It has been less than two years since Xbox announced that longtime series developer 343 Industries would be rebranding to Halo Studios. This was envisioned as a new dawn for the beloved shooter franchise, as Xbox seemed to leave the Reclaimer Trilogy behind as it sought to tighten Master Chief’s focus to enable a more faithful and satisfying future.
As someone who always held out hope for Halo regardless of how dire things seemed, I was legitimately convinced that this reformed studio was destined for bigger and brighter things. I became even more reassured following the July release of Campaign Evolved, a confident remake that despite polarising reception amongst hardcore audiences, did its job of pulling a fading icon back into the limelight. If the next steps were carefully made, we could have been living in a reality where Halo took over the world again.
But with Microsoft obliterating Halo Studios with 268 layoffs and putting the series’ future under the Activision umbrella, my fading flame has finally flickered out. Whatever form it takes in the coming years with a new team and a refreshed creative vision, I simply cannot bring myself to care anymore. The Halo I grew up with is gone, and the cheering I have done from the sidelines for all these years has been for nothing.
I wish this weren’t the case, because there were so many moments over the years that oozed potential. Halo 4 dove into more compelling lore than Bungie ever did, while it was amazing to watch 343 Industries flesh Master Chief out into more than a stoic naval officer. He is far more complex: a child soldier bred for warfare and robbed of personal agency so much that the only meaningful relationship he has is with an artificial intelligence destined to eventually leave him behind.
Unfortunately, the potential of this storyline was abandoned when Xbox decided to soft-reboot the franchise with Halo Infinite: a game that was intended to--as the name suggests--grow into an eternal home for all things Halo. Its free-to-play multiplayer had the potential to rival huge live-service efforts like Fortnite or Destiny, but a glacial approach to seasonal updates and its failure to maintain an active audience led to a premature demise.
As for the campaign, the presumed events of a nonexistent Halo 6 took place offscreen as we reunite with Chief long after the battle has been lost. Once again, a narrative examination of how this once-unstoppable soldier deals with picking up the remnants of a human race he was expected to save is incredibly powerful. All of those opportunities to produce something wonderful, lasting, and impactful never quite reached their full potential. Much has been uncovered about how things turned out this way, and many of the internal decisions made were a foolish attempt to try to recapture what Halo used to be. It was a dominant global titan that transformed the medium time and time again as it pushed the shooter genre to new heights, gave people a reason to sign up for Xbox Live, and helped the platform stay afloat during an awkward start--but that's no longer the case.
Bungie’s original trilogy was lightning in a bottle. Three masterful games released over the course of seven years that would go on to define an entire generation of culture. I’m not exaggerating when I say millions of gamers were raised by Halo. It helped define several of my own tastes during a formative time in my life as I played through each story campaign with my older brother and felt like I was taking part in a living, breathing battle: a conflict that was confident in its mechanical and narrative ambitions despite having to live up to massive expectations. It stuck the landing each and every time, with ODST and Reach acting as big ol’ cherries on top before the series was finally laid to rest. Or so we thought.
We hold the first three games to such an untouchable standard because of what they came to represent: experiences that evolved the medium before our eyes while bringing countless gamers together in a world before social media and smartphones. There was something so intimately raw about fighting alongside Master Chief with close friends under the dim light of a cracking CRT display. The medium we know today was still finding its feet in a brand-new era, and Halo played a fundamental part in that journey. Fondness in the moment has since morphed into entrenched nostalgia, which is precisely what Xbox has been trying again and again to recapture to mixed results. Not the gameplay or narrative, since 343 Industries has done an admirable job of taking risks in that department, but rather the emotions Halo once stirred up inside of us all those years ago.
But things change, and video games no longer exist in a landscape where a game like Halo can waltz along and take over the world. We have become accustomed to live-service titans like Fortnite and Call of Duty, which have thrown aside traditional solo campaigns and online multiplayer in favour of something alien.
Our present is about platforms making lots of money and sinking their hooks into players for as long as possible rather than offering an adventure that stays with you. The original Halo trilogy made and tried to do things within the medium that had never been done before, which is precisely what made them so memorable to an entire generation. Whether you were a player or a developer, we were all watching this magic come to life at the exact same time.
As much as it breaks my heart to admit this, it’s time to stop hoping for Xbox to somehow recapture this unattainable magic. For the past two decades we have watched brave new stories dropped unceremoniously and gameplay changes introduced as the giant tries to achieve the impossible. We finished the fight back on Xbox 360, and this fruitless chase of trying to justify a new conflict has given us nothing but manufactured nostalgia. I love Halo, but it’s finally time to let it go.