Rare & World's Edge will now report to Activision following Xbox layoffs

In addition to overseeing the next Halo, Activision will also be watching over the studios behind Sea of Thieves and Age of Empires.

As part of Tuesday's latest Xbox shakeup, developers Rare and World's Edge now find themselves reporting to a new publisher. The studio behind franchises like Sea of Thieves and Banjo-Kazooie and the team behind the Age of Empires series are now going to be reporting to Activision.

Rare's new direction was noted as part of Tuesday's memo to Team Xbox from Chief Content Officer Matt Booty. Rare will join Age of Empires developer World's Edge in reporting to Activision, which was also just put in charge of putting together the next Halo game.

With this change in the chain of command, Rare's immediate future appears murky. Most recently, Sea of Thieves appeared during the Xbox Games Showcase with Custom Seas, which allow players to build their own game modes within Rare's pirate adventure game. There doesn't appear to be much else on the horizon, since Rare's Everwild project was canceled after a July 2025 round of Xbox layoffs. World's Edge, meanwhile, was last seen working on Age of Mythology: Retold, which released in September 2024.

What comes next for Rare, World's Edge, and anybody else caught in this latest Xbox circus remains to be seen. We'll continue to follow this story at Shacknews, so be sure to watch the Xbox topic for the latest updates.

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