160°

343 Industries' Next Halo Project Could Take a Page From Call of Duty's Playbook

The future of the Halo franchise is a little unclear right now, but it may be a smart move to borrow one idea from Call of Duty's past.

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gamerant.com
SullysCigar399d ago

Can't they just take a page from Bungie's book and take this floundering franchise back to it's roots?

It was awesome back in the day. Now it struggles to keep up, because 343i keep 'changing direction' or doing something 'fresh'. I don't want fresh, I want classic and a return to form. FFS just give it something else and save us all the pain of repeatedly dashed hopes.

kingnick398d ago

343i isn't the studio to make Halo relevant again.

While Halo will never be as popular as it once was another more competent developer might be able to do something with then franchise.

The title is ironic as Halo's downfall in part started when it started copying COD and ignoring longtime fans of the series.

just_looken398d ago

i remeber in my days there were a shelf of fresh fps games

resistance
killzone
halo
doom
wolfenstien
metriod
unreal tournament
csgo
mag anyone?
planetside 1/2
old rainbow six games

Top of my head

Now its like ok 2023 military AAA shooters

cod and

SO yeah cod is the best fps now sense there is no longer anything else :(.

Hofstaderman398d ago (Edited 398d ago )

It would be more prudent to give Halo to Activision in its entirety.

just_looken398d ago

Lets all remember former bungie employees wanted to join 343i in the beginning but were denied then they all moved on.

I was shocked to see how quick they through out the human covenant peace pack.

I was expecting mass effect style upgrades how the Normandy had each races tech inside as a show of peace.

So future unsc gear would have covenant tech overtime would get better introduce unsc laser guns and weapons for spartans that can be used through there on board power system. Even spartan upgrades like arm shields or swords like elites had but for spartans. Heck those mech we rarely see could have had shield tech

The multiplayer could have been a advanced vr simulator style like sword art online.

so with that tech it could have been a advanced training sim which would have used more alien tech and over time have many new modes outside ground combat,

Na f all that they were like just introduce robots then make crap up as we go

Atleast we got halo wars 2 that campaign and red team were great.

BandarHub398d ago

There is nothing wrong with Halo, it has it own dedicated community that supports it. A forge, multiplayer and story community.
Halo in the 2000s was great because it was an unrivaled console shooter but over time many shooter came with new ideas and took it thunder.
COD releasing every year outstripped Halos market share of multiplayer. Only fans and the community came back for Halo.
Making Halo go back to its popularity of the early 2000 would mean adding many things that strips away it's Halo identity.
-Battle Royale mode
-ADS aiming
-Kill Streaks/powers

They experimented with that idea with Halo 4 and the backlash as heard far and wide. Halo 5 struck a good balance and was really fun to play. Adding any other gameplay features from other multiplayer games is a strick no no.

Halo is all about balance fights, map knowledge and spawn knowledge.And that's the beauty of Halo, they have nothing to learn from Bungie. 343i is perfect for Halo as they have understood the franchise well and have listen to fan feedback with the need to call them toxic.

Halo infinite multiplayer is the perfect balance between Halo tradition gameplay and modern controls.
All 343i needs to do is implement a deep career system and reward players with credit so that they stop complaining about the store.
343i can easily just do what ever they want and ignore fans and bulldoze their way towards creation but they know that they will betray their community.

PhillyDonJawn398d ago

Well said, people have no clue what they're talking about they probably never even were halo fans lol

Hofstaderman398d ago (Edited 398d ago )

Remember Halo Reach? I love that game. That was the last great Halo. 343 felt derivative from Halo 4.

PhillyDonJawn398d ago

Disagree, I disliked reach with a passion. The art style wasn't good, the armor abilities werent balanced and wasn't Traditional to Halo.

-Foxtrot398d ago

No because 343 has done everything it can to try and get away from Bungie which is why their games have sucked

Halo 4 - Changed up the online Bungie had perfected rather than expand on it

Halo 5 - Switched it up and tried to change up the single player with plans of focusing on Agent Locke as they wanted to get away from Chief.

Halo Infinite - God knows. Open world like stuff it is.

BandarHub398d ago

What are you talking about?
Its Bungie that ruined Halo multiplayer with Reach
Bloom was problematic and cause a lot of issues in one on one fights.
Armour Abilities changed the game for Halo. The meta for halo reach multiplayer was people spamming the Amour lock when they knew they lost a fight then waiting for someone else to pick them off. My taste for Halo multiplayer has changed since.

Halo 4 multiplayer gets a lot of slack but the only issue was the powerful weapon that you could get after getting kills. It was an issue if those weapons came into the hands of a skilled player any regular player would need the skills to dominate. The criticism for the load outs over-exaggerated, they were acting like players we created load-outs like CO, in fact, it was everyone the same weapon but with a different set.

Halo 5 struck a good balance and this after consulting many esports Halo teams who worked together with the developers. But people can
Halo 5 story was underdeveloped and could have used a couple more chapters to expand the story they were trying to tell. People are acting as if Agent Locke was supposed to replace Master Chief and that can't be further from the truth. Master Chief is Halo and the lore surrounding his character is integral to the story.
343i biggest mistake with Halo 5 was telling a story that needs people to understand the expanded lore...for a Halo fan it was good but for the regular person, things got confusing pretty fast.

Halo Infinite is the perfect Halo game both Multiplayer and Single-player.
Calling the Halo Infinite campaign just open world is misleading as the game is more open with areas opening up as you play. You need to remember that they took the Halo Enemy AI and they put that in a more open area.
Walking around and discovering logs and story behind ring was intriguing and is the way Halo lore should be delivered. The ending with the mere mention of offensive bias is something to look forward too.

Halo inifte multiplayer is pure perfection and strikes the best balance between Old and new Halo.

It easy to bash a game but 343i have done exactly what the fans wanted. They could have just bulldozed their way towards a vision of their own but they have to take into consideration the community. 343i gets too much slack from on-the-fence fans when they do something good like Forge, adding community maps to the rotation and giving players more customisable option like no other halo game. Peopl ignore te good stuff that 343i have created.

-Foxtrot397d ago

Halo Reach was amazing and the single player story hasn't been matched in any Halo game after since

BandarHub397d ago

I just made a breakdown of Halo Reach's multiplayer and you say that it's amazing by not mentioning why.
Speaking of Halo Reaches its single-player, it told a simple story. Halo Reach had untapped potential because it was the main stronghold for the UNSC. Instead, they skipped all of the best parts of the story of Reach and focused on a side story as you watched everything from the sidelines. It was decent but if you know about Reach you will know that Halo Reach story was but a mere speck in the overall story.

Rude-ro398d ago

The masses do not want a high resolution throw back game..
They want new, innovative and fresh off of the roots of the game.
Infinite is THE prime example of that because it is back to the throwback being as basic as can be.
They also want a campaign full of mystery, lore and wonderment.

Obscure_Observer398d ago (Edited 398d ago )

@SullysCigar

Not happening. And you no longer have to pretend you care about Halo since 343i is here to stay. MS just showed you 343i haters the middle finger by allowing them to remain Halo´s main studio.

Just move on with your life and forget about that franchise.

+ Show (4) more repliesLast reply 397d ago
CrimsonWing69398d ago

Can’t Halo just be Halo? Y’know, it’s true 343 has turned this series into a mess. The truly last great Halo game, in my opinion, was Reach.

Hofstaderman398d ago

Absolutely agree, Reach was epic

Flawlessmic398d ago (Edited 398d ago )

Halo needs a god of war style reboot if it wants to go back to being the giant it once was.

Halo has become a good series now which compared to the master piece status of before just isn't enough.

How 343 do it I don't know, but if keeps going like this it'll just be cool another Halo is out, not bad but not amazing either.

I don't hink Halo belongs in middle ground territory.

BandarHub398d ago

You guys shouldn't talk about Halo.
You simply don't know that you can't reboot a franchise that has built-in lore like Halo.
Making Halo go back to its popularity of the early 2000 would mean adding many things that strips away it's Halo identity.
-Battle Royale mode
-ADS aiming
-Kill Streaks/Hero powers
If you're are fan you do not want this for Halo. Maybe a spin-off game but not Halo core multiplayer.
Kids that played Halo back in the day are now in their mid-20s and 30s. The majority of the gamers about there are kids and they don't want to play Halo because it's not the next big thing.
The only place where Halo can be big is in its campaign and expanded universe.

I don't know how the god of War fans even allow the developer to take the franchise in the direction that they did both gameplay and character-wise. The first God of War was great and set something up with the story but GOW R had a bad story and no one wants to admit it. There is a reason why it lost to elden ring.
Making Kratos cry......nah...are there even god of war fans out there. If that happened to Master Chief the fans would stand it.
On the topic of gameplay, if GOW had dedicated fans they would complain about the direction that God of War went with its gameplay. There is no reason why Kratos is in the position on the screen that...that's shooter camera angle.

SinkingSage398d ago

They should take a page from DOOM's book.

BandarHub398d ago

No, Doom was a dead franchise with no community do cater for. so a reboot made sense.
Halo has a big community you cant just flip the switch on a franchise.

Concertoine398d ago

Is it really that big at this point?

I agree with your earlier post that Infinite’s gameplay is great and feels well thought out. But the lack of content, mediocre campaign, and slow drip of content has killed it. Thats on 343.

PhillyDonJawn398d ago

Absolutely not. They did that with halo 4 and ppl were not happy. Halo infinite was rated 11 points higher than CoD yet ppl acting like it was the opposite? Make it make sense. I will say if the buy out goes thru it would be interesting to see Activision make a ODST 2 and 343i make a CoD advance warfare dlc.

just_looken398d ago

Problem with that $10 says 90% of current cod devs have no clue what a odst is and never played halo 3 or its side dlc for mombasa.

You probably get a battle royal with strippers or some crap.

PhillyDonJawn397d ago

Lol they probably don't know but with the a director that knows the lore leading charge a codified halo dlc and a halofied CoD dlc could be interesting for those audiences. You could end up getting halo fans to dive in CoD and CoD fans to dive into halo

just_looken397d ago

@phill

sounds like some rule38 dlc then?

Ok i am in LOL

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80°

There are no "thoughtful" ads in video games, EA

There are no thoughtful ads in Video Games, EA. Leave them be.

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videogamer.com
northpaws6h ago

I think the only type of games that can gets away with it would be sport games, having those sponsors ads on the side like on real life.

But don't put freaking Doritos ads in Star Wars or something, it breaks the immersion. If it is a pop-up ads, then big no.

Hofstaderman5h ago

EA can thoughtfully eff themselves.

Makersbreath25h ago

EA coming back for the crown of being perceived as the worst company in gaming.

250°

Bungie CTO Leaves Company After 14 Years, Joins Sony PlayStation

Bungie veteran and current CTO, Luis Villegas, has left the company after fourteen years and has joined Sony PlayStation as its new Head of Technology.

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thegamepost.com
Sonic18811d 1h ago

"I feel incredibly lucky because as part of my new role I get to still work closely with my Bungie family."

New role and more pay and still can work closely with Bungie

21h ago
fr0sty10h ago

Yeah, he basically just got a big promotion within the same parent company.

21h ago
S2Killinit9h ago

Seems logical for him and probably for PlayStation

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140°

Square Enix Is Going Multiplatform; The Layoffs & Its Past Don't Inspire Confidence

After its latest games didn't meet sales targets, Square Enix is going multiplatform but the company's track record isn't convincing.

Scissorman1d ago

Square Enix been multiplatform for decades, a few exclusively-deals doesn't make them any less multiplatform.

fr0sty1d ago

Nor is selling their games on a console with only 25 million install base going to bring their sales to where they hope they will be... Unless they somehow manage to dumb down FF7 trilogy to work on switch, they aren't going to have much luck. They already released it on PC, after all.

anast12h ago

Where are you getting that number?

SegaSaturn6691d ago

It kind of does, giving preference to a certain platform by timed exclusivity. Console ports generally feel superior. Legend of mana PC port extremely broken

neutralgamer199223h ago

Sega

It doesn’t when square themselves didn’t want to fund the development of remake. It’s only after the success of the 1st they realized their mistake but now contract is signed. If it wasn’t for Sony there would be no FF7 remakes. Same goes for silent hill 2 with Konami. They don’t want to fund AAA budget. Companies like PlayStation and Nintendo get blamed when in reality they are saving some of these franchises

Remember sega didn’t want to fund bayonetta and epic games didn’t want to fund another gears of war. It’s easy to blame console makers but they are the ones taking the risk and paying huge upfront costs without seeing the final product. FF7 remake trilogy won’t be coming to Xbox now or in the future. PlayStation and PC is what square signed up for. Sony paid them more than they would make from Xbox sales.

ravens5223h ago

I just wonder when everyone is going to demand that the Square Enix exclusives with Nintendo come to PS and Xbox. Or it's just the PS exclusives that matter lol

phoenixwing23h ago(Edited 23h ago)

I'd love for the nintendo exclusives to come to pc or ps5. They'd actually be playable then.

neutralgamer199223h ago

Raven

Exactly and that’s where square enix does more exclusive than any other platform. Gaming is square has always been very unrealistic with their sales expectations. Remember when tomb raider reboot sold 7.5 million and square said it wasn’t enough. They need to spend less on development and have more realistic expectations from sales.

And those thinking games being not on Xbox makes a difference don’t understand we have a decade plus of data showing square enix games having less than 20% of their multiplatform sales on Xbox (final fantasy series) and Nintendo consoles aren’t strong enough to run any current games. Nintendo switch should be as strong as Xbox one x atleast but we all know that’s most likely won’t happen

RoadRacer22h ago

@raven

thing is, as neutral said in their comm, the switch isn't strong enough to run flagship SE games
i think what SE does is, it makes unique games for switch only so that it has something for that console too. Thats where all the "underlined sans" rpgs go to mostly

maybe things will change when Swtich 2 drops cuz that's gonna be as strong as ps4 afaik from the rumors flying around

TheGamingHounds23h ago

@Scissorman

Your point is valid enough but when the icon of this company is limited to one console in timed-exclusivity, it means the company has crossed the line. By some degree at least

All things aside, Square itself stated "aggressive multiplatform strategies" so we all know what it's talking about

Scissorman20h ago(Edited 20h ago)

Then the headline should read "Square To Drop Exclusively Deals in Pursuit of A Sweeping Multiplatform Strategy". I don't recall this argument when Square Enix released Bravely Default, Octopath Traveler, and Triangle Strategy on one platform. And even if FF is the icon, not all of its titles have gone to one platform. We're talking about three games, one of which is already on PC. Did Square suddenly go 'multiplatform' after it released subsequent Tomb Raider sequels on more than just the Xbox? It's just a silly way of putting it.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 12h ago
TheGamingHounds23h ago(Edited 23h ago)

SE needs to go all in optimization. Broken PC ports won't help its case, especially with big releases like mainline Final Fantasy

Asterphoenix22h ago

It's actually simple. What doesn't inspire confidence is Square allocating their budgets on the wrong projects such as Forspoken, Avengers, Babylons Fall and Foamstars.

Square has always been multiplatform since PS3/360 days which 80 % of their games are. People kick up a fuss over PS exclusivity but not Nintendo which has more exclusive projects console exclusive from Square.

FF16 has done ok but not enough to fix the blunders that the past mistakes Square has made with some of their projects. FF7 Rebirth is unclear we'll see a PC release for sure so it's hard to say so far not as good as they would of liked.

Then again unrealistic expectations. If it weren't for Sony these games would at least had another 2 years development time. So some people need to be realistic in that regard.

Scissorman20h ago(Edited 20h ago)

It's the blunders that set those expectations so high. If you remove those from the equation, I bet the sales numbers would be more than stellar. Square believes it's okay to release a pile of risky, middling, garbage because the big boys will ultimately subsidize the cost. Don't worry if Forspoken sells poorly, FF16 will surely sell 10 million copies to balance that right out. Oh wait, it only sold like 4 million. Well that's a disaster. Meanwhile games that sell 2 million units with comparable budgets are deemed successful.

thorstein15h ago

I would also add that FFXVI, which I loved has a hint to one of their biggest problems: the number 16.

It's a great franchise, but that's all they've become known for. Dragon Quest is my favorite all time series but it's like they don't know what to do outside of those two IPs.

Valve never makes trilogies. The idea is that they don't want to become stagnant. Gabe Newell hates the number 3.

I can't imagine their talent wouldn't want to try a new RPG.

RoadRacer22h ago

Square Enix just really need to revise its expectations. Maybe consider a change in strategy on dev end as well. Multiplat will help for sure but only good games that are marketed well will sell

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