Veteran Age of Empires developer from the defunct Ensemble Studios have announced that they're teaming up with publisher Stardock to create a new strategy game.
BonusXP, founded in 2012 by veteran game developers from Age of Empires developer Ensemble Studios, will join up with Oxide Games and Mohawk Games "as partners in Stardock’s vision for the future of PC gaming."
The Texas based studio will work to create their game using Stardock's Project Tachyon, a cloud-based meta-gaming infrastructure which Battle.net's Adrian Luff is responsible for overseeing.
BonusXP CEO Dave Pottinger commented, "Working with Stardock is fantastic opportunity. Stardock shares our vision of great games made by passionate people. We're thrilled to work with a publishing partner that rejects the tired mentality of churning through developers in the name of mindless sequels. While we could have self-published our next title, this partnership allows us to leverage the talent of both companies to create the game we have been dying to make. It’s not often that two veteran studios get a chance to work together on something like this. We cannot wait to share it with everyone."
Ensemble developed the likes of Age of Empires and Age of Mythology before being closed in 2009 after the launch of Halo Wars.
Galactic Civilizations III, Mohawk Games’ Offworld Trading Company, and Oxide Games’ unannounced title will all use Project Tachyon which will launch in early 2015.
BonusXP's game has yet to be announced and we've no word yet on when it will be released or for which platforms.