Most would've thought that Bungie has the final say when it comes to farming out its beloved Halo franchise to other developers, but according to Ensemble it's in full control of Halo Wars.

"It's ou🐼r game," lead designer Graham Devine said. "We worked closely with them on the story and they give us cღontinuous feedback, but they let Ensemble make an Ensemble game."

Apparently, despite how remarkably the Age of Empires developer has managed to capture the Halo look, all of the Halo Wars assets were built from the groun♛d up for th♚e RTS as well.

"We're excited to bring RTS to a console," pipes in 🦋producer Chris Rippy. "So many people have an Xbox and have never played this type of game before, so we need to m🐽ake sure that they get in the game and enjoy it."

Halo Wars is due out early next year on 360, with a demo due to hit Xbox Live shortly before release. Check out our E3 impressions and trailerhere.

Check back next week for our massive Halo Wars interview.

July 20, 2007