Halo creator Bungie sets its sights on Facebook, mobile games (and making piles of cash)

It almost goes without saying, but it's almost stupid to not consider mobile and social these days as a game developer. So--surprise--another game creator has entered the mobile/social space, the creators of the Halo franchise, Bungie. The ex-Microsoft developer revealed to Develop today in an interview that its Bungie Aerospace publishing division will focus solely on independent mobile and social game projects.

Its first game is called Crimson (pictured), the same as its previously revealed mobile tech for cross-platform games, and it looks like it will launch on iPad by the looks of its website. Still, no details have been revealed about the game other than Harebrained Schemes, a mobile games developer, is working on it.

During his interview with Develop, Bungie COO Pete Parsons revealed that it's about time Bungie uses its expertise as a developer to enter the publishing realm, but also joked, "Well, it's like every other developer publisher relationship where the developer does the work and the publisher takes the credit and the money... I'm kidding of course."

Parsons went on to say that he sees Bungie's deal with Harebrained Schemes as a partnership rather than a publishing deal. But more importantly, Parsons alluded to a network that will exist across all Bungie games and all the platforms it develops (and publishes) on. It's designed to track analytics for all of its games, provide united leader board services and to be deployed through both Facebook and Apple's Game Center. (So, Bungie is lookin' at Facebook, eh?)

Check out the full interview here, where the Parsons and Harebrained Schemes head Jordan Weisman go into detail regarding the risks, rewards and intrigue of mobile/social game development. We'll be here, waiting for the imminent Halo Facebook game--make our dream a reality, guys?

[Image Credit: Bungie]

What else do you think or hope Bungie is working on for Facebook and mobile? Do you think the creator of Halo has a chance against EA, Disney, Epic Games and the like on these new frontiers? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment.