They didn't "lose" shit, those people got canned by microsoft. After doing great work with Ensemble's legacy, no less.

in the process of moving from Xbox’s direct control to Activision’s.

Ugh, Activision? AoE might be cooked.

Remember to never buy gamepass, xbox, or anything MS. It will only fuel them doing this to other companies.

Well, this is a bummer. I felt they all had already been catering far too much to the competitive scene - for example, my biggest gripe is that I want maps to be much larger. They really aren't much larger than they were two decades ago and it seems like we should be able to support larger maps. I'd love to be able to build up a wonderful base, then go on a rampage around the map, having it make sense to start up new towns to take over more and more of the map. But it seems like most people want quick games. meh.

I know people like me are a minority, but I'm surely not the ONLY one.......

Cool, good to know that any new games won't be worth my time