Reasons for getting relic to develop age of empires IV
1: Business sense: It was probably cheaper for them to contract out the game to relic than to make the game themselves since they know how much it would cost to hire a team.
2: Experience: Microsoft probably relied more heavily on emblem studios to make the game more than themselves. Microsoft development team are more about the hardware side of things and knowing their OS inside and out. With that being said, you could expect relic to do the more gamey side of things than anything. It is well known how good relic is at delivering later era game play.
3: Lack of a better studio: Relic’s track record is really good, since emblem is in the grave with so many other great RTS game development studios, really relic was the best possible choice at the time.
I also wondered why Relic. Let me explain: knowing that Relic is developing AoE 4, it makes me excited and incoherent at the same time. I do not know what to expect from Relic, and this makes me nicely nervous because it is a gamble for me. Looking at the previous Relic games, I can say that surely it is a great development studio, but it differs from the AoE genre. Obviously, for AoE 4 it takes something innovative, different than the previous chapters, so it’s a new study. However, we hope Microsoft can keep Relic within certain tracks so that an AoE style game is developed. After the last interview, I feel safer; having heard Microsoft say that the game wants to remain rooted in the AoE franchise. I admit that I would have liked to see the Creativy Assemble: he has already had microsoft relations for halo wars 2, proving he does not develop a total war style game (as dictated by microsoft). CA has a lot of experience on past history (just look at all of her chapters at what age they set, except for warhammer. By the way: have they chosen Relic because of the abundance of world warfare settings?) And do not forget that the total war series is only half a strategic turn, because there is a gameplay centered exclusively on the battlefield, where all units move simultaneously and for multyplayers it is very well that the rooms are full of players playing in this mode (jumping the part of the shift strategy). Probably the CA is full of work: warhammer, arena total war, support from halo wars 2 and the development of a spin off specific on a historical period. Go Relic !!!