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Microsoft Studios acquires rights to Gears of War franchise/Black Tusk does the work

T

The Driver

Member
Iffy on this. This series finds difficulty in finding a audience now. It's like Halo now where it hit it big just before COD came and bled both them of their players. I sank so much time into 1 & 2 but I slowly dropped off of 3 (not so much for the gameplay, more of the obnoxious DLC playlist paywall/start of the Season Pass shit) and Judgement nearly killed this series for me with its anemic content.

If they are just gonna develop another game that will be popular for a whole week or will have half the game hidden behind a paywall then I'll pass. Tbh I think I would actually be really excited if CliffyB showed back up...
 
C

chubigans

y'all should be ashamed
Griss said:
They probably didn't think they could keep the transfer of an IP that big a secret. For all we know Epic may have to disclose the sale in financial results. It's business news, nothing they can do about that. So they announce the deal, and then soothe fans by saying that one of their top studios is on it + the producer from Epic.

Not sure how you'd do it differently, considering the deal was bound to leak.

EDIT: Just looked them up and Epic is a private company. Still, it would have leaked, lol.
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Eh, MS or Sony isn't in the habit of pre-announcing things simply because they might leak out. Especially given that this project seems extremely early in development.
 
P

Portman

Member
Hopefully Microsoft will have new IPs to announce at E3. That is what I'm waiting on to lure me to a Xbox One, Gears doesn't do it for me.

Crap, I was hoping Black Tusk had something new up their sleeve too.
 
L

la flama blanca

Banned
MercuryLS said:
MS's biggest problem is that they're more interested in big franchises then they are the talent behind those franchises. Bungie is what made Halo great and Epic is what made Gears great. They have the IP's but don't have the original studios that made these franchises what they are.

It'd be like Sony buying ND's IP and farming them out to other devs. The talent at ND is the real prize.
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They know their consumers don't pay this much attention, they'll buy it anyway.
 
C

Con_Smith

Banned
Dumbest shit ever and a waste of cash. Microsoft is just gonna shut BT down when this doesn't sell as they hoped.

QB and Sunset are the only games Microsoft have that got me wanting a Bone. 343 can't compete with destiny and black tusk is just unproven in my eyes. Had they had something original coming I might have been more interested in the studio but whatever.
 
F

flkraven

Member
MercuryLS said:
MS's biggest problem is that they're more interested in big franchises then they are the talent behind those franchises. Bungie is what made Halo great and Epic is what made Gears great. They have the IP's but don't have the original studios that made these franchises what they are.

It'd be like Sony buying ND's IP and farming them out to other devs. The talent at ND is the real prize.
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On the flip side, the talent can always leave while the IPs can't (see: Rare). Ideally, you want both :p
 
I

IHaveIce

Banned
They should have left Gears behind in the last gen and should have made a start with a new IP.

Not really happy about this.
 
NoMoreTrolls

NoMoreTrolls

Banned
Great move by Microsoft. I just hope that it'll be better than Judgement was. A bit of a revamping may be in order.

Trailer at E3? :p
 
B

Blur

Banned
They were said to have 4 unannounced games in development. Just give it time and they will give you something other than Gears... They were rumoured to have 3/4 games in development.
 
iceatcs

iceatcs

Junior Member
Wait they are official announce it?! with no media at all.

Oh wow, that's very unexpected. I thought it was just rumors or leak when click this thread.
 
S

SlipperyMoose

Member
Vico said:
I love Gears, but give it a rest for now.
It saddens me. I wish Microsoft tried to do new stuff.
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I find posts like this a bit unfair. Yes Microsoft in the past has given us only the Halo/Gears/Forza/Fable cycle but as of right now they have been keeping their word on it. Lionhead recently announced that they are working on games other than Fable. We are seeing just now Project Spark which is pretty different in Xbox standards. Quantum Break is developed by Remedy but owned by MS. And they just released Max: The Curse of Brotherhood on XBLA. That doesn't even bring up exclusives that aren't internally developed like Sunset Overdrive, TitanFall, D4, Ryse, etc. which are not on the main competitors platforms (PlayStation 4 and Wii U). Heck, most of those won't be available on the PC either.

I understand that MS has a history of recycling tried and trued games but right now I think they are doing an alright job on bringing new IP to the console. The whole Gears of War thing is a fan service to people that actually love the franchise and we are still getting all those other games. This just ensures that you can only get it on their console and it is a more stable route than continually paying Epic for exclusivity.

Of course they could go back to their ways and I have no way of knowing that but as right now I don't think they are doing a bad job. If they do go back to their old ways then that is shame but I have some faith they will not.
 
I

ironcreed

Banned
Portman said:
Hopefully Microsoft will have new IPs to announce at E3. That is what I'm waiting on to lure me to a Xbox One, Gears doesn't do it for me.

Crap, I was hoping Black Tusk had something new up their sleeve too.
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The systems have only been out for two months. There will no doubt be a nice mix of new and old coming down the pipeline.
 
S

Sissel

Member
What a bummer. At this point this franchise is so stale that any real improvement to it could have been a new IP.
 
C

chubigans

y'all should be ashamed
Blur said:
They were said to have 4 unannounced games in development. Just give it time and they will give you something other than Gears... They were rumoured to have 3/4 games in development.
Click to expand...

Who, Black Tusk or MS 1st party? Because I highly doubt Black Tusk is working on anything but Gears for the immediate future.
 
L

LittleJohnny

Banned
boredandlazy said:
Gears of War has always built itself around being a decent shooter with great graphics, so it would have played up to the latter of those strengths by being available on the PS4. :p
I'm not port begging though, I'm not particularly a fan of the franchise.
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PS4 may be more powerful, but both are well enough capable of producing next gen quality stuff. We haven't even seen the best of either system, so what you think looks impressive today on PS4, you'll probably laugh about later when compared to 2nd and 3rd gen software that even Xbone will likely surpass.
 
.la1n

.la1n

Member
A new studio doing development on Gear of War could be exactly what the franchise needs. I hope it's more like Gears of War 1 vs the other games that followed. Love the hell out of the series and nice to finally hear it isn't dead.
 
Y

yankeehater

Member
chubigans said:
This is great news for GOW fans obviously and good for MS for not allowing their franchise to be scooped up/go multiplatform.

That being said, imagine this with me.

The lights go out at E3, everything goes dark. Cue a voiceover from one of the GOW characters. Then a logo flashes: Gears of War begins again, exclusively on Xbox One. Maybe we get a short CGI trailer, or maybe all we get is a logo. The crowd goes nuts, and the conference moves on.

Instead MS immediately announces they've acquired the IP in an early Januarly Monday morning with no trailer, no graphics/assets, no plans, no dates, just another tradition of literally announcing anything/everything they have, right now.

What is the thought process behind this? Why not hype it up? Why not have something, anything ready to go before announcing this? Because- as E3 last year showed- they're still hurting a bit and need any bit of good info right now. That comes at the expense of having hum drum announcements like this. Sure we'll get a trailer at E3 (likely conceptual as this game sounds a ways off) but it won't be the same, obviously.

Like I said, great for MS and this is a big franchise to have on XB1, and this is nothing but good news, but the way they presented this news speaks volumes.
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They are putting this news out asap because there are probably tons of people on the fence about what console to buy. No reason to wait 6 months to give them info that could possibly swing their decision. Get the news out now and then at E3 should a teaser trailer with the logo.
 
I

ironcreed

Banned
Sissel said:
What a bummer. At this point this franchise is so stale that any real improvement to it could have been a new IP.
Click to expand...

Well, a new generation and a new development team might be just what the doctor ordered. I grew weary of it after playing the second one, so I am kind of curious to see a different approach on better hardware.
 
T

TangoAlphaLima

Member
Shrewd move by Microsoft, buying after the disappointing GoW: Judgment. I bet they paid pennies on the dollar compared with what they would have paid back in the GoW1 and GoW2 days.
 
T

Tagyhag

Member
Heh, and we were just talking about this too.

Not surprising, but I do hope Black Tusk does a good job. I'm still hoping for that COG squad game.

And are people really asking as to why they would make another Gears? It's a good IP that could be a system seller if done right, it's the exact same scenario that Uncharted was in.
 
S

SlickShoesRUCrazy

Member
LapinAgile said:
This is pretty much what I expected. And if this game doesn't sell well I.... Black Tusk gets poached. It'd be a bummer to see another ensemble studios situation.
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My issue is that now they have dedicated studios for all the major franchises they cycled for the last 3-4 years of the 360s life span...

I don't want halo, gears, forza and fable on two year dev cycles all gen
 
B

Barzul

Member
Why are people writing Black Tusk off? Let them release a game first and judge them on that. It sucks that the concept they showed at E# is getting shelved, but if they can make Gears great again, I won't mind. I will say Phil Spencer kinda contradicts his earlier statements that Gears will be given a long break.
 
A

Aaron

Member
I loved Gears 1-3, but was completely over it by the end, and didn't bother with Judgement. I don't think the series has anything left, but if Black Tusk can come up with a new spin on things that might bring me back.
 
B

bigboss370

Member
what the fuck its not even a new IP? oh man. I honestly thought MS had their next big IP with Black Tusk, but they're just making Gears....I was hoping for something new...

welp, still curious to see what it looks like. But i'm less excited than before....
 
A

AlphaK

Member
GeoW has been a series on decline for a while now; It's a shame that a new studio like Black Tusk has to work on something like this instead of a new, exciting IP which is what i initially expected.
 
S

shungokusatsu

Member
My friends and colleagues break my balls nonstop for talking them into buying Judgment, which was complete dogshit. To make matters worse, even 24 hours after release Amazon and Gamestop were only offering $0.99 for the game. Even today, no one will take it for trade in.

I don't mean to be pessimistic, but they fooled me once with Judgment. I just don't see the series truly evolving (for the better) without Cliffy. Going to be Halo 4 all over again.
 
H

Hoo-doo

Banned
Disappointment-a-thon!

After all the "new IP, new IP!" talk around Black Tusk, I actually thought they had something new in the pipeline.

Gears is so done in my book.
 
F

farisr

Member
Would've been okay with this news if it didn't mean what it really meant (as in scrapping that brand new IP they teased and putting them on development for the Gears series instead).
 
SHADES

SHADES

Member
Smart move from EPIC here cashing in a franchise that after 3 & Judgement lost its way a little. I'm curious how much would this have set MS back?

Don't get me wrong for Gears fans this will be awesome & will shift consoles (XBone exclusive's inbound) but personally when I hear Gears now that stirs up the same feelings as Halo, stale.

I wonder how many would rather have seen a new IP from Black tusk than a Gears revival tour?

Personally I would have preferred new IP.
 
P

PetriP-TNT

Member
Well I guess this re re re re re re re re confirms that buttocks was right. I wonder how long they have been doing the neo gears, is it their IP reskinned or was the whole project shitcanned or were they working on it in the first place.
 
T

TheRagnCajun

Member
yankeehater said:
They are putting this news out asap because there are probably tons of people on the fence about what console to buy. No reason to wait 6 months to give them info that could possibly swing their decision. Get the news out now and then at E3 should a teaser trailer with the logo.
Click to expand...

I agree with chubigans. Usually MS is smarter than this, and I don't think this is changing anyone's minds until we see a trailer or something.
 
L

LapinAgile

Member
SlickShoesRUCrazy said:
Well, that's fucking lame. I wanted blacktusk to bring a new ip, not milk an existing one.
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This is pretty much what I expected. And if this game doesn't sell well I.... Black Tusk gets poached. It'd be a bummer to see another ensemble studios situation.

Edit: Server issue caused a double post? Mods please delete this
 
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