Bungie giving Halo 2 "one last hoorah"

By Robert Purchese Published 8 February, 2010

But "saddened" by XBL Xbox 1 funeral.

Bungie's organising a send-off for Halo 2 a day before Microsoft shuts off Xbox Live support for Xbox 1 games.

On 14th April, those of you with all of the Halo 2 maps released so far will be treated to "one last hoorah".

"We're all saddened at the realisation that an era is coming to an end but looking back, we're incredibly fortunate to have had such a great run and such strong support from our fans," a statement on Bungie's website read.

"Halo 2 has been at or near the top of the Xbox live charts for original games since it launched over five years ago.  We're extremely thankful to everyone who has played, enjoyed and supported Halo 2 over Xbox Live.  We've had some great fun together, including far too many humpday losses to even recount. 

"That said," the developer added, "mark your calendars now - on April 14th let's all rally to go online for one last hoorah. One final farewell and one final opportunity for all of you to kick our asses at Halo 2."

Frustratingly, anyone without the full compliment of Halo 2 maps - including DLC - will be unable to play. And that DLC can no longer be downloaded from Xbox Live, making the retail-released map disk the only option should you be able to find it.

Bungie's aware of this and trying to find a solution.

"On it. Not sure what, if any, solution we can work out, but we definitely can't adjust the playlists over the weekend. Sit tight," wrote the developer on its forum.

Halo 2 was released in 2004 and earned 9/10 on Eurogamer - one whole point better than its predecessor.

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.

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

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Comments (31) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #1 2 years ago

    What this really means is they can finally increase the Xbox Live friends list limit now.
    The reason it's been set at 100 friends for all these years since the 360 launch is because of things like Halo 2.

  • alasdairm #2 2 years ago

    Why on earth have they pulled the DLC servers already....

    Disappointed that after upgrading to a 250 gig harddrive I cannot get back all my "corrupted" XBox 1 DLC, especiallly as the drive that had working DLC was wiped as part of the transfer process !!

  • bad09 #3 2 years ago

    Not played it for years but had a blast on MP Halo 2. Rest in peace buddy.

    I now see why PC gamers are hurt when dedicated servers are missing.

  • SniperZoz #4 2 years ago

    Bungie - now is the time to re-release Halo & Halo 2 with (as a minimum) the Halo 3 engine, and with x360 compliant net-code!

  • miiiguel #5 2 years ago

    I now see why PC gamers are hurt when dedicated servers are missing.

    huh?

  • bad09 #6 2 years ago

    @ miiiguel

    These games get lost. Cut off, sure you still have SP but MP is lost forever. It's a shame and it makes me understand the need for those servers that PC gamers seem to be losing more and more.

    Edit - as an example I thankfully can still play Battlefront 2 as I have a PC. If I was on xbox/360 not so lucky.
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 09:40

  • miiiguel #7 2 years ago

    @bad09 : I don't think that having dedicated servers help in extending the MP life of a title. As a matter of fact I think it's the opposite.

  • bad09 #8 2 years ago

    Well like I said miiiguel if I still had BF2 on xbox it will be useless to me very soon (TBH the xbox community was pretty dead anyway on BF2 but you get my point).

    Actually I might install BF2 tonight, this talk of shutting down originals on Live has made me think of the fun I had with that game and it might drag me from the AvP demo for once. Cheers miiiguel. :)

  • Meho #9 2 years ago

    "I don't think that having dedicated servers help in extending the MP life of a title. As a matter of fact I think it's the opposite."

    How so?? There are still people out there playing reskinned, modded to hell and back versions of Duke Nukem, Doom and Quake, precisely because they support dedicated servers (and also because they support open source architecture).

  • ignatiusjreilly #10 2 years ago

    @miiiguel

    It's not the developers/publishers that provide dedicated servers, it's clans, private hosting companies and individual gamers. So as long as there is someone out there with a copy of the server files and an internet connection, multiplayer can in theory live on forever.

  • Sunyavadin #11 2 years ago

    A major pain in the arse about Halo 2 multiplayer which limited how much I continued to play it was that the 360 stores installed maps in the same place it keeps game updates. Install updates for three or four more games and it gets deleted and requires a reinstall. Sitting for five minutes while my 360 installs the maps every time I wanted to play got annoying fast.

  • FooAtari #12 2 years ago

    @miiiguel
    "@bad09 : I don't think that having dedicated servers help in extending the MP life of a title. As a matter of fact I think it's the opposite."

    Edit - Think perhaps bad09 and miiiguel are referring to different things... And I am referring to allowing for custom or third party servers, whatever you want to call them

    As ignatiusjreilly stated, dedicated servers can be run by anyone. As a direct comparisson, because Modern Warfare supports dedicated servers people can still use it's multiplayer ten years from now weather Activison are still around or support the game. However when Activision decide to pull support for Modern Warfare 2 which doesn't have dedicated server support (well not officially at least) multiplayer will largely die.

    Decicated servers have a DIRECT impact on the longevity of multiplayer. As ignatiusjreilly, there are still people who play Doom, Duke 3D, Quake 1 and many other aging PC titles.
    Edited by 2 at 08/02/10 @ 15:20

  • darleysam #13 2 years ago

    Calendar marked, I will be there.

  • kangarootoo #14 2 years ago

    @FooAtari

    "Do you understand the concept of dedicated servers?"

    I'm not sure you quite do.

    A dedicated server does not mean server than anybody can run, it means a server that is set up specifically to be the HOST of the game (rather than one of the machines also partaking in the game). Whether the publisher, or the gaming community, run that server is a seperate issue.


    Dedicated servers ran only by publishers will indeed, if closed down, kill the online aspect of a game.

    Dedicated servers ran by players will allow the online side of the game to stay alive.

    BUT a game that uses local servers (i.e. running the server software on one of the gaming machines) will also allow online games to persist without publisher support.

  • CHAZBIGPOTATO #15 2 years ago

    http://ww w.xbconnect.com/index.php?topic...

  • TheChieftian #16 2 years ago

    Chances are you can get lan play working over then net if you try hard enough, I know you could with Halo 1

    ^ What he said
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 13:43

  • obscured021 #17 2 years ago

    just use kali to play halo2 on line in lan mode, ive been using it for years with psp lan games and before that with my orignal xbox

  • dr_faulk #18 2 years ago

    "one whole point better than its predecessor."

    Ssssh! Don't mention the war!

  • rprince #19 2 years ago

    The terminology confuses me. "Dedicated server" makes it sound like there is separate server software running on a separate machine, which the game clients interact with, and which takes charge of distributing all of the updates to all clients.

    The implication is that that opposite of this is a peer-to-peer architecture, where there is no intermediate server and all game clients communicate directly with each other. There is another situation where one of the game client machines act as server, and all the other clients connect to this one machine (but not a server).

    If there is a server software running on a server machine, there are again two options. Either the developer and publisher can make this software proprietary and host it on their own machine, or they can distribute the server software for free and then anyone (including the publisher) can host the server.

    So I understand there to be X main scenarios:
    1. Proprietary server hosted by the publisher.
    2. Freely distributed server (hostable by anyone).
    3. Peer-to-peer game clients communicating with every other game client.
    4. Peer-to-peer where one client machine acts as a server.

    I think @miiiguel is referring to #1, a publisher-hosted server, and @ignatiusjreilly, @bad09 and @FooAtari are talking about #2, a freely distributed server. However, as both of these solutions are not peer-to-peer (#3 and #4) and hence involve a server that is dedicated to hosting games between players, it seems fair to call both "dedicated servers" (it is the hosting that is in contention).

    In fact, by saying "this game doesn't have dedicated servers", it sounds like it uses peer-to-peer for multiplayer, hence the confusion!

    So what is the term "dedicated server" meant to refer to? #1? #2? #1 and #2? Can't we have a better term that isn't so ambiguous?


    EDIT: Ok, so according to @kangarootoo, it's #1 and #2, which I think makes sense. But why is there such confusion around this?
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 14:20

  • FooAtari #20 2 years ago

    @kanga

    "I'm not sure you quite do.

    A dedicated server does not mean server than anybody can run, it means a server that is set up specifically to be the HOST of the game (rather than one of the machines also partaking in the game). Whether the publisher, or the gaming community, run that server is a seperate issue.     "

    I do, I just did not express myself very well.

    And also may have jumped to some conclusions. Put your way perhaps miiiguel was referring to P2P vs dedicated servers
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 14:30

  • kangarootoo #21 2 years ago

    @FooAtari

    "Put your way perhaps miiiguel was referring to P2P vs dedicated servers"

    That is my understanding of the distinction too. I was being naturally cheeky, I'm sure you do know the difference :)


    @rprince and FooAtari

    "But why is there such confusion around this?"

    It comes down to common usage I think. In PC gaming circles, dedicated servers were usually ran by independant 3rd parties. Hence people come to believe that is what a dedicated server is all about, when in fact it is a purely technical term and has nothing to do with who is in charge of it.

    Left4Dead gives you the option of dedicated servers, or local servers. The dedicated servers in question are ran by Valve. If they decided to can them, the local server option (which I actually prefer, as the performance is consistently better) would still allow the online experience to persist.

    Now I understand that PC gamers are used to the whole "we can set our servers up the way we want them" aspect of free-to-manage dedicated servers, and company ran dedicated servers remove some of that customisation. I understand that concern and I accept it, but a lot of the other ill feeling about this stems I think from a territorial sense of "this is our clan server, not yours, stay out". You know, people like being in charge of stuff, even if it is just boring old game server code.

    Edit: to be specific, the "local server" I am on about is peer to peer. I.e. one gaming console or PC acts as the server, and all the other clients route traffic through this console. It is a good idea for the person with the best upload speed to act as the server in such instances (as upload speeds vary more than doanload, and are often rubbish).
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 14:48

  • ignatiusjreilly #22 2 years ago

    Dedicated servers for Left 4 Dead can be run by regular people too, on Windows or Linux boxes. It's not just a choice of developer servers or local.

    I can't actually think of any games which only offer a server run by the developer/publisher (apart from MMOs). I'm sure there must be some, but they will be in the large minority so I think that's why PC gamers tend to refer to dedicated servers as those which can be run by anyone.

    but a lot of the other ill feeling about this stems I think from a territorial sense of "this is our clan server, not yours, stay out". You know, people like being in charge of stuff, even if it is just boring old game server code.

    90% of people will never be part of a clan or rent a server - they just play on them. So personal loss of control will only be a factor for a small number of people. But I'd agree that a more general sense of the game being out of gamers' hands is a significant part of the problem people have with the recent decisions.
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 16:38

  • rprince #23 2 years ago

    @ignatiusjreilly: How about any EA Sports game? Most of them only run only on EA servers, don't they? Also, I guess just about any console exclusive, as Halo 2 is currently demonstrating.

    @kangarootoo: thanks for clearing that up for me. It's annoyed me for a long while.

  • ignatiusjreilly #24 2 years ago

    Sorry, I meant PC games.

    And EA Sports games are usually so terrible on PC that I've never had the pleasure of finding out how they do multiplayer.

    edit: A quick Google says you're right, EA sports games do require an EA server for multiplayer even on PC. And as most of them have shut down, multiplayer now doesn't work on most of EA Sport's PC games.
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 16:53

  • rprince #25 2 years ago

    :-) Fair enough!

  • miiiguel #26 2 years ago

    @ rprince: yes, you understood me correctly, I was refering to #1. Examples being I can't any longer play some EA sports titles, and I can still play PES06, the former uses dedicated, the later P2P.
    I'm aware that there are "unoficiall" game servers, and I can imagine they will be running "forever" (?!), but for P2P I just need another person with the game. Not saying that one is better or worse, just saying that lifespan-wise P2P, seems, theoretically better.
    Edited by 1 at 08/02/10 @ 17:03

  • ignatiusjreilly #27 2 years ago

    But doesn't it need the Xbox Live network? So you are still relying on a company to provide your service?

    Or do you not, I really don't know.

  • miiiguel #28 2 years ago

    Yes that's right, Live in itself is a "dedicated server", hence what is happening with Xbox 180 games, hence why I think the 1st comment by bad09 is contradictory.

    edit: or at least paradoxical.
    Edited by 2 at 08/02/10 @ 17:26

  • the_mtfr #29 2 years ago

    Microsoft is doing WHAT???

    ...
    ...
    Serenity now, serenity now, serenity...

    So glad I'm a PC gamer. Those backstabbing bastards! (And yes Backstabbing Bastard is also a Finnish band, quite good, but I mean Microsoft here)

  • Shakey_Jake33 #30 2 years ago

    miiiguel is correct in pointing out that dedicated servers would not help if MS chose to pull support anyway, because the whole system is closed to the extent that it relies on the Live service to still exist. This isn't dissimilar to games that rely on a master server list, except for the fact that the (relatively) open nature of PC multiplayer (until recently, anyway) means that you don't have to rely on the master server list to find a game - you can connect directly, or use other applications. Perhaps this actually underlines the inherient problem in closed networks like Live?

    On a similar note, you can use XBConnect and XLink Kai to create your own proper dedicated servers for XBox1 games (as long as they have LAN support). I guess this demonstrates the point that bad09 et al. were getting at.

  • neosalad #31 2 years ago

    DAMN my "corrupted content" message when i go to play Halo 2!!!
    (from transfering between hard drives a while back) and not being able to re-downlaod it!!!