Microsoft said yesterday that it was giving up its controlling ownership of Bungie Software, the video game subsidiary that developed the hugely popular Halo franchise, including its latest iteration, Halo 3.
Bungie, based in Kirkland, Wash., said it planned to return to its roots as an independent game studio, a move that eventually will cost Microsoft exclusive ties to one of the most successful and sought-after teams of game developers.
Harold Ryan, president and studio head of Bungie, said that he had been working for months on a plan to separate the studio from Microsoft, based in nearby Redmond, Wash. Mr. Ryan said that the companies had a good working relationship, but that developers at Bungie yearned to work for themselves, not a corporate owner.
“It’s an emotionally creative point of view,” he said of the decision to take the studio independent. “That’s the state we wanted to be in.”
Neither Mr. Ryan, nor Shane Kim, the head of Microsoft’s game studios, would discuss the financial terms. Microsoft originally acquired Bungie in 2000 for an undisclosed amount.
Bungie’s Halo games have been of singular significance to Microsoft in the development of its video game machine business
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