Microsoft opens new AAA studio in embattled Vancouver

It's been a tough year for the video game industry in Vancouver, but a new Microsoft studio is looking to put the Canadian coastal city back on the map. Black Tusk Studios is a 55 employee-strong studio focused on creating AAA games for the Xbox 360, and the company's staff have an average of 12 years experience each in the field, according to the Vancouver Sun. Studio manager Mike Crump says that the company is "working on Microsoft's next big entertainment franchise -- 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. We are building something from the ground up." Vancouver has seen its games industry presence dwindle in the last 12 months. Max Payne 3 studio Rockstar Vancouver closed in the summer, while Prototype developer Radical Entertainment followed suit. The start of the year also saw Ubisoft closing its own Vancouver branch. Gamasutra's Leigh Alexander recently looked into why everything appears to be falling apart for the city's games industry.