MS debating "a more persistent" Halo

By Robert Purchese Published 22 September, 2010

To turn it into an "ongoing relationship".

Phil Spencer's Microsoft Game Studios is trying to figure out how to make Halo "a more persistent engagement" that doesn't go "dark" for a period while a new pillar release is developed.

"There's no explicit strategy that says we're to ship a Halo game every year. One Halo game every three years - which was kind of our old cadence – is probably not frequent enough," Spencer told IGN.

"We're coming up on, what, next year is the 10th anniversary. You watch the change in gamers in 10 years; the percentage of players who are playing Reach that were not old enough to play Halo 1 at the time - 10 years is a long time between launches. We definitely think about a more persistent Halo engagement for customers and not going dark for two years, and Live helps obviously with multiplayer to keep people engaged."

"343 Industries is thinking a lot about how to take this franchise and turn it into something that people feel like they have an ongoing relationship with," he added, "and they can entertain themselves more often. But it's not, hey, every 6th November or whatever we have to ship a game and build a production plan around that. We want to do things that make sense as a first party."

One solution would be a Halo MMO. Now defunct developer Ensemble had been working on a prototype of a Halo MMO for Microsoft that had been given the green light. Bungie, the creator of Halo, saw the concepts and thought aloud about how such a game would be "challenging" - "not that it couldn't be done," Brian Jarrard added.

Halo: Reach, which launched last week, was Bungie's last Halo game. From here, 343 Industries - lead by ex-Bungie man Frank O'Connor - will carry the torch.

Last year Microsoft introduced Halo Waypoint to Xbox Live. This is a Halo aggregation destination that covers community statistics as well as offers entertainment such as videos and animations.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds. @Clert on Twitter.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (57) Latest comment 2 years ago

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  • frankfurter209 #1 2 years ago

    Say what you will about Halo Wars, but the Halo brand has been pretty expertly managed over the past decade. Five games in ten years (Six if you want to count Wars, I don't) is not at all over-saturation. Seeing Halo fall prey to yearly exploitation a la COD would break my heart.
    Edited by frankfurter209 at 22/09/10 @ 09:06

  • Fab4 #2 2 years ago

    And as we all know 'ongoing relationships' cost ;)

  • X201 #3 2 years ago

    "MS debating over Halo"?



  • BAM! #4 2 years ago

    They'll milk it to death...

    and then milk it a bit more.

  • Ignatius_Cheese #5 2 years ago

    Keep staying the course. As frankfurter says, 5 games in 10 years is good going. Perhaps interspersed with side projects like Waypoint and Legends.

    Oh, and PLEASE do a Forerunner game!

    And an HD remake of Halo 1/2 combined a la God of War/Team ICO please. Could even be XBLA. Just make it happen :o)

  • Negotiator #6 2 years ago

    I don't get what MS are getting at, it seems like they are talking about an MMO product. As long as they still make FPS along with that its ok by me.

  • Tricky #7 2 years ago

    Ugh - you're forgetting that a forerunner game would involve the Flood

    /shudders

  • Ignatius_Cheese #8 2 years ago

    @Negotiator - No, not an MMO. I think Phil Spencer was saying that he would like to see the Halo brand continually represented, like for example through Waypoint.

  • GiarcYekrub #9 2 years ago

    With 3 year you'd think they of come up with a better story, all it was space marines, no connection to any of the characters non of the team were memerable enough for me to tell you which one was which. Bring back the over the top action set pieces, the Sabre bit was the only highlight... there was no humour at all and I think that was its main problem

  • Ignatius_Cheese #10 2 years ago

    @Tricky - If programmed right, the coming of the Flood to the Forerunner society could be like a creeping terror. Do it more from a survival horror-esque element with Forerunner society falling into chaos and end with the firing of the Halo rings. Final shot - Guilty Spark on the first Halo installation whistling to himself.

  • GamesConnoisseur #11 2 years ago

    Lambasting MS for trying to do Activison, COD every year, the truth is that the market is there.

    I m not that bothered about the quantity of releases under Halo tent compared to the QUALITY, Halo Wars for me was reasonably fun and an advancement on the franchise. Rather than getting just another FPS.

    Indeed re SP element, prefers Wars to ODST.

    Halo Kinect.... Now that is something I DO NOT WANT!!

  • Ignatius_Cheese #12 2 years ago

    Something Halo with Kinect, yes, but not a full game. A side project/experiment, perhaps using the Milo tricks, such as talking to Cortana or something.

  • mcmonkeyplc #13 2 years ago

    Dont you fucking dare do a CoD with Halo!

  • Britesparc Verified Creative, ITV #14 2 years ago

    I'd quite like it if they made, essentially, Halo Arena: a multiplayer-only affair. You buy the boxed game full-price, and its supported and enhanced throughout its lifespan WOW-style, with lots of free updates, tweaks, patches, etc, but also micro-transactions and DLC.

    That's a way of having a persistent Halo experience without milking the brand totally dry or having an MMO.

  • ouchio #15 2 years ago

    Smear my teats with lube 343 industry milk bitches! theyre getting ulcerated.
    perhaps That could be a new way for the company formally known as Rare to make themselves useful after they finish cleaning MS s toilets of shit stains from MSs PR guys BIGGEST TURDS EVER IN THE HISTORY OF EXCRAMENT

  • Cronan #16 2 years ago

    A survival horror set in a Forerunner installation - but none of that annoying flood music.

  • Dolly #17 2 years ago

    Please don't go episodic with Halo! :(

  • darkmorgado #18 2 years ago

    there was no humour at all and I think that was its main problem

    In complete fairness, the game revolved around the fall of an entire planet to a massive invasion force, which pushes Humanity to the brink.

    Not particularly a situation that lends itself to humour.

  • MiniAmin #19 2 years ago

    +1 Frankfurter209

    Halo's only continues to be a massive franchise because they games remain quality and are released just as the fans crave a new title. Don't expect Halo to be as successful if it becomes another cynical annual release.

  • darkmorgado #20 2 years ago

    That could be a new way for the company formally known as Rare

    Last I checked, they are still known as Rare.

  • carlitoswagon #21 2 years ago

    Bobby Kotick's version may have read........

    "We need to milk gamers until their teets are raw and bleed. Then we'll send in the commercial milking machines to suck them so hard they start to enjoy the pain! It's a cycle they will become accustomed to and they will eventually see this as the norm. I love you shareholders!! You're the best"

  • rivuzu #22 2 years ago

    How to find an excuse to create a new game for no apparent reason...

    It's obviously Halo x Tekken.
    Seems to be working for Namco, after all.

    (Though, I still remember the Spartan in DOA4. That shit was awesome. PLASMA GRENADE GRAB, FWING)

  • jamhead #23 2 years ago

    Wouldn't a strategy similar to Rockstar and GTA be worthwhile exploring? A major release with reasonably regular and reasonably substantial DLC.

  • Kaminari #24 2 years ago

    "10 years is a long time between launches."

    Now just imagine a game like The Last Guardian or Alan Wake requiring 6 years of development... It's not only a long time -- it's insane.

  • Embra #25 2 years ago

    So, ten years between launches is too long, so is three and so is two. But you're not talking about doing a game a year because that seems to be too long between launches too and we don't want that. Wow. We gamers really don't impress you much, do we? You seem to suggest we have the attention span of a blind fly and the memory of a... of a... what was I saying? Still, it's nice to know that you're going to cater to the brain-dead masses you feel we are by not unduly surprising us with a new game every few years (we might get frightened by all that 'new' stuff). Instead, we'll get a drip feed of... something.

    And you'll get great steaming wedges of money. Sorry about that. I know that's not what your after, what with all this charity work you're planning with the mentally ill...

  • TopKatt #26 2 years ago

    Look what happened to Star Wars. We don't want Halo to go all phantom menace on us.

  • coolbritannia #27 2 years ago

    Am I the only one who really enjoyed Halo Wars then? There are many rumoured Halo projects out there, the movie, the TV series, a few comic series, Halo 4 (which is where we'll meet the Forerunners, no doubt) and the dlc for Reach.

    Can I suggest however, that m$ follow the current trend of releasing old games again in HD, I'd love CE and 2 in HD.

  • Lukus #28 2 years ago

    This doesn't sound good at all. 'Hmm, we have this popular and well liked IP... we'd better release more iterations more frequently.' Not stopping for one minute to think why it has become such a well liked and popular IP. I swear executives live in dreamland where anything is possible. I'm sure they're probably thinking, 'why can't we keep up the standard?! Why can't we release a triple A Halo themed game every year?! Who needs Bungie?! There's no such thing as over-egging the pie! This is definitely a good idea!'.

    Nobs.

  • bobiroka #29 2 years ago

    Halo 1/2 remake for the 10th anniversary is an absolute no brainer... It will begin the cycle again etc...

    Not sure if an XBLA release will be enough of a big deal for M$ though. You won't get people queuing outside shops for a download...

  • Dizzy #30 2 years ago

    I think a lot of FPS companies are looking in this direction since so many people now buy Reach/CoD and play/buy nothing else for 1-2 years.

    I think a F2P system like League of Heroes might work. With people spending credits to buy new stuff and/or real money if they can't wait.

    But with the ending of Reach a Halo 1 remake with the Reach engine would certainly not be a bad idea and the fans surely wouldn't mind.

  • anomagnus #31 2 years ago

    There is an opportunity here for MS to do something different. Persistent relationship shouldn't automatically mean MMO.

    A pillar release every three years is, in my mind, too long, but a two year release gap, with regular content updates, and I just don’t mean new maps, but additional chapter, side stories etc, should be very possible.

    There is a wealth of content out there. Stories based on ODST’s, Marines, other Spartans, hell, even the Elites again would make great DLC stories.

    As others have said though, a Halo CE, and Halo 2 re-release with the new graphics engine would be an automatic buy for me.

    Being honest, I don’t think that MS would follow an MMO. The cost is prohibitive, you’d be looking at 3-5 years development and deployment if starting from scratch, and you’d have the ‘jedi conundrum’, i.e. every will play a Spartan, and almost nothing else.

    Brainstorming, perhaps you could do a planetside style game – a persistent world to be fought over? Not an MMO qith quests, but just seizing and holding ground, with resets every month. Rewards every month with new equipment?

    Anyway, I love Reach. A lot.

  • altitude2k #32 2 years ago

    You're not the only one. I loved Halo Wars and really like the idea of Robot doing a sequel.

    I'm hoping that 343 tiptoe their way along, and I think a sequel to ODST using the Reach engine would be a good place to start.

  • AphoticCosmos #33 2 years ago

    Please for the love of god just keep it going every three years or so.

  • Dizzy #34 2 years ago

    >Being honest, I don’t think that MS would follow an MMO

    Not it won't be an MMO... more like a persistent FPS, maybe like Global Agenda.

  • PhoenixMDK #35 2 years ago

    I think this means we'll finally get that Halo kart racer we've all been desperate for!

    In all seriousness though, isn't this exactly what they've been doing through multiplayer support so far? The previous Halo game is still in the Live top 10 by the time its successor is released, which seems like evidence of that relationship. The solo fans may not fall into that category but even the campaign begs for co-op now (on Heroic or above, at least).

  • lordofthedunce #36 2 years ago

    I'm more a fan of Bungie than Halo.

    I'm happier to wait for a dev to take its time getting the games right than need constant brand installments regardless of who's made them.

  • Farstarbuck #37 2 years ago

    They need to up their multiplayer game in order for the persistence to remain.

    The learning curve coming back to Halo after 3 years is too steep! And still it remains the same.

    You can have options out your ass tactic, but is it good? Is it fun? The answer is no its not. Jump shoot melee. Mix that order up, that's Halo.

  • Nephirion #38 2 years ago

    Halo: Milkage Evolved

  • Darren #39 2 years ago

    Since Halo 2, the series has mostly been popular for its online modes and they seem very long-lasting (as in years). All those gamers would want is regular map packs I'd imagine, something they get anyway so the persistent comment can only really refer to the single player element.

    One of the more common criticims of Halo Reach that I noticed was about the familiarity of the single player game so I cannot imagine releasing a new game annually would do the series any favours. The annual release of Call of Duty games had made them a whole lot less exciting than they used to be IMO but it does help that every other one has been relatively poor compared with the 'proper' Infinity Ward developed ones (in other words, the real deal CoD games came along every two years)!

    Without Bungie's involvement in the Halo games I don't predict a very bright future for the games anyway; 343 Industries may turn out to be the next Treyarch... ;)

  • spekkeh #40 2 years ago

    Roll on Road to Halo:Reach Spring edition '12.

  • jtodroc #41 2 years ago

    Now I'm not a Halo fan & know nothing about the whole Halo universe but surely if they start releasing new Halo game every year or every 2 years the game would start to stagnate.

    There's surely only so many stories they can tell within the same universe/conflict before people start getting sick of it. Someting similar happened when there were so many games based around World War 2?

  • pickles4uk #42 2 years ago

    Is 'MS debating' an intentional pun. Or did the writer not realise?

  • kinky_mong #43 2 years ago

    You watch the change in gamers in 10 years; the percentage of players who are playing Reach that were not old enough to play Halo 1 at the time

    There's a pretty big percentage of people playing Reach who are not old enough to play Reach.

    Damn parents not checking age ratings before buying little Johnny Shitbag a new game so they can sit him in front of a screen for hours rather than raising him properly.

  • coolbritannia #44 2 years ago

    I'd welcome episodic installments of Halo backstory, eg the battle aboard Truth's cruiser unseen in games between 2 and 3.

    Couple of hours gameplay, some nice armour mods, a map or two, deal.

  • SilverInfinity #45 2 years ago

    @X201

    "MS debating over Halo"?

    PMSL - I didn't get the reference until I read that a couple of times ;)

  • BoffBoff #46 2 years ago

    I think it could be good - IF DONE RIGHT.

    But you can have too much of a good thing, yes?

    Major DLC ('Chapter' style a la GTA) would do well to keep it fresh every 6 months or whatever.
    You can also add my vote for a HaloCE/2 HD 10th Anniversary Special Edition!
    I'd really love to see more about the Forerunners - I find them the most interesting part as they're so mysterious, and also see things from the Elite perspective with regards to them finding out the 'truth' and siding with humanity - not sure how this particular bit would go down with the Halo fanboys (Master Chief/Spartan fanboys?) though.

    Just my humble little opinion anyway!

    *edit for typo
    Edited by BoffBoff at 22/09/10 @ 12:38

  • Harmonica #47 2 years ago

    I don't think I'm alone in thinking that any future Halo universe games are almost non-canon without Bungie helming the ship.

    Good luck to them and I hope they manage to pull off some great Halo games, I'm just not sure if I would care about playing them.

  • reverandglass #48 2 years ago

    I must admit I'm not a fan of Halo, in fact the only enjoyment I get from it is beating my Halo loving friends online (while at someone's house who has a Halo game), but this does seem like now Bungie are out of the way MS will turn the series into the new Sonic and no-one wants that. Not even me.

  • edhe #49 2 years ago

    "MS Debating" ... /snort.

    Sorry, went all pubescent there.

  • Armoured_Gideon #50 2 years ago

    @GiarcYekrub

    "... there was no humour at all and I think that was its main problem"

    As darkmorgado has said, that's the problem with genocide. There's no sunny side up.

  • SwedBear #51 2 years ago

    As someone said before a persistent Halo game in the same veins as Planet Side would be absolutely wonderfull.

  • Bluetooth #52 2 years ago

    MasterChief: Cooking Evolved
    - Cook your own ration packs!
    - take part in the annual MasterChief competition with other spartans!
    - Over 500 recipes including Grunt Soup, Jackal's Ass and Elite Ice Cream!

  • Gaiduku #53 2 years ago

    I think a Halo MMO would be quite interesting actually. Also the game world at the end of Halo 3 is similar to how Azeroth was at the end of Warcraft 3 - i.e. at a bit of a stalemate. The Covenant have been destroyed and whats left are two races that dont... hate each other any more but still aren't on amazing terms.

  • thepiedpiper #54 2 years ago

    well a few people have mentoned that Halo is being milked to death an all that. What about Mario?

  • SwitchBladeUK #55 2 years ago

    This makes me sad :(

  • man.the.king #56 2 years ago

    Monthly updates?

  • Harmonica #57 2 years ago

    Halo isn't yet being milked to death, considering all the Halo games are AAA quality, even ODST which I didn't think was much cop (for not being a proper shooty FPS) is still a cut above most games.

    It's just that now the team behind it are moving on, and they infused the games with such a core personality from well back in the day, it's not going to be the same.

    Not to say I wouldn't like a kind of forerunner game, a Halo universe RPG, an MMO, or any games featuring spartans set after Halo 3... but anything involving the core characters like Chief is going to just leave me cold.