14 DAY TRIAL // A Microsoft executive has claimed that the once every three year launch schedule for Halo titles will be changed now that Bungie is no longer in charge of the franchise, with the company thinking about how it can keep fans engaged with the franchise for longer periods through new products.
Phil Spencer, who is a corporate vice president at Microsoft Game Studios, has told IGN that, “There’s no explicit strategy that says we’re to ship a Halo game every year. I will say I think one Halo game every three years — which was kind of our old cadence – is probably not frequent enough.”
He added, “We’re coming up on, what, next year is the 10th anniversary. You watch the change in gamers in 10 years. The percentage of players who are playing Reach that were I’ll say not old enough to play Halo 1 at the time, 10 years is a long time between launches”.
His comments might mean that Microsoft is preparing to mark the anniversary by remaking the original Halo and releasing it for the new Xbox 360 gaming console, maybe even using Xbox Live as a delivery service.
Spencer also talked about more “persistent” Halo products, which might mean that Microsoft is thinking about expanding the multiplayer element of the shooter in order to bring it closer to the structure of a MMO.
Bungie is now preparing some downloadable content for Halo: Reach, consisting mainly of multiplayer maps and new game modes, and will be then moving to work for ten years with publisher Activision Blizzard on a new game universe.
Halo will then be handled by 343 Industries, a new developer which includes some Bungie veterans, but so far the only product they have delivered is Halo Waypoint.
With Reach now out and selling well Microsoft will only officially talk about new Halo products in 2011, with rumors the only sustenance for fans until then.