Asha Sharma continues to remake Xbox, shifting key Xbox Game Studios IP and developers to Activision, King, and Bethesda Softworks.
The Xbox bloodbath that began back in June continues today with the platform holder announcing the next phase in it's massive restructuring. While the previous announcement focused on divesting five studios and eliminating 1000+ jobs, today's restructuing fundamentally changes Xbox Game Studios, moving many of its owned and first-party IP and studios to the third-party publishers it had previously purchased. It also means Xbox is laying off 268 people, a bad look considering how much money was likely spent acquiring the publishing rights to Kojima Productions' Physint.
Call of Duty: Halo
Probably the most remarkable change in today's restructuring is that Halo Studios (formerly 343 Industries), the team hand built to handle Halo following Bungie's departure, has effectively been shut down. Activision will now be handling the IP, building out a new purpose-built team to tackle Halo. It is unknown if this new team will be built within a current Activision developer (ex: Sledgehammer Games), or under a brand-new development team. Activision will also take control of Rare and World's Edge. A skeleton team will remain at Halo...
