Microsoft sent shock waves throughout the industry when late in 2008, they announced the closing of Ensemble Studios. Widely respected as one of the best developers of PC based RTS games, they were shuttered before their final game was even released. Although they kept on a skeleton crew to finish the project, it looks like Halo Wars will be the swansong of the storied designers.

But do not fret, news was just announced that a good portion of the original Age of Empires development team has formed a new studio, Robot Entertainment.

Ensemble Studios co-founder Tony Goodman and a number of veterans from the Age of Empires developer have formed a new studio called Robot Entertainment, Gamasutra has learned.

Details on the studio's current projects are unavailable, and it's unclear whether Robot Entertainment will maintain a focus on the PC realtime strategy genre in which the Ensemble team specialized, or try new arenas.

Microsoft closed Ensemble down once impending Xbox 360 RTS Halo Wars had completed development, in what it called a "a fiscally-rooted decision that keeps [Microsoft Game Studios]on its growth path." -- Gamasutra

It is not known if this is the team that will be handling the post-release work on Halo Wars, but the timing of this press release would lead me to believe that this might be the case.

Personally, I am more interested to see where they go from here. This could be a fresh start for a team that has otherwise been cemented in their ways for over a decade. Might we see a whole new direction for the established team? Regardless, we wish them the best of luck in their new endeavors.