nice!

Awesome news for the Vancouver console development scene. Looking forward to see what springs forth from the Black Tusk team.

Didnt Microsoft already had a studio in Vancouver? I know people who have been working there for years. Is this a second studio, or did they rebrand the existing one?

I'm an industry vet from Vancouver. Most of my career I've had to work in the USA, although my experience in the USA is far more positive than in Canada.

Why are people excited about this studio in Vancouver? Here's some quick facts about Microsoft Vancouver.
- they have 3 artist positions in a city with about 400 unemployed artists.
- one of the positions is contract, a contract job is useless if you have a family.
- the other contract position in Vancouver at EA also requires you help cheap labor in China do assets.
- the lead artist position they have, they are speaking to artists from Europe to fill.
- if they hire a local artist that person will very unlikely be Canadian.
- they are located in Yaletown, here's a wakeup call, to buy just a 1 bedroom apartment 800 square feet is more than half a million dollars, or a mortgage of 2600 / month.
- to skytrain to a normal city (say Surrey) that has condos / houses in the 400k range you'll be on a skytrain for a steady 50 minutes catching a new flu every month.
- there are many students = cheap labor waiting in the wings in Vancouver.