has never been a full development studio. They're more like a creative design and pre-production team that sets the vision, and then has a partner that helps them with that. This doesn't mean the partner coming in won't have some better ideas, but that's what partners are for. The Initiative always intended to have a development partner. Better they have an outside partner as opposed to tying up another important internal xbox studio.

I didn’t say it was a bad thing - if anything we are on the same page. Microsoft don’t have the talent or capability at present to do it by themselves.

 

[Black_Stride]

Where'd you get the idea that either Crystal D or Eidos Montreal were loafing?

From the fact they were contracted as Co-Developers on other AAA games.
If you dont have spare talent and time, you dont send the spare talent you dont have to work on other projects.

 

[solidus12]

Creative Assembly is helping with Halo Infinite
Crystal Dynamics is co-developing Perfect Dark
Now, Eidos Montreal is working on Fable too..

YIKES

 

[Ozriel]

It’s interesting that Xbox don’t feel confident enough in their talent, or have enough talent, to develop Perfect Dark and Fable internally in a traditional sense. All big AAA productions outsource, but they don’t usually outsource much outside of art and asset development.

There's a full fledged Playground team leading development on Fable. Eidos is working in support.
I'd have thought Playground games immune to trolling based on their track record, but here we are

Xbox are using full ‘AAA’ studios owned by other publishers to help get their games over the line. It’s an interesting strategy.

You mean like how Kojima studios got support from Guerilla games to make Death Stranding? Or how Naughty Dog pulled support from multiple Sony studios for TLOU2? Or how Certain Affinity has supported Halo MP development since the Bungie days?

 

[StealthGoblin]

There's a full fledged Playground team leading development on Fable. Eidos is working in support.
I'd have thought Playground games immune to trolling based on their track record, but here we are



You mean like how Kojima studios got support from Guerilla games to make Death Stranding? Or how Naughty Dog pulled support from multiple Sony studios for TLOU2? Or how Certain Affinity has supported Halo MP development since the Bungie days?

Like I said, this isn’t uncommon, but support is different to co-development. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos are having ‘creative’ input, not just building out what the main studio needs doing.

That isn’t the case with the other studios you listed.

 

[Ozriel]

Another case where I'm more on your side than I am the counter-argument I'm about to make, but PD and Fable are being developed by first-time studios still building out their structure. Bringing in help isn't a bad thing if the production cycle actually was designed this way and if staffing up made less sense than contracting an experienced team already put together.

Fable is being made by Playground Games. It's not a 'first time studio' and the dev team is led by Playground veterans with an already established structure. They've also recruited aggressively years back and have a full fledged dev team for the game as reveal by that Spanish dev's interview.

The support level they'll use Eidos devs for is vastly different from the situation with Initiative which you rightly note was also set up to be a lean internal team for pre-production + a full fledged external team brought in to build the guts of the game.

 

[Ozriel]

Like I said, this isn’t uncommon, but support is different to co-development. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos are having ‘creative’ input, not just building out what the main studio needs doing.

Source?
You've pretty much just made this up, haven't you? Because none of that is in Jason's tweet or the linked article.

The article even speaks of support for MS games incl Fable in future tense

The company also plans to work with Microsoft Corp. to help develop some games, including one in the Fable franchise led by UK-based Playground Games.

And Fable's been in dev since 2018.

All signs point to industry standard support. Even more glaring when you read that it's planned as a long term relationship supporting other MS games in development.

 

[Barakov]

New Deus Ex? Finally.

 

[CamHostage]

From the fact they were contracted as Co-Developers on other AAA games.
If you dont have spare talent and time, you dont send the spare talent you dont have to work on other projects.

Heh, so you have never worked for a company which over-extended itself then...

Between them, they had at least five projects (one a GAAS) in active development for companies with 270 and 480 people, and yet they took on 2 extra gigs. I may be a glass-half-full-of-holy-shit kind of guy, but these unusual contract projects do not read to me as moves taken by studios in a position of confidence and abundant free time.

(Also, again, Crystal Dynamics has a GAAS to support and ideally save... probably it's hopeless to try, but that's their job until the plug gets pulled.)

 

[Umbasaborne]

So the embracer group can afford to buy triple a studios but cant afford to make triple a games?

 

[Moses85]

 

[ToTTenTranz]

So Onoma were the ones doing smartphone games?

Meh...

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

New Deus Ex? Finally.

I can be a banana as well, a salty banana.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Yes. SE has had nothing but bad news, they are a failed publisher.

1. Underwhelming sales across the board
2. Committed to blockchain
3. Sold their talented western studios and IPs for dirt cheap
4. Admitted they are squeezed out of the Japanese market
5. Selling stakes to their studios
7. Final Fantasy 14 back on the decline
8. Forespoken looks underwhelming

The only good news about square enix is that final fantasy 16 looks promising, But that’s one game.

I hate SE as well.

 

[CamHostage]

Creative Assembly is helping with Halo Infinite

Creative Assembly was always helping with Halo Infinite. They've been on the Halo support team for 15 years. (They also do work on CoD and World of Tanks and a bunch of other games... people don't take much notice of those long, long credits usually, but there's a lot of external development team integration into all the big game franchises.) So, don't worry too much about co-developers being announced for projects; there's almost always more on the credits than just the studio listed at the top.

https://www.certainaffinity.com/

The weird thing in the Fable/Perfect Dark's case is that these are internal studios for Square Enix/Embracer contracted to work for MS, not indie devs. (Crystal Dynamics for example took on support work for studio Eidos Montreal on one of the Tomb Raiders, which makes sense since they're siblings. Going outside the family isn't unheard of, but it's more unusual, or at least unknown to the public.) So, why take this unusual approach on two different start-up studio projects?

Like I said, this isn’t uncommon, but support is different to co-development. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos are having ‘creative’ input, not just building out what the main studio needs doing.

Eh, don't over-analyze the Fable situation yet just yet. All we have is a reporter's tweet about "co-dev partnerships"

(I would not say BTW that "Support" and "Co-Developer" are defined, contractual terms in the industry BTW. When you look at these experienced development houses who take contracts on big franchises, like Certain Affinity or High Voltage, you don't see terms like "Support" or Co-Developed" all that regularly; work is work in these cases, and how much work they do or don't get credit for usually doesn't get told much to the public.)

Fable is being made by Playground Games. It's not a 'first time studio' and the dev team is led by Playground veterans with an already established structure. They've also recruited aggressively years back and have a full fledged dev team for the game as reveal by that Spanish dev's interview.

Fable is being made by the second Playground Games studio, established in 2017. They can get help from their neighbors/siblings (and they're not starting from scratch of course, they're repurposing Forza Tech for Fable,) but the Forza Horizon team has plenty of its own work to do, which is one of the reasons why the St Albans House office was established. Like you said, it's a full-fledged dev team, with its own department directors. working on their first project as a complete unit. So I would consider them a "first time studio", as the alternative is to call them the new "B-Team", and that's not as hopeful a label.

 

[Kurotri]

I guess we'll be seeing more and more third party devs being contracted to help others in this gen. We have The Initiative on Perfect Dark and Eidos Montreal on Fable, and CD Projekt Red also stated that the Witcher remake is made "outside", by Fool's Theory. Pretty cool.

 

[GhostOfTsu]

You mean like how Kojima studios got support from Guerilla games to make Death Stranding? Or how Naughty Dog pulled support from multiple Sony studios for TLOU2?

You guys keep parroting the same examples but the difference is all these studios are first-party Sony studios helping each other. Death Stranding is published by Sony.

Embracer or Square Enix are not publishing Fable and Perfect Dark, MS is. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal are big AAA studios known for their own franchises so it's surprising they are now a support studio. That's all.

You can just admit this is an unusual situation instead of doing your 24/7 damage control. Take a break for once.

 

[Crispy Gamer]

That's definitely new info I didn't know SE was contracted to help with Fable hopefully it comes sooner as result of all the help

 

[TLZ]

 

[Warablo]

I just want more Deux Ex

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

Wonder why MS didn't buy Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal....

They would probably by Crystal Dynamics itself, but not if it's anchored to a ball and chain right above a 20ft pool of water.

 

[Ozriel]

You guys keep parroting the same examples but the difference is all these studios are first-party Sony studios helping each other. Death Stranding is published by Sony.

Embracer or Square Enix are not publishing Fable and Perfect Dark, MS is. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal are big AAA studios known for their own franchises so it's surprising they are now a support studio. That's all.

You can just admit this is an unusual situation instead of doing your 24/7 damage control. Take a break for once.

‘Damage control’ for an industry standard occurrence?

Tell me, what ‘damage’ am I supposed to be ameliorating here?

Also, nothing unusual for a studio that’s light on work to support delivery for another studio. Like I cited in the case of Certain Affinity supporting Halo MP content development. An example you conveniently omitted from your response.

 

[Ozriel]

Fable is being made by the second Playground Games studio, established in 2017. They can get help from their neighbors/siblings (and they're not starting from scratch of course, they're repurposing Forza Tech for Fable,) but the Forza Horizon team has plenty of its own work to do, which is one of the reasons why the St Albans House office was established. Like you said, it's a full-fledged dev team, with its own department directors. working on their first project as a complete unit. So I would consider them a "first time studio", as the alternative is to call them the new "B-Team", and that's not as hopeful a label.

‘first time’ connotes an untried and untested setup, which isn’t true in this case. Much of The core of the team remains Playground staff who’ve worked on Forza Horizon for years.

Either way, we’ve gotten insight into their setup From that Spanish dev and they’re supposedly a well oiled, efficient team of veterans that properly managed the Playground way. Pretty much why I’m surprised you’re endorsing a viewpoint that insinuates there’s a lack of confidence in their work from MS

 

[Ozriel]

So the embracer group can afford to buy triple a studios but cant afford to make triple a games?

They’re making AAA Tomb Raider and Deus Ex games. Also floating the idea of a Soul Reaver remake which should be AAA.

I don’t think they’ll shy away from these AAA games that are safe franchises that should make money.

 

[GhostOfTsu]

‘Damage control’ for an industry standard occurrence?

Tell me, what ‘damage’ am I supposed to be ameliorating here?

Also, nothing unusual for a studio that’s light on work to support delivery for another studio. Like I cited in the case of Certain Affinity supporting Halo MP content development. An example you conveniently omitted from your response.

I omitted Certain Affinity because they are a support studio and I never heard of them unlike Eidos Montreal and Crystal Dynamics. They don't belong to a big AAA publisher like Square or Take 2 so different situation but keep going. Phil appreciates it.

 

[Ozriel]

I omitted Certain Affinity because they are a support studio and I never heard of them unlike Eidos Montreal and Crystal Dynamics. They don't belong to a big AAA publisher like Square or Take 2 so different situation

Splash Damage is owned by Leyou and worked with the Coalition to make Gears Tactics.
Creative Assembly made Halo wars 2 for Xbox despite being owned 100% by Sega.

big publishers, both of them.

Do I also mention Sumo Digital, brought in to help Playground games make the xbox 360 port of Forza Horizon 2?

but keep going. Phil appreciates it.

Show some respect and keep things classy. I’m helping you for free

 

[01011001]

Wonder why MS didn't buy Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal....

maybe they wanted too much? their games aren't big sellers in the grand scheme

 

[01011001]

I omitted Certain Affinity because they are a support studio and I never heard of them

you never heard of the studio that basically made the majority of Halo's Multiplayer modes?

 

[Old_and_Slow]

Hitman Go was kinda sick. I don’t generally play mobile games but I finished that entire thing. Great, simple concept.

I also enjoyed Hitman and Lara Croft Go. I'm a sucker for good puzzle games and these both hit the spot.

 

[feynoob]

 

[01011001]

 

[Ronin_7]

That was fast LMAO

 

[CamHostage]

‘first time’ connotes an untried and untested setup, which isn’t true in this case. Much of The core of the team remains Playground staff who’ve worked on Forza Horizon for years.

Either way, we’ve gotten insight into their setup From that Spanish dev and they’re supposedly a well oiled, efficient team of veterans that properly managed the Playground way. Pretty much why I’m surprised you’re endorsing a viewpoint that insinuates there’s a lack of confidence in their work from MS

Look, we don't need to argue semantics (it's all Playground Games, it's Playground Games office #1 and #2, however they operate) but you yourself just said, they have "a full fledged dev team". They bought an office, they brought on dedicated leadership, they hired a whole new staff starting by opening the doors to 60 with plans to fill out that second office with 200 people, and the collective group is working together as a team for the first time ever. They'll get assistance from their Playground Games teammates across the parkway, but Anna Megill and the rest of the leadership crew at the St Albans office are working together on their first project as a team, so call it what you will.

Also, I guess I did sort of endorse a post with a negative viewpoint, but check back on my post, it wasn't about my lack of confidence in their work, it's the Xbox Games Studio response to whatever is going on with these projects. My point was, there could be a number of reasons why they have brought on development assistance at this point in the project, and most of those reasons are not bad news. It's how games get made. The studio might not even be to the point yet where it knows if it's in a "bad news" scenario or not. And games that get into "bad news" don't turn out bad, sometimes they just need to go through a crucible to come out strong. PD and Fable may be on route to being great. Also, although I would personally like to think of The Initiative and Playgrounds St Albans being capable of making the games they were established to make in the first place, video games are big these days and everybody needs a little help.

But MS's moves don't send a message of confidence in the team when they're bringing in studios that shepherd big projects instead of studios that jobber for the boss man. MS could have staffed up these group if the games need more people, or bring in familiar support studios who are in the business of just cranking out assistance; in Fable's case, they could have sent over/reassigned a number of staff from the main Playground office now that FH5 is done. Instead, MS went to busy companies who make big games themselves and brought them into the mix. (Fable, I don't know the situation of and don't want to speculate too deeply and can believe if Eidos Montreal happened to have manpower available right when needed after they finished GotG and it just worked out; my opinion of the matter may be colored though by all the rumors and evidence of Perfect Dark being ghost-developed almost completely by Crystal Dynamics rather than The Initiative being a proper "co-developer" with whoever is left there.)

If it was the individual ideas of both leadership teams at Playground Games St Albans and The Initiative to say, "Hey, you know what might work best for us is if we brought in co-development assistance even at this point in the project...", and MS just happened to find its best options to be two active staff groups inside Square Enix/Embracer, then it's a weird coincidence but whatever works is good. But it's two unusual approaches back to back, and there's got to be more to this story on one side or the other or both than just business as usual.

 

[Ozriel]

But MS's moves don't send a message of confidence in the team when they're bringing in studios that shepherd big projects instead of studios that jobber for the boss man. MS could have staffed up these group if the games need more people, or bring in familiar support studios who are in the business of just cranking out assistance; in Fable's case, they could have sent over/reassigned a number of staff from the main Playground office now that FH5 is done. Instead, MS went to busy companies who make big games themselves and brought them into the mix. (Fable, I don't know the situation of and don't want to speculate too deeply and can believe if Eidos Montreal happened to have manpower available right when needed after they finished GotG and it just worked out; my opinion of the matter may be colored though by all the rumors and evidence of Perfect Dark being ghost-developed almost completely by Crystal Dynamics rather than The Initiative being a proper "co-developer" with whoever is left there.)

I really don’t see the logic behind this paragraph.
Fable team wanted to outsource work. There’s a pool of experienced devs who’ve worked together for a while and whose parent has apparently inked deals with MS to contribute to several MS games. What’s unusual about this? You also pushing the ‘MS shows lack of confidence’ line and claiming the studio behind the likes of Hitman Go and Lara Croft Go is used to shepherding major projects is really weird.

The Bloomberg article makes it clear this is for a multi-game support type of deal, and not just Fable.

Done with this back and forth anyway. Moving on…

 

[CamHostage]

You also pushing the ‘MS shows lack of confidence’ line and claiming the studio behind the likes of Hitman Go and Lara Croft Go is used to shepherding major projects is really weird....
Done with this back and forth anyway. Moving on…

Sure, we're done, no need to go more into it. (Just a difference of viewpoints, and maybe not even that far apart. PD is whatever, but I personally have faith in Fable and the Playground Games namesake, it's just Microsoft's particular business choices that have me ill at ease that they're meddling instead of letting these teams find their own footing.)

However, we should clear up confusion: there are two Montreal studios in discussion here, Square Enix Montreal (aka Onoma) and Eidos Montreal. SE Montreal made the Go games and other mobile titles, Eidos Montreal made the Thief and Deus Ex continuations as well as Guardians of the Galaxy. The one which is surviving and also has been helping on Fable is not the mobile studio. (Kind of too bad it didn't happen to be the other way around and SE Montreal was taking console contract work, since we wouldn't be having this thread right now about a studio closure...)

 

[ahtlas7]

Hit after hit and they still got shut down? Is there no justice?

 

[Pejo]

 

[Negotiator101]

Looks like Fable production is ramping up! Really hoping we see this soonish. There's a lot of questions with this one, Forza Tech how it handles a completely different genre and obviously how PG do the same. How large is the PG team on this and how large is Eidos who are helping out?

 

[cireza]

Shit happens in the various daylife of a Square-Enix studio.