Here's my free advice to Activision on how to proceed with Halo:
Step 1: Contact and request an audience with the following original Halo/Bungie devs: Jaime Griesemer, Chris Barrett, Marty O'Donnell, and Marcus Lehto.
The goal of the conversations should be to answer the following questions: "How and why did the 343 Halo games not live up to the Bungie Halo games? How can future Halo games do better in this regard?"
Have those discussions. See if you can find a common understanding. Beyond that, the franchise is Activision's to find success or failure. But perform this necessary due diligence immediately.
Let me use a hypothetical to help make the point:
Let's say that I was given the game director role on the next Half-Life game. And then I was asked, "Hey, would you like to meet and chat with some of the original devs from Half-Life1/2? They would be happy to share their knowledge." My answer would be "Yes, of course. Only a fucking idiot would choose NOT to talk w the original devs."
It would seem that 343/Halo Studios didn't see this as an important part of the process.. and we all know how that ended.
I hope Activision doesn't make the same mistake.
I hope the people who like halo 4, 5, infinite and campaign evolved never stop crying. When Activision make their first halo they will finally understand what the people who enjoyed the actual good halo games felt like when 343 took over.
@ChiefCanuck Halo Wars was Ensemble Studios.
Spartan Assault and Spartan Strike were Vanguard Games.
The MCC was almost entirely Bungie games with H2AMP from Creative Assembly as the bonus.
Play Mechanix created the Fireteam arcade game.
343 did basically NOTHING.
It was actually fucking terrible. Halo 4 attempted to be Call of Duty. Halo 5's story was a trainwreck. Halo Infinite felt tired and impressively failed expectations (except forge).
I much rather take a risk to Activision than to see another 343 game goddammit
@WillOfTheWraith@Slonk01 They haven't even released anything yet. This is the best I'm feeling for Halo since 2012. Uncharted territory, there is a lot of possibility. Yes it could go tits up, but they also might snatch halo from the jaws of extinction.
I did not have "An Indian-American woman being the Queen of the Chuds" on my 2026 bingo card. That's the last prediction I would have ever made.
But here we are 🥳