Microsoft to cease flight sims and age of empire games

family man

family man

family man

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not sure whether you new this already so apologise if it is old news.

Apparently Microsoft is axing 500 jobs and shutting down the studios that made flight simulation x and age of empires,

So no more flight sims :(
 
From what I remember, Bill Gates was always bit of a Flight Sim fan and thus kept the Flight Sim franchise going through thick and thin. It was a long lasting IP. Once Bill left it didn't take Mr Balmer long to ditch it. Citing the current financial doom as a reason is rather dubious, as Aces Studios weren't exactly losing tons of money from the series, it sold well. Crazy that FS11 and Train Sim 2 would get axed so far into development.....Steve Balmer must really hate sims :p

Whether they will ressurect the franchise in the future is anyones guess, I think its more likely we'll see a dumbed down arcadey version on their beloved xbox platform rather than PC specific. But that's just the cynic in me talking ;)
 
Just read the article, and this stood out...

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Kinda shows how far we've come since 1982, doesn't it?
 
Me and my mate have started playing AoE2 The Conquerers again and are quite saddened that we probably wont get another decent AoE game for a long long time to come.

AoE3 just didnt really do it for me and it's a shame that for the time being at least the franchise is dead :(
 
Old? That article is only dated a month ago...sad to hear that, although I think FS topped out in 2004 and AOE3 was rather disappointing.
 
I thought it was known for a while the Flight Sims were coming to an end?

As for AOE, I don't think any of them have ever beaten how good the first one was :)
 
The studio's have been gone or going for a while, Microsoft planned this well ahead in my opinion.

Shame, as Age of Empires and Age of Empires II were two brilliant games, and helped define the real time strategy genre.
 
As a massive, massive FS9 fan, I can't say this (old) news really bothers me.

FSX really doesn't hold any interest at all for me, and as someone stated earlier, I think history will show the MSFS series peaked in 2004.

On the other hand, the X-Plane devs now have a huge opportunity. We will see whether or not they choose to take advantage of it.
 
andyp said:
FSX really doesn't hold any interest at all for me, and as someone stated earlier, I think history will show the MSFS series peaked in 2004.
Click to expand...

What utter tosh and bosh.

FSX sold twice as much as FS9 did (if not quadruaple) ... Aces even sold us an add on for FSX, something they never did for decades.

Check out the main FS forums, its always been the fact FSX was busiest for a while now ... there has to be a reason for that, and that's that most people are loving it.

I'm currently beta testing Saiteks latest FIP with FSX and can confirm, with what Hardware Manufacturers and software company's have planned...

We are good to go for a few more years yet, even if Ace's do pull the plug forever.

And I hope they dont.
 
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