Whenever I cast my mind back to my years playing the Xbox 360's greatest hits, I often wonder if these games were really as fun as I remember, or if it's just a combination of nostalgia and my younger self being less critical. Aཧfter all, I don't think I could approach games the same way I used to, wide-eyed and assured that I was about to have an amazing time. It's perhaps a consequence of my profession thaℱt I've become cynical in my gaming habits.
The recent news that 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:343 Industries is 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:rebranding to Halo Studios, adopting Unreal Engine 5 and working on multiple Halo games at once has prompted my latest bout of longing for times gone by. Simply put, Halo hasn't been the same since stewardship of the series was transferred from Bungie to 343 (now Halo Studios). The reasons for this are numerous, but first, allow me to wax lyrical about how wondrous the Halo 3 era was.
Halo was one of the major drivers of my gaming experiences in my adolescence. I used to come home from school and instantly🔯 dive into a game of Halo 3 multiplayer with my brothers. At that time, I hadn't played much Halo 2 as I was only five years old when it was released. That didn't stop me from instantly taking to Halo 3, though. It was my first real ex🍒perience of being a part of a community, and it was magical.
At the time, Halo and Xbox were intrinsically linked. Master Chief was the poster child of the console, and the games were actually good enough to sell consoles. I've written about this in the past, but there was a strong social energy on Xbox at that time, especially in Halo. Bungie's facilitation of community-created content meant you were often invited to try custom lobbies on Xbox Live, where you wouꦓld inevitably play well-known community game modes like Cops 'n' Robbers and Griffball with random players for hours on end.
There were also community clans, a concept borrowed from MMOs. These clans would queue as 8 players in Big Team Battle, or participate in private clan battles against other clans. I was a member of a clan that only used Sangheili (Elite) models in multiplayer and we denigrated those who chose to play as Spartans, which was ironically the option with far more customisation options. There was a hierarchy and everything, it was a big🦄 deal.
That's not to mention a legitimately good trilogy of campaigns that were well-loved by everyone who played them, complete with couch co-op. Halo and Gears of War were two series' from Xbox that combined narratively rich single-player campaigns with compelling multiplayer experiences. It remains difficult to get both aspects of these games correct, so havingﷺ two series' that managed it was quite the feat for Xbox at the time.
♔After the release of Halo: Reach and the subsequent transfer of Halo to 343 Industries, the studio (or Xbox higher-ups) made the questionable decision to immediately bring back Master Chief. It already felt like 343 was getting off on the wrong foot by bringing Master Chief back from what was a perfect ending to his arc in Halo 3. Halo 4 wasn't bad by any means, but the campaign's narrative was laboured and oftentimes nonsensical, and the multiplayer failed to maintain the longevity of its predecessors.
That's the thing with the 343 era, none of the games released by 343 are bad, exactly. They reviewed strongly and adapted to the changing first-person shooter environment by adding more movement mechanics and more visceral hit registration. Generally, these are technically competent games. But they don't have the soul, they don't evoke the same feelings in the player as the original trilogy. This is evidenced by the fact that 343's Halo games never maintained the player populations seen in Halo's heyday, and post-launch support was sluggish and lacking. Even now, Halo Infinite has an underdeveloped multiplayer and a slate of cancelled features. Forge mode wasn't available for years, stunting the crea🍃tive potential of the community.
It would appear 343 Industries is aware of some of its shortcomings as one of the reasons for the switch to Unreal Engine 5 is to reduce the amount of time it takes to create new content and also to at🧸tract developers experienced with an industry-standard engine. Personally, I don't really care about the visuals. Yes, seeing the lush foliage of a Halo ring fully realised is cool, but that's not what made Halo what it is.
I'll give credit where credit is due, 343 Industries has always involved the community in the development process. The Master Chief Collection is the best thing the studio has released, and there's tons of extra content in those games that make revisiting Bun🔯gie's Halo games even better. The fresh-faced Halo Studios needs to maintain this energy going forward, continuing to bring the community in and ensuring the games have all of the necessary features at launch, not on a roadmap that players won't wait for.
It's immediately apparent from watchin🐲g the Halo Studios video that the te♔am has the requisite passion for the series, they need to channel this to capture the feeling of a game with a living, breathing community; a game with engaging multiplayer and a campaign that invests you in the fight of its protagonist, as the original trilogy did. There are still millions of Halo fans out there. If Halo Studios can make the right game, they will come running back.
In Halo 3, Master Chief must again battle the Covenant 𒉰and the Fl💖ood, this time rounding off the trilogy with a battle to end all battles.
