Microsoft bet all their chips on kinect, and Rare was spearheading game development for that device. When it didn't work as well, they gutted Rare.

They bet on the wrong horse then.

Activision blizzard recently released one of the worst rated call of duty games, diablo Immoral with obscenely predatory micro transactions, ruined overwatch forcing the original game into a sequel model no one asked for and is still reeling from a controversy involving years of employee abuse, including sexual offenses.

Gutting the management of ActiBlizz is a good bet. Too bad they got hit by the same wave of layoffs of many other studios and tech companies.