The Agency then walls off the infected area of Pacific City and secretly creates an antidote, but only uses it on their own agents; as a side effect, the agents lose their superhuman abilities, which the Agency again blames on Thorne. They then send undercover police to instigate violence at Thorne's peaceful protests, turning the public against her entirely. The Sunburst weapon is built to supposedly deal with the freaks, but is actually built as an antipersonnel weapon, meant to kill anyone who might oppose the Agency. Thorne, in an attempt to stop the Agency's plan, leads attacks by the Cell on the Sunburst bombs, giving the Agency a reason to send their Agents back into the field. Phil Wilson and Billy Thomson, respectively Producer and Lead Design of "Crackdown" had previously confirmed that the game was designed from the outset to be a long-running series, stating that sequels for the game are very likely to be produced, especially if "Crackdown" performed well commercially. However, during the Industry All Stars event in September 2007, Wilson confirmed that Realtime Worlds was not working on a sequel to the game, saying "Microsoft [was] a little late in stepping up to the plate to ask for "Crackdown 2", and by then we had already started working on bigger, better things." However, then-Microsoft Game Studios corporate vice president, Shane Kim, stated that Microsoft still holds the intellectual property rights for "Crackdown" and that a "Crackdown" sequel was still a possibility. Realtime's Studio Manager Colin MacDonald clarified that if they have the resources after completion of "APB", they could approach Microsoft to discuss a sequel. Prior to its announcement, industry rumors stated that the new start-up company, Ruffian Games, a Scottish studio formed from members from the Realtime Worlds team, may be involved in the development of a "Crackdown" sequel. This was confirmed when the game was announced during the 2009 Electronic Entertainment Expo Conference. The rumors of Ruffian's involvement with the sequel were initially dismissed by McDonald, saying he doubted "Microsoft would harm an otherwise fruitful existing development relationship by gambling on funding "Crackdown 2" with a startup on RTW's doorstep, for obvious reasons." Following the announcement, David Jones, founder of Realtime Worlds, stated he was "a bit miffed" with Microsoft's decision, believing that Microsoft may have been looking at an internal development studio instead of the new start-up located in the same geographical area as his company and formed of many of his team's former members.