Microsoft To Move Bungie Offices To Kirkland

Officials from Microsoft have announced that first-party developer Bungie is to move its offices from Redmond to Kirkland, Washington. The developer of the best-selling Halo series will now be based on the site of the Kirkland Hardware Store – apparently the Eastside’s oldest established business, dating back to 1890. The new offices will house more than sixty employees, who will mix with other Kirkland residents including Google, Monolith, Gas Powered Games and Rad Game Tools. "The creative energy that will bring to our downtown is very exciting," City Manager Dave Ramsay said. "This, coupled with the recent arrival of Google says good things about the downtown." At the same time as relocating its most famous internal team, Microsoft is also renovating its Redmond campuses to add up to 12,000 employees in the next ten to twenty years. The company recently got into a minor dispute with Redmond neighbors Nintendo over expansion plans for its site, although this was resolved amicably when Microsoft agreed to scale back its plans by 251,000 square feet.