Microsoft have signed a licensing deal that covers their entire first-party soundtrack collection. Halo, Age of Empires, Fable and hey, probably even Fuzion Frenzy, their licensing rights are now in the hands of Warner Music Group Corporation.

Warner/Chappell Music, the publishing arm of Warner Music Group Corp., and one of the world's largest music publishers, and Microsoft Corp. announced today a worldwide music publishing administration agreement, whereby Warner/Chappell will claim, administer and license music compositions owned and controlled by Microsoft, including the award-winning compositions for: Bungie Studios' blockbuster, Xbox and Xbox 360 video games, Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, as well as Age of Empires, Fable, Kameo: Elements of Power and other video game franchises.

One question: uh, why?

We have developed a large library of video game music and are excited to make it available for placement beyond games.

OK...still doesn't really answer the question. What, do Coke want to use the Age of Empires theme for a commercial? Do they want to sell the PGR soundtrack as ringtones or....ooohhhh. Hey, that's an idea. Luke Plunkett

Warner Music buys video game composition publishing rights from Microsoft [Music 4 Games]

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