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Microsoft To Close Xbox Sports Game Studio

Posted by simoniker on from the skipping-lots-of-years dept.

AbyssLeaper writes "Microsoft is closing its Xbox sports game studio in Redmond and laying off 76 employees. In a Seattle Times article, Robbie Bach, Microsoft's Xbox chief, cites the difficulty of competing in the game development space and the expansion of 3rd party support - this move wasn't surprising based on their focus on making the Xbox profitable. MSNBC/Seattle Post-Intelligencer speculates that it might also be due to an increased partnership with EA Sports." We previously reported on many XSN Sports titles skipping 2004.

4 of 36 comments (clear)

  1. I think it's sad by Sp00nMan · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Microsoft only tried making sports games good with XSN for one year.. It really had some potential. Heck, I think Top Spin is one of the best tennis games to come out in a long time. If only they didn't have so many bugs with the XSN release, this might not have happened.

    1. Re:I think it's sad by PainKilleR-CE · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I think that's possibly the worst thing about this announcement. Their yearly titles may not have been the best (though their first year or two weren't bad, 2003 wasn't a good year for them), but the other titles (Top Spin, Links, etc) were very good. Hopefully they'll consider keeping some of those titles to compete in the less-dominated markets, but looking at the layoffs and so forth, it seems unlikely.

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      -PainKilleR-[CE]
  2. Why more sports games? by Matt+Perry · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Does anyone here play and buy sports games? I'm wondering what the appeal is in creating yet another football or basketball game. Do the newer ones deviate from the rules to create a new type of game, or is it just better graphics and sound? Or are game studios working on games based on other sports? It seems to me that one could only create so many football games before covering the same ground, yet there seems to be a new "Madden" game every year.

    Not being a sports game player I'm wondering how the game developers are keeping sports games new and different.

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  3. Amped not cut!!!11 by Mike+Hawk · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Thank god. MS is the only party out there making a real snowboarding game. Please don't cut Amped MS. For Me.