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Black Tusk Studios 'looking to build the next Halo'

Microsoft first-party developer expanding for new triple-A property

Words: on November 29, 2012
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The newly rechristened Black Tusk Studio is working on "Microsoft’s next big entertainment franchise." The Vancouver, Canada-based first-party developer is calling for applications to roughly double the size of its 55-person team, with a focus on "creating immersive, triple-A games that push the limits of Microsoft's entertainment platforms."

Studio manager Mike Crump told The Vancouver Sun (via Eurogamer) that this is an entirely new intellectual property which already carries some big expectations from Microsoft.

"We’re not working on an existing franchise, we’re looking to build the next Halo here in Vancouver, for example, which is really exciting," Crump said. "We are building something from the ground up.”

Black Tusk developers average 12 years of experience in triple-A development, and the studio expects to share contributions with other Microsoft first-party developers, including 343 Industries, Rare, and Lionhead.

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Platforms:

Xbox 360

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Black Tusk Studios

6 comments

  • ObliqueZombie - November 29, 2012 11:26 a.m.

    Depending on what genre they chose to develop in, this could be awful. How many Call of Duty or WoW killers have there been, again?

  • Redeater - November 29, 2012 12:35 p.m.

    Whenever I hear "insert game"-killer I always think back to that EGM with Dark Cloud on the cover and the headline saying "Zelda Killer?". I think about 99.9999999% of the time these games usually tend to turn out either sub-par or just complete shit.

  • angelusdlion - November 29, 2012 2:25 p.m.

    But the hype machine must be fed, otherwise investors wont' be interested and the game programmers own't be fed. yah, I always mentally add "We want this to be..." In front of any statement like that.

  • shayne-galloway - November 29, 2012 3:38 p.m.

    The Dark Cloud series is one of my favorites of all time, though. I hope you're not implying that they suck as much as the other "Insert-popular-game-series-here"-killers. They didn't sell too well, but they were great games.

  • LordZarlon - November 29, 2012 6:13 p.m.

    This worked out so well for Sony when they developed two very similar games for the same console from the same publisher. Neither Resistance or Killzone's sales numbers come anywhere close to Halo's. It's not wise to divide your audience.

  • dktuesday - November 29, 2012 7:46 p.m.

    I didn't read "Halo killer" anywhere in the article. Also, he most likely means that they want to build something that was as successful as Halo was, being an original IP and all.

Showing 1-6 of 6 comments

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