December 17^th, 2004 (2:51pm) - Take-Two Interactive has revealed in their fourth quarter and fiscal 2004 financial results release issued yesterday that they have acquired Salt Lake City, Utah-based developer Indie Built from Microsoft Game Studios.

Indie Built is responsible for Xbox-exclusive sports games such as Amped, Amped 2, and Links 2004, and also acted in a supervising role overseeing the development of the critically acclaimed Xbox Live compatible tennis game Top Spin.

According to the financial report, Indie Built will be focusing their game development efforts on next-generation game development across multiple platforms. Many analysts believe that this acquisition has been made to strengthen Take-Two Interactive’s sports lineup, which, thanks to a co-publishing agreement with SEGA, has performed very well in sales the past year thanks to the low-priced versions of Visual Concepts’ ESPN line of sports games.

Microsoft Game Studios announced in August that they would be putting their XSN sports lineup on indefinite hiatus. This sell-off of Indie Built confirms that Microsoft has no intention to provide their own sports lineup for their game consoles. Unlike Microsoft-published games such as NFL Fever, Inside Drive, and NHL Rivals, Indie Built’s sports games were accepted well by critics and consumers alike.