With having this week confirmed that former Chicago boss Kudo Tsunoda will be Microsoft's new "general manager", boss Mark Rein describing the appointment as "normal".

"In practical terms this is a normal reorganisation at Microsoft," the Epic big wig told site Eurogamer.net. "They're a huge company with something like 70,000 employees and they re-organise their structure on a fairly regular basis."

"Kudo will be the GM in charge of the studio that oversees MGS/Epic publishing relationship. Our previous GM is moving over to the studio that oversees the franchise where there's more going on," Rein went on to explain.

"We had dinner with Kudo during DICE and I think we'll have fun working with him as we've had with all the folks we've worked with at over the years."

Tsunoda's appointment has been taken as a sign that Gears of War 2 could be on the way, although Epic and Microsoft have so far shied away from such confirmations.

By Luke Guttridge