Since Microsoft , and Diital Envil are on the table heres my opinion. And I ve been here as many of us since the 80ies playing.
As allways companies want profit...but

Chries Roberts had a vision. Wasnt so much in bankrupcy as you say. Was in fact searching for a big production/distribution company...And for a long time Microsoft and Digital Anvil had talks about Digital Anvil passing to Microsoft.

In fact Digital Anvil was considered to be a succesfull Company when Starlancer was launched

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Corporate/Virt ... 13,00.html
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/sim/freelanc ... 52391.html
http://www.gamekult.com/finances/contac ... 0333005904

But to know the real story go here

http://pc.ign.com/articles/088/088608p1.html

The IGN explains it all...
But short is this...Microsoft saw Digital Anvil as a good investement. And it bought it...

The problem was latter on. Chris Roberts had a vision for the game...
But Microsoft felt the game didnt need to be so "rich"...Microsoft wanted the game done even without all the twists.
With Chris having less powers, Chris decided to leave. Since he felt that a "less" Freelancer wouldnt be that good. He wanted and strongly fought for big support to this game..And felt the natural evolution would even be a reall mmopg. In fact Freelancer was THE game Chris always wanted to build.
And we can only guess what if..I know many players dont feel enclined to playing Freelancer because there are so many basic things that arent in. Capital Ships, changing nick name, posting news online.
And things like dynamic trading just to name a few.

But this is basically why most popular games come from small house companys at the time they released the popular game
want some examples?

Bohemia Software - Operation Flashpoint
Epic Megagames - Unreal 1 - Theyve been around for a long time but at the time
they were very low profile
ID Software - Doom and so on ...at the time same thing
When Epic and ID were seen as small the big names were Sierra, Lucasarts, and EA. They were the big boys with popular adventure games, and strategy games.
Then came the 3d shooters and they gone off.
CCP - Eve Online

You see when small game companys start ..they set a mission...Do a big product to gain popular vision and set the weels going ... If they fail they die, if they succed they are in the BIG bucks. But when this companys become part of big Software houses , like Sierra, EA , Lucas Arts, Microsoft ,Activision the big boss wants to play all safe..They do marketing studys..And if they see FPS are selling well letst use this formula over and over again..Just like TV with the Reality shows. They dont explore new areas. Go to the sierra, Lucas Arts, Microsoft games page ...And youll see most games , dont bring that many new things....

In the end regarding Freelancer. Chris is a no constrains type developer...He has a vision and he wants to realize it... When Microsoft gave the ultimato he left...
And Microsoft released the game.

But what big companys are failing to see..Is if they risk more...If they give more freedom to developers they achieve more...

Just remember this ...Who came with the policy of "When its done?"
It was Epic with Unreal...