So far, several game blogs were rumoring that Microsoft and Bungie have decided to split, but now it’s confirmed. Bungie is the developer behind Microsoft’s Halo series; they recently released Halo 3 exclusively on Xbox platform. It went on to bring $300 million in first week of sale, crashing all records and becoming the fastest selling video game title in history.
Bungie Studios has become an independent identity with effect from October 1st and has been renamed as Bungie LLC. Microsoft still retains a small fraction of rights in Bungie and they will continue to build games for Microsoft.
Bungie founder and partner, Jason Jones, was very optimistic and didn’t nag anything about Microsoft. He said:
"Working with Microsoft was great for us, it allowed us to grow as a team and make the ambitious, blockbuster games we all wanted to work on".
It seems like Bungie will go on with to developing games for Microsoft, but as a separate identity. Prior to the acquisition by Microsoft in 2000, Bungie was an independent company developing games for Mac platform. It’s not devastating news, but still it’s quite a surprise for me.

wrote, on October 6th, 2007
[...] pthurrott wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptSo far, several game blogs were rumoring that Microsoft and Bungie have decided to split, but now it’s confirmed. Bungie is the developer behind Microsoft’s Halo series; they recently released Halo 3 exclusively on Xbox platform. … [...]
wrote, on October 6th, 2007
[...] AlexMarquez wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptIt went on to bring $300 million in first week of sale, crashing all records and becoming the fastest selling video game title in history. Bungie Studios has become an independent identity with effect from October 1st and has been … [...]
wrote, on October 6th, 2007
[...] maqbes wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerpt So far, several game blogs were rumoring that Microsoft and Bungie have decided to split, but now it’s confirmed. Bungie is the developer behind Microsoft’s Halo series; they recently … . Microsoft still retains a small fraction of rights in Bungie and they will continue to build games [...]
wrote, on October 10th, 2007
this is good for the employees at bungie that wanted to make something new and fresh, i agree with them 100% about not wanting to just pump out rehashed versions of halo for years to come.