I think it’s time we finally admit that Microsoft has officially lost their minds. They’ve been making some of the most baffling decisions for over a decade in regards to Xbox and it’s most popular franchises and this recent announcement regarding the future of Halo is just another example of out of touch leadership. Halo was once the biggest console FPS on the market with amazing set pieces, great characters, unforgettable music, a game focused on FUN with friends.
But I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say that Halo is just done at this point. It’s time has passed. And one could make the case that it’s been done since 2010 when Bungie split from Microsoft and handed off the IP to 343 Industries.
Halo 4 and Halo 5 were such massive departures from what made Halo great during the Bungie days, with awful narrative decisions and gameplay overhauls that spit in the face of everything that Halo used to represent. Halo Infinite while initially appearing to return to some sort of classic Combat Evolved style in terms of visuals, gameplay and thematic elements, ended up feeling like a cheap Halo knockoff with a boring story, a half baked launch with features like Forge, Multiplayer, Co-Op, and Splitscreen all being delayed into the post launch cycle, and one of the worst leveling experiences in multiplayer that was designed around some of the most egregious monetization systems. This is not the Halo that many of us grew up with and the problems run deep with the franchise ever since 343 took over.
Almost all areas of the game need addressing. But for some reason, in their new Vidoc, Halo Studios decided to focus on probably the least important issue with the series. Graphics.
This recent trailer released by Xbox announced a rebranding of 343 Industries, they’ll now be known as Halo Studios and all new Halo projects will be using Unreal Engine 5 from now on. In this six and a half minute trailer all they talked about was graphics and how they won’t be held back in any way and they can fully realize their ambitions with the Unreal Engine. But I gotta say, I don’t think that moving to Unreal Engine will solve anything.
And in fact, could bring us new problems. I’m convinced that the main reason why so many studios are moving to Unreal Engine is not because it’s so much better than their own proprietary engines, but because of two things. One, Unreal Engine 5 slapped on your game makes normie customers very hyped out of their mind because they have this massive obsession with graphics.
It’s a good marketing tool. And secondly, game studios can outsource a lot of work to countries with cheap labor because Unreal Engine is available all around the world and with your own proprietary engine, outsourcing labor becomes a lot more challenging or even impossible. So yes, Halo might have marginally improved graphical fidelity.
But Halo never really looked that bad. In fact, Halo Infinite looks pretty good graphically. The original Halo franchise was a graphics showcase.
Um it was best in class. That’s what Halo was when it first was released and that’s what Halo needs to be again. No it doesn’t, Halo does not need to be the new graphics benchmark, that is not what will make Halo great again.
These are the things that will make Halo great again. Great storytelling with writers who care about the Halo universe and aren’t interested in inserting modern day social politics, badass set pieces need to make a return because in Infinite there really just were no great cinematic set piece moments. A feature complete release with Splitscreen, an in-depth Forge mode with tons of features, Co-Op Campaign, and addicting multiplayer with meaningful progression.
That’s what Halo needs to be great. But we’ve heard nothing about those important things so far and Unreal Engine doesn’t magically make those things happen. There still needs to be dedicated and talented project leads with a proper vision regardless of the Engine being used.
But taking a look at current leadership at the company I’m feeling pretty mixed about the direction they’re planning to take Halo. On one hand, Pierre seems like a pretty solid studio head. He might be the only one at the company who knows sort of what he’s doing.
343 has done very few positives for the Halo franchise, but almost all of the positives that they have done have likely been directly linked to him. So at least there’s that. But on the other hand, the Chief of Staff is highly invested in DEI practices and seems to be the type that lets that take precedence over the things that actually matter in game development.
And largely it seems like most of the staff from 343 are still here at Halo Studios. So this isn’t some massive restructuring and rehiring and brand new studio. This is just 343 with a new name.
Now, I’m not opposed to 343 swapping to Unreal Engine 5 and rebranding to Halo Studios, I just want that to actually mean something. Things have to change on a fundamental level in terms of direction and game design. My fear is that this rebrand and engine swap will be the only tangible changes and we’ll continue to see poor storytelling, game launches with missing game modes and features, things like Splitscreen not even being considered for the game, and a multiplayer mode that still lacks any substance.
I’m gonna have to see much more from these guys on how they plan to make a good game, not just a pretty looking game. Which also leads me to this. What the hell is this Chief design?
It looks so much worse than his design in the older titles it’s big and bulky and ugly and chunky. That armor change alone already has me very concerned about their art direction for this game. Now let’s take a look at the biggest strengths of the past Halo games and show some examples that 343 or should I say now Halo Studios needs to follow if they want to make a great Halo game.
A focus on community. Community is one of the biggest reasons you can attribute so much success to the franchise. It was designed to be a fun party game for friends, and a simple action packed campaign with a badass protagonist that everyone can relate to.
Master Chief being the masked hero always allowed just enough mystery so that anyone can put themselves in that hero’s shoes and share the Master Chief experience together as a community. Co-op and Splitscreen were also extremely important in creating a strong sense of community in Halo’s past, and it still CAN be today if they do it right. Co-op games and multiplayer shooters still have strong communities all around the gaming industry, but 343 over the years has done almost everything in their power to remove a lot of the social elements of the game like pre game lobbies and voice chats being removed.
Lobbies disbanding after a match completion, no splitscreen. They desperately need to improve the social elements in order to bring back that strong sense of community. Environmental storytelling.
Halo’s storytelling has always been pretty straightforward and simple in the past. Full of alien bad guys, MacGuffin driven plots, and an overpowered protagonist destined to save humanity. But the storytelling was always enriched by the surroundings of each level.
The mission 343 guilty spark is one of the best examples of great environmental storytelling that gave the worldbuilding a bit more depth. In this mission you finally encounter the flood and there’s a whole lot of crazy foreshadowing in the environment before you finally reach them. And in the aftermath of defeating the flood, you can find two marines and two jackals dead on top of a barrier surrounded by ammo.
Implying that the Covenant and the Marines died fighting together in their final moments trying to hold off the flood. All of the Bungie Halo games have strong environmental storytelling like this that helped bring each mission to life and comparing that with games like Halo Infinite where missions felt like these sanitized perfected rooms that hadn’t been touched in ages. 343 games just feel lifeless compared to the Bungie games.
And along with environmental storytelling, we need Big Set Piece moments something Halo Infinite also notoriously lacks. It’s a reason I feel that the open world mission design was a largely net negative for the game because it made the mission design be extremely small scale and generic. You know largescale epic battles or massive assaults on enemy bases there’s always been some of the best cinematic gameplay from the early Halo titles and those type of moments need to make a return.
The writing needs to be improved. Frankly the writing has been just abysmal lately. They gotta hire brand new writers entirely who actually know the lore and care about the franchise.
And a bonus, we need to make Cortana hot again. Weapon sucks. She’s your typical overly cheery annoying AI, where Cortana was an AI that actually had great character and dialogue with Master Chief.
And again, we just gotta bring back a hot AI alright. And lastly, we cannot have Halo for modern audiences alright. You already know what that means.
Halo with a super sanitized, inoffensive, social politics injected piece of propaganda. Infinite was already heavily leaning that way and if the game gets even more woke, censored, and sanitized it’s going to be an immediate turnoff for me and most diehard Halo fans. There isn’t a massive Halo community anymore.
People aren’t playing Halo like they used to because I think most people have accepted that it’s a franchise that had it’s heyday in the past but it’s been years since that time. And honestly, looking at the leadership of the new Halo Studios, I’m sure that social politics will absolutely ruin this games development and the end product when it finally releases. But let me know what you guys think, thank you all for watching, I’ll see you all in the next one.
