A new report tied to Xbox’s Halo franchise has shed more light on what is happening behind the scenes at developer 343 Industries. Earlier this month, Microsoft suffered substantial layoffs across multiple segments of the company. Some of these layoffs ended up hitting 343 Industries, which led to speculation from fans about what would happen with Halo in the future. And while 343 itself has already said that it will continue working on Xbox’s flagship franchise, it sounds like there are still major changes transpiring.ย
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According to Bloomberg, 343 Industries is now in the process of changing the way that it approaches Halo moving forward. With Halo Infinite, the most recent entry in the series, 343 developed the project on the Slipspace engine. Rather than continuing to build on Slipspace in the future, 343 is said to potentially be leaving the engine behind and will now look to develop new Halo projects within Unreal Engine. Compared to Slipspace, which is reportedly quite cumbersome to use, Unreal is more streamlined and is a common engine used by a number of studios around the globe.ย
When it comes to what these future Halo projects will center around, 343 is said to be mainly focusing on multiplayer experiences. Although the campaign from Halo Infinite was largely well-received, 343 is no longer working on story-focused DLC for Infinite despite previously announcing plans to do so. This decision is one that was likely made following the game’s less-than-stellar response from fans over the course of 2022.ย
For now, it seems like nothing is set in stone when it comes to what’s next for Halo. As such, everything that has been outlined here could end up being changed in the months ahead. Regardless, it seems like 343 Industries is definitely in the midst of a massive shakeup, which means that what we’ve come to expect from the studio in the past with Halo likely won’t continue to be seen down the road.ย
What do you think the future holds for Halo as a series? And what are your thoughts on these changes that are happening within 343? Be sure to let me know either down in the comments or hit me up on Twitter at @MooreMan12.ย
