Halo Studios (current branding for 343 Industries) confirmed yesterday in a Halo Waypoint update that their next update for Halo: Infinite (or finite, I guess) will be the last content update for the game. This news came alongside details for the upcoming “Operation: Infinite” update. This update will bring to the troubled live service a lot of progression changes and a new map for the remaining player base to enjoy. The update will launch on November 18th and mark the end of meaningful support for the game.
Below is the exact quote confirming that this is the last update for the game:
With multiple Halo titles in development, we’ll need our whole team’s combined focus to deliver new experiences with the same passion and care that our community has given us. While we remain committed to supporting Halo Infinite on the road ahead, Operation: Infinite is the last major content update currently planned. – Halo Studios
While no live service lasts forever, this one was supposed to last for 2 and a half times longer, as confirmed by 343 Industries in 2020. Halo Infinite was supposed to be a game with a coveted 10-year plan, similar to Bungie’s Destiny series (which Bungie fulfilled come hell or high water). This comes as yet another lie to add to the pile for the troubled studio that underwent many issues during the game’s development. If we look only at the last few years, there is a cycle that has been repeated, regardless of who is in charge.
Still No Couch Co-op, and Late Arrivals to the Loyal Few for Halo Infinite
In March 2017, former Studio Head of 343 Industries proudly proclaimed that after the staple feature for all mainline Halo games, couch coop, was missing from Halo 5: Guardians, that split-screen coop would be a feature in “all FPS (first-person shooters) going forward (credit to Windows Central Gaming for the quote and clip). But it was not all broken promises over the years. Leading up to the launch of Halo Infinite, there was a lack of core features overall, on top of the divisive campaign.
The first being, not just the lack of split-screen, but also cooperative play overall. A feature that was prominent in every single mainline entry had to be patched in a year later. Split-screen was pivotal for putting Halo on the map in its debut in 2001 alongside the original Xbox launch. Not having this feature at all for a year was a terrible look. But not only was Coop missing, but so was the Forge map maker.
Forge was a feature added in Halo 3 in 2007, and was featured in Halo: Reach, Halo 4, and only needed a small delay for Halo 5: Guardians. Having not one but two missing features that were long-time staples of the series (and even functional in Halo: The Master Chief Collection) was a sign that 343 Industries (now Halo Studios) was not able to deliver on what they promised multiple times. Halo 5: Guardians not having split-screen at all to this day is still a bad look.
Was it All Broken Promises?
While one can argue that leaving Halo Infinite in maintenance mode and letting the playerbase that remains enjoy what it offers for maybe 10 years altogether (after all, Bleeding Edge from Ninja Theory still has servers up), there was a leak regarding the game’s original 10-year plan back in March of this year, confirming what was lost. New game modes, campaign content, and more were planned for the game. However, if we look at the games’ Steam Charts, the game’s player base seemingly dropped off a cliff dramatically. Falling from:
- 256k players in November 2021 to 147k in December.
- From 147k players to 62k in January the following year.
- By June 2022, it dropped to 6k players before fluctuating throughout the years to 3.8k at the time of writing this article.
From 256k players on Steam to 6k in just 6 months during the pandemic for a free-to-play game with a major IP title attached to it must have been the straw that broke the camel of promises back. Now, with Campaign Evolved on the horizon and launching without multiplayer, it calls into question whether trust in the company is warranted moving forward.
Is Halo Studios only dipping its toes into the development of its games and backing out behind the scenes if things don’t go as planned? Was the remake built with that cowardly mindset? I do not know, but looking at the timeline, promises and numbers presented, and subsequent action taken, the augmented backbone that a Spartan needs to step into the armor appears to be missing, and the weight and expectations of the IP’s name might be too much for them. At least the Halo legacy lives on properly in The Master Chief Collection.
