Profile of SturmtigerCobra

I'm not surprised only by the timing. If anything this confirm they are planning to port both COH and AoE4 to Xbox that runs windows 10. This is a growing cross platform team IMO, they will recruit new devs for this. I suspect they will do PC first on steam and then port later to Xbox. With Halo Wars 2 they got that backward and no steam support except Halo Wars: Definitive Edition. Hopefully, this is PC first, xbox second. Info from Phil Spencer (see below interview link) about AoE seems to confirm this will be on steam.

Introducing @AgeOfEmpires IV [T], only on #Windows10. Check out the brand new trailer. #gamescom2017

https://twitter.com/Windows/status/899729582747602944

AoE2 in recent years has been making a comeback on steam. AoE2 vs CoH2:
http://steamcharts.com/cmp/221380,231430

Company of Heroes dev reckons it's solved the RTS on console problem Published 02/06/2014
But it's keeping its "plausible solution" secret - for now.
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-06-02-company-of-heroes-dev-reckons-its-solved-the-rts-on-console-problem

Working with Head of Microsoft Studios/Phil Spencer, properly save SEGA a lot of money building a larger cross-platform team. This is a win-win deal for both publishers. Combined with Creative Assembly, this will grow to become a pretty large RTS team. Who knows, maybe Creative Assembly will be involved in COH3 (for Xbox).
I said years ago they were planning something bigger than Halo wars 2 and this is just the beginning. Wargaming/CA team also has plans to bring Total War: Arena to console.

Total War: Arena Dev Talks Possible Console Edition And Avoiding Pay-To-Win
https://www.gamespot.com/articles/total-war-arena-dev-talks-possible-console-edition/1100-6449249/

Phil Spencer (MS gaming executive) is the real deal and does seem to care about making good games. After Ed Fries left MS gaming, xbox/pc had some bad years with leadership and studios leaving/going defunct.

Ed Fries - "Making Stuff" - D.I.C.E. 2014 Summit

FYI, ever since leaving MS Ed Fries has been helping indie devs including former COH1 vets that has worked on the AoE IP (mobile) for years now. http://www.smokingguninc.com/
When Company of Heroes vets build the next Age of Empires.. (August 28, 2014)
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/224356/When_Company_of_Heroes_vets_build_the_next_Age_of_Empires.php

When Smoking Gun Interactive was offered the chance to pitch a mobile Age of Empires to Microsoft, the studio didn't need to be asked twice.

So now we have COH vets working on both AoE mobile and PC/Xbox. Very interesting. AoE is MS biggest RTS title and have eSport potential.
Biggest Age of Empires 2 tournament ever has $120,000 prize pool
https://www.pcgamesn.com/age-of-empires-ii-hd/biggest-age-of-empires-2-tournament-ever-has-120000-prize-pool


Phil Spencer interview June 13, 2017
http://www.pcgamer.com/phil-spencer-interview-we-have-work-to-go-do-on-improving-the-windows-store-uwp/
The head of Xbox talks Age of Empires, Windows Store, and says "as a first party, we need to build some PC-first games."
[Phil Spencer has previously said he practically consider Creative Assembly as a first party for Halo Wars 2]

I'll wrap up with a nice one. Tell me a little bit behind the process behind how Microsoft decided to bring Age of Empires back. Had it been kicking around for a long time?

I want to give Shannon Loftis a ton of credit. Shannon's been in Microsoft Studios for a long time, and is somebody I've worked with and have a ton of respect for.

There's some franchises... it's interesting, as we're investing more in our first party, and we've looking at new IP in some of our existing franchises and things that do really well, Age is just one of those things that year after year on Steam, we see it continue to sell, even though the infrastructure that's underneath the game is creaking a little bit. The community's been there supporting it.

She said, you know, this is something we should bring onto our modern platform. Make it visually more up to speed. You're obviously not going to take that game and completely make it a 4K game and everything, but make it look something closer to modern. Support some of the Live features that we have. And then let's think about where this franchise can actually go.

We own it, so maybe it seems like we're talking about ourselves a little bit, but I think it's one of the important franchises in gaming, and I think it deserves a future.

It's the 20th anniversary. So this could be the start of the renaissance? That's how you feel about it?

I do. And I think the interesting thing is the community's been out there kind of supporting this game without us. And shame on us, right?

They crashed the website today.

[Laughs] I'm really excited. They crashed our website? I actually didn't see that.

Straight off the reveal. They had it back up quickly.

Good! Good. I was involved... I started working with Ensemble on Age 3, I think was the first one I as a studio manager was working with them on. That was a studio that had some real vision in what they wanted to do with this mix of history and RTS coming together. I think it's one of those franchises that deserves a great future.

As soon AoE4 was announced they are already hiring a new game director.
https://boards.greenhouse.io/relic/jobs/805315

FYI; Quinn Duffy (COH2 game director) recently updated his linkedin profile;
https://www.linkedin.com/in/quinn-duffy-95311622/

No DoW3 credits included. So Quinn Duffy has been working on other projects/games since they gave up on their five years COH2 plan.

Sega promotes John Clark and Creative Assembly's Tim Heaton:
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/sega-promotes-john-clark-and-creative-assembly-s-tim-heaton/0185200?

Meanwhile, Heaton will continue in his role as studio director at Creative Assembly while also becoming a flag bearer for the continued development standards of Sega Europe's numerous studios. In addition to supporting Sega Europe's other studio directors, Heaton will also advise on best practice and encourage cross-studio collaboration across the business, and keep in close contact with Sega Europe's COO and president about all studio and development matters.

Cross-studio collaboration might be related to Relic expanding to console. CA AAA console team was Halo Wars 2 and Alien Isolation.

I also noticed one Microsoft gaming community manager has been active in COH (more than 100 hours in-game) and social channels. The name COH cupecake/ArtistRage. Also wrote the Community Spotlight on Generals Gentlemen:
https://www.microsoftstudios.com/news/2016/02/29/community-spotlight-generals-gentlemen/

https://twitter.com/MSStudiosBlog/status/704819878197235713
Say hello to the gamers in this week's Community Spotlight! YouTubers Generals Gentlemen: http://j.mp/1TMpYTR
1. mar. 2016

https://www.twitch.tv/artistrage/videos/all
https://twitter.com/cupecakeplays
artistrage/cupecake

Hey there! I'm a community manager at a game studio and a freelance artist. This is where I come to play all my fave games and to get creative during my time off. Go ahead and give a follow so you know when I'm live!

To keep things in perspective:

A few games from Relics former publisher THQ - year 2011;
How Much Does It Cost to Make a Video Game?
https://www.techspot.com/article/771-cost-of-making-a-game/

Warhammer 40k: Dark Millenium Online - $30 million - Former THQ executive Danny Bilson told Eurogamer last year the publisher spent around $30 million on this licensed MMO before the title was cancelled.

Homefront - $50 million - THQ's attempt to take on Call of Duty had a $50 million development budget, according to former Kaos Studios producer Dex Smither (Update: Link to his CV removed at his request; he subsequently confirmed the $50 million budget figure to Kotaku directly).

RTS games - year 2001:
Black & White $5.7 million - Peter Molyneux's Game Developer postmortem for the game said the god game cost $5.7 million to develop.

RTS games - year 2006;
Anno 1701 - €8 million - A press release from developer Sunflowers pegged development costs of the strategy game at eight million euros.

Empire Earth III - $10 million - A former Mad Doc Software producer said the strategy sequel cost $10 million to develop.

Thursday Jan 24, 2013
Notice of SEGA’s Acquisition of Relic Entertainment and Some IPs Owned by THQ Inc.
http://blogs.sega.com/2013/01/24/notice-of-segas-acquisition-of-relic-entertainment-and-some-ips-owned-by-thq-inc/

As a series Warhammer 40k Dawn of War has sold more than 7 million copies worldwide, whilst the “Company of Heroes” series, a real time strategy game based on the modern history of warfare from World War II and after, has sold more than 4 million copies worldwide.

In comparison to COH, DoW1 had some pretty big esport sponsors with World Cyber Games.
https://www.esportsearnings.com/search?search=dawn+of+war&type=tournament
2006-10-18 - 2006-10-22 World Cyber Games 2006 (Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War) $43,000.00
2005-11-16 - 2005-11-20 World Cyber Games 2005 (Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War) $35,000.00


If Relic was planning for DoW3 to become an eSport game they needed a larger playerbase than COH2 to justify further investment post-launch from SEGA.

$3.5 million seems like wiki bogus without any credible source and/or Relic using cheap labor.
DoW3 (not including THQs "project Atlas" mention in recent Relic DoW3 documentary) has been in development since at least 2014. None of this is included in the report nor wiki.

GamesBeat: How many years have you been working on this now?

Philippe Boulle: I’ve been on the project two-and-a-half years. I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to finally be able to talk about it.

https://venturebeat.com/2016/06/13/warhammer-40000-dawn-of-war-iiis-creator-promises-the-return-of-spectacular-real-time-strategy-battles/

In the same time period (2014-2017), Relic grew to almost 200 devs. Vancouver living expenses are high especially real estate. This means their salaries have to be considerably higher than other cities to attract new talent outside Vancouver.
Relic has openly said this was their biggest RTS to date and they recruited many new devs based on that premise and future AAA games.

The "A-Team" is here (COH3):

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/pressreleases/300844/Company_of_Heroes_2_Crowdfunded_Grand_Championship_FinalsLive_from_ESL_this_Saturday.php

[This unedited press release is made available courtesy of Gamasutra and its partnership with notable game PR-related resource GamesPress.
Sometimes video games communities do awesome things. Their passion for the games they love underlined by their ability to galvanise their peers into doing something really rather cool. Company of Heroes 2 community stalwart, Matt Dunn, aka ‘A_E’, and a handful of likeminded friends did just that. They took it upon themselves to crowdfund a Grand Championship Series via Kickstarter. Not only did they achieve four times more than their £1400 goal, they earned investment from Relic and the interest of UK based eSports outfit, ESL, to help promote the event.

The Grand Championship Finals will take place in front of a live audience at ESL’s studio in Leicester, UK at 2pm BST on Saturday, 1 st July and will be streamed live on Twitch on COH2 caster Stormless’ channel where he’ll be joined by ‘A_E’ to host the event. The contestants in the final are two of the world’s best COH2 players, ‘DevM’ and ‘Luvnest’, with the winner set to land £1400. While that might seem like a small amount in comparison to top eSports tournaments, the money was raised almost entirely by the community.

The finalists have been preparing for the final with some respectful, yet serious fighting talk:

DevM: “ Fighting Luvnest will be the ultimate challenge of my career in COH2 since he is a very skilled and flexible player. To beat him I will have to make him pay for his mistakes and that is exactly what I plan to do. I won’t stop until I’ve proven 100% that I am the undisputed best player in the game and the only thing standing in my way of that title is Luvnest.”

Luvnest: “ I'm looking forward to playing DevM in the final. I've come a long way, playing the best players this game has to offer, there is no way that I will be stopped now. The GCS trophy won't be going to Portugal I'm afraid.”

32 of the world’s best Company of Heroes 2 players competed over a six-week period to reach this stage. You can recap on all the matches so far by visiting ‘A_E’’s YouTube page or watch the highlights here.

For more information about the how the tournament came to be, please see the attached one-pager written by Matt Dunn. For more information about COH2, log on to www.companyofheroes.com or follow it on Twitter and Facebook.

https://www.pcgamesn.com/company-of-heroes-2/company-of-heroes-2-championship-finals

In April this year, 161 backers pledged £6,305 on Kickstarter to fund a Company of Heroes 2 Grand Championship tournament. Tomorrow, July 1, the finals take place.

Is Company of Heroes 2 on our list of the best strategy games? Take a look and find out!

Company of Heroes 2 community member Matt Dunn, aka ‘A_E’, and a few friends took to Kickstarter to fund the tournament. They not only smashed their goal of £1,400 they gained the support of developer Relic, publisher SEGA, and the UK’s ESL eSports outfit too.

32 of the world’s best CoH2 players competed over six weeks. The remaining two players, ‘DevM’ and ‘Luvnest’, will be squaring off in the finals tomorrow July 1 at 06:00 PDT / 09:00 ET / 14:00 BST / 15:00 CEST / AET 23:00. The prize is £1,400 and the title of Best Company of Heroes 2 Player In The Universe, presumably.

There’s even a little smack talk going on. “Fighting Luvnest will be the ultimate challenge of my career in COH2 since he is a very skilled and flexible player. To beat him I will have to make him pay for his mistakes and that is exactly what I plan to do. I won’t stop until I’ve proven 100% that I am the undisputed best player in the game and the only thing standing in my way of that title is Luvnest,” says player DevM.

Luvnest replies, “I'm looking forward to playing DevM in the final. I've come a long way, playing the best players this game has to offer, there is no way that I will be stopped now. The GCS trophy won't be going to Portugal I'm afraid.”

The finals are being hosted by the ESL studios in Leicester. The event will be streamed live on the Twitch channel of popular CoH2 player Stormless, who will be joined by Matt Dunn.