On their official blog, Microsoft has proudly announced their acquisition of Havok. The company is a leading provider of 3D physics (from Intel). If you have played 3D games with simulated physics within the last decade or so, chances are good some of those games were powered by the Havok Physics Engine. As a result, you’ve probably seen the Havok logo a number of times before. They are the leading supplier of real-time physics for video games. Throughout its history, the company has worked with many partners, including Activision, EA, Ubisoft, Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft and plenty more. These partnerships resulted in the creation of more than 600 games, including Halo, Assassin’s Creed, Call of Duty, Destiny, Dark Souls and The Elder Scrolls to name a few.
Microsoft’s blog post says they will continue to build great experiences for gamers, and license Havok‘s tools to their partners. They also say that Havok shares Microsoft’s vision of empowering people to build game worlds full of experiences that haven’t really been seen before. Microsoft’s post says that their acquisition of the Havok Company continues their tradition of giving developers the tools to empower them to unleash their creativity (and to create the best games they can for the world to enjoy). They also say they will continue innovation to benefit their game development partners. Part of this will include building the most complete cloud service. They’ve already just started to show it in games such as Crackdown 3.
Microsoft says that Havok is a “fantastic” addition to their existing tool set for game development, which includes DirectX 12, and Visual Studio among other tools. The company’s blog post also says it looks forward to sharing more of its vision (of creating game worlds and experiences never seen before) in the near future.
