The Microsoft owned developer FASA Studio, who most recently produced the multiplayer 360/PC FPS 'Shadowrun', has closed presumably due to the sales of the game being inadequate considering the lengthy development time.

Shadowrun received generally favourable reviews, but scores were low due mainly to reviewers feeling that the standard full price was excessive price point for an online-only multiplayer game with only three game-types and 9 maps.

In a post on the official Shadowrun forums, FASA head Mitch Gitelman explained that the team had known of this since well before the three patches were produced, suggesting that their fate was sealed as soon as initial sales results became available to them.

FASA Studios has been wholly owned by Microsoft since 1999, developing highly rated games including MechWarrior and Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge.

The fledgling video game industry has a terrifying turnover rate of devcos of all sizes. Luckily for FASA whose ofices are located mere miles from Microsoft's Redmond headquarters, half of them have already found new positions within Microsoft Game Studios or elsewhere within Microsoft.

This rules out the possibility of any new maps, which were supposedly being readied, but at least fans have one thing to be thankful for; Xbox Live not using dedicated servers has its advantages in these unfortunate situations.