"Whoring out the Halo franchise"

Ensemble Studios developed Halo Wars, was met with rather positive reviews as it managed to deliver a solid strategy experience on console, however in an interview Gamesindustry.biz former Ensemble employee Tony Goodman, explained how the relationship with Bungie was a problem throughout development:

"Another problem was that Bungie was never up for it... Bungie was kind of sore about the idea. What they called it was 'the whoring out of our franchise' or something. Yeah, that didn't create a great relationship between us and Bungie; they viewed us as someone infringing [on their franchise]."

Of course, Bungie has since moved on from the Halo franchise, and Ensemble Studios was closed down by Microsoft, but in part resurrected with Robot Entertainment.