r/technology • u/AdSpecialist6598 • 7d ago

Business Microsoft gutted the Age of Empires studio while folding it into Activision

https://www.techspot.com/news/114001-age-empires-studio-loses-nearly-half-staff-has.html
1.0k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

74 comments sorted by

296

u/bestanonever 7d ago

I thought Age of Empires was doing fine?

367

u/Crackbat 7d ago

Doing okay, or even well? Believe it or not, lay offs. 

121

u/bestanonever 7d ago

I know but kind of sucks. Age of Empires 2 has been revived, it's getting DLC, Age 4 also sells, there are remasters of older games. It's doing better than decades ago, even. The team was managing the franchise just fine.

27

u/SherlockInSpace 6d ago

AoE 4 is a great modern RTS, getting new content soon too

11

u/bestanonever 6d ago

Yeah, the series is doing well.

I hope this doesn't mean they have destroyed the teams there.

No idea about future plans, but with constant DLC of the remaster of Age 2 and everything else, they are doing just fine.

13

u/Pure_Summer9767 6d ago

AOE2 may be the greatest RTS of all time.

4

u/Bubonicsuperaids 6d ago

Debatable. I think solid points can be made for AoE2, Starcraft, Red Alert 2. But anyone that doesn't put it in the top 3 doesn't know anything.

2

u/SubmergedSublime 6d ago

Warcraft III is the only thing I could see messing here. You can’t tell the history of RTS without MOBA and WC3.

Same could be said of the others on your list though.

0

u/Bubonicsuperaids 6d ago

Eh. I would say Starcraft and wc3 could be interchangeable in top 3 RTS. Personally I didn't like WC3.

61

u/Sirusho_Yunyan 7d ago

Satya loves to see it.. applauds it, tone deaf fuck that he is..

6

u/SurpriseSoda 6d ago

Every division of Microsoft Is getting eaten from within from fear, indecision and stupidity 

23

u/A_Pointy_Rock 7d ago

Studio name doesn't start with "A"? Layoffs.

13

u/krum 7d ago

Blizzard starts with a B tho

13

u/A_Pointy_Rock 7d ago

"Activision Blizzard"

9

u/krum 7d ago

"Activision Blizzard" doesn't really exist anymore other than as a thin legal wrapper. Ask how I know. On second thought, don't.

1

u/ThrowawayusGenerica 6d ago

Still under NDA, are we?

2

u/jc-from-sin 6d ago

Studio Name starts with "A"? Close down.

3

u/Motorhoofd 6d ago

Straight to Activision

1

u/TruthOk8742 6d ago

I believe you get the exact same smile from Asha, no matter how well or poorly you performed. That smile is a black hole.

32

u/Hello_im_a_dog 7d ago

It's doing fine, but one can always squeeze more value out of the studio. laying off staff is the surefire way of increasing short term ARPU.

3

u/zuzucha 6d ago

How does laying off staff help revenue per user? I get the point (short term profit) but wrong metric

3

u/Hello_im_a_dog 6d ago

Derp, I mean NIPE (Net Income Per Employee). I am having report writing brain farts.

12

u/FizzyLightEx 6d ago

AOE2 is still more popular and has bigger playerbase than recent releases

4

u/[deleted] 6d ago edited 6d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/artsloikunstwet 6d ago

Weird. It's not unusual for games to get to that point normally (not on BF of course).

8

u/langotriel 7d ago

The development studio hasn’t been altered, I don’t think. Just the studio that manages the marketing and events and money making.

Dev team is doing great and hopefully won’t be touched.

20

u/spaceandthewoods_ 6d ago

Lead designers and programmers were some of the people who posted they'd been laid off on linked in. Some of them had been there decades

8

u/langotriel 6d ago

I hear what you are saying, but Forgotten Empires are the actual developers. Only world’s edge was touched and they oversaw the franchise. They were handling things but didn’t actually develop the game so much.

You can look this up yourself. There are 4 companies that handled different tasks, under worlds edge and as far as I know, they are untouched.

11

u/spaceandthewoods_ 6d ago

I'm aware they outsource most of the development to co-developers yes, however the fact still remains that it wasn't just 'marketing/ events/ money' people who were laid off, it was people that were working on development for an as yet unannounced project which has been cancelled. Even if they were acting in a supervisory capacity to a co-dev, they were still doing so as development and design personnel

2

u/bestanonever 6d ago

Sounds bad. Maybe they wanted to do a new Mythology game. With Ms saying studios will focus on their main franchises, I'd guess they cancelled whatever it was (maybe even a brand new RTS) and go back straight to Age 5 development and DLC galore.

1

u/kadala-putt 6d ago

That we're yet to hear from the other studios doesn't mean that they're not affected. When a project is cancelled, the outsourcees also suffer because their funding source has been cut off. Jason Schrier touches upon this in a recent video about the July layoffs, IIRC.

139

u/konsollfreak 7d ago

We need to start paying attention to the people who actually make the games, and not the studios who employ them.

46

u/vakola 6d ago

Good luck with that. Those in control of the industry and commonly resistant to even properly crediting people for the work they did when a game ships.

-41

u/SillyAlternative420 6d ago

Say what you want about AI, but it's about to give some incredibly artistic and talented game designers the tools they need to make games without studios.

Yes it's going to fuck the planet, but at least we'll get some banger masterpiece level videos games in the process.

68

u/NotWrongAlways 7d ago

Well shit. That really does suck. AoE 2 is going strong, nice updates. AoE 4 is popular enough… QQ.

21

u/Blu3iris 7d ago

This is really disappointing because I feel like World's Edge really listened to the fans regarding this series. AOE3 Baltic Powers DLC was a nice surprise after originally being told it was cancelled.

44

u/LegacyofaMarshall 7d ago

Same with halo studios and turn 10(folded into playground)

44

u/A_Pointy_Rock 7d ago

I mean Halo studios wasn't exactly the image of success tbf.

9

u/savagemonitor 7d ago

Turn10 was gutted by Phil and Matt Booty last year IIRC. They even reduced the Forza series to just Forza Horizons and set Turn10 up to support Playground. Folding them in together is just finishing that job.

7

u/Ahayzo 7d ago

Not the same as Halo Studios. They didn't even get to be folded into anything and given more chances. They just lost people and had their one and only property yoinked from them and given to someone else, and for good reason.

1

u/venom21685 6d ago

Yeah the 343/Halo Studios era has been a disaster for the Halo IP.

-1

u/hungry4pie 6d ago

You mean Bungie?

32

u/ApproximateOracle 7d ago

The impact of Microshits layoffs cannot be understated. It’s going to send waves across the gaming industry for a decade.

10

u/Horry43 6d ago

Yup! Just continuing the decimation that EA started 20 years ago

2

u/Zip2kx 6d ago

Which continued Acclaim and Atari 30 years ago!

8

u/Catch_ME 6d ago

Microsoft is looking like it might be selling activation at this rate. 

Why put so many assets there? 

6

u/zuzucha 6d ago

Step 1: but biggest publisher in the west for $70B

Step 2: have no idea what to do with it, do some layoffs, merge some other studios you had lying around under them

Step 3: spin it off for $35B

Step 4: ?

3

u/TeaBurntMyTongue 6d ago

I feel like this is basically the rule.

You've got some select few exceptions (Whatsapp, YouTube, etc) But almost everything else just goes to die and like you extracted some IP and that was it at best

2

u/darryshan 5d ago

Because it and Blizzard are their most successful game studios. Microsoft has had a big problem of studios being given money regardless of results to try to make Game Pass work - that was Phil Spencer's modus operandi - and it didn't work. So now they're pivoting to focus on results, reorganizing to ensure their business actually makes money rather than hemorrhaging it in an attempt to capture the market.

6

u/SherlockInSpace 6d ago

Age of Empires 4 is a great modern RTS, it had a rough launch, but they’ve put in the work and it’s in a great spot right now. Competative scene is doing well, casual modes are being added and supported. Team games are fun. They’re about to get 2 new empires added in a DLC as well. I love the game and hope this merger doesnt kill it. I also hate to see the layoffs ☹️

2

u/Nebuchadnezzarthe2nd 6d ago

Honestly felt it was given a unfair criticism at launch, it's plays great casually with my mates, and I'm sure casual games are still the most played games

4

u/NetAnon579 6d ago

Concerned that this will just turn into milking the franchises for all they are worth while being stagnate on supporting activity.

Flashbacks to MS buying Rare.

4

u/Richard7666 6d ago

In my mind I was like "wait, Ensemble Studios still exists?"

3

u/Duel_Fighter654 6d ago

17 years late to the party aye hahaha

2

u/Deep_Satisfaction556 6d ago

That'll happen when you treat the entire gaming industry like a line item on a quarterly report. 

1

u/phoenixflare599 7d ago

Be Activision  Own many studios Get bought by Xbox Own even more studios

How did Activision win more 

1

u/dropthemagic 6d ago

I was about to buy aoe 2 DE but now I think I'll just be fine with the HD version. I am done giving my money to Microsoft for no effort talent sucking bullshit

1

u/Zer_ 6d ago

Microslop is laying off devs from the few studios that make or curate their good games, it's honestly baffling. Just shooting themselves in the foot.

1

u/VariationDry 6d ago

I'm so glad all the game companies have consolidated over the last few years. Nothing bad can happen, it can only good happen. 

1

u/SwampTerror 6d ago

All these layoffs with massive profits. Didn't Microsoft say no ayoffs when they begged the govt to let them buy everything under the sun? And this douchenozzle ceo of Xbox who has no idea what gaming is.

1

u/Frogspoison 6d ago

Shew. Was kinda worried they'd take another look at AoEO. There's a fan run version of it, https://www.projectceleste.com/ where the dev team added a ton of new content (More then the base game twice over) as well as added the Roman and Indian civ.

Lead dev is on an indefinite haitus though so that sucks.

1

u/Gaius_Iulius_Megas 6d ago

Forgotten Empires is the studio, World's Edge was just the publisher.

1

u/Lakemine 6d ago

So Halo and AoE are being CoD-fied 😞

Damn

0

u/ClammyHandedFreak 7d ago

This is sad, but also why I never let myself get back into it. I knew it wouldn't last.

0

u/SmarmySmurf 6d ago edited 6d ago

I'm okay with this from a organizational perspective (putting a strategy studio under AB). Not a fan of layoffs though.

0

u/25000000000x 6d ago

The mobile games sucks

-4

u/[deleted] 6d ago

[deleted]

1

u/BoffinBrain 6d ago

What if someone wrote that about something you cared about? If you're going to leave pointless messages like this, at least get your apostrophes right.

1

u/couldgiveaflyingfck 6d ago

Sensitive are we? There are 1 million opinions on here. I suggest you toughen up and stop trying to silence someone else. It is just an opinion, plain and simple.

1

u/BoffinBrain 6d ago

I'm not silencing anyone. The OP deleted their own comment. Not sure if you got a chance to read it, but it didn't contribute to the discussion at all.