Sounds like every other company. The suit who's in charge think they know best, run a product into the ground and then blame the people who told them it was a mistake. For their mistake. To their bosses.
Honestly, the more I work the more I notice that property managers, bosses etc always think they know best but never are in the field to actually choose what’s the best course of action. Some do & some don’t but damn it’s sad to see Halo have management that doesn’t 😤
Pretty much. Doesn't rally matter what industry you're in. In my company the joke is the bad employees get promoted to managment while the good ones remain in field. Every new manager comes up with the same old "consolidation" of skills while the sales team oversell capabilities. 😂 Who gets to solve the problems? People in the field. It's not always true, but after being at my job for 20+ years I see the pattern baring out.
@@kingineazzy A real leader is one who is 'down in the dirt' with the rest of the workers, using their expertise to not only guide workers in the right direction but also DOING THE WORK WITH THEM. If a worker has trouble, a leader is one that shows them the way. A manager is one that complains they aren't working fast enough.
Two years, that's all. I feel Microsoft were gonna just sack everything at this point. They scrapt sooo much from Infinite, it's not funny. Guess who was still in charge? @@Lumbago-box
@@Lumbago-box yeah... two years is not a lot, and by that time Halo was already pretty much dead. and you know... bringing the dead back amongst the living is difficult
@@Lumbago-box*”She’s been gone a long time”…I’m sorry but how many Halo games have they made in the time since she’s left? As the studio head we’ve seen many (unfinished) titles under Bonnie Ross. We haven’t seen any games yet since the shakeup of the hierarchy at Halo Studios.*
So when Piere was head of MCC fixing team, everyone in 343 praised him, but as soon as he became studios head, ex staff complaing about him? Sorry but i cant take these reports seriously
Yeah that’s where I’m at too. This guys talking about stifling creativity but we all saw how much of a mess the slipspace engine was and how it limited content. My guess is when Pierre became studio head he narrowed the focus on just getting the game to a better place and moving on. Which was the right move imo. I’ll reserve judgement on the new studio until they drop a game.
Didn't he want to add MTX to MCC originally, though? That's what I've been hearing, at least. haven't watched the video yet so I'm unsure if this is addressed.
I want to post these interesting replies some people made about this “ex 343 dev” situation that I saw on Reddit: - For those curious, here's a link (couldn’t paste link here on YT) to the LinkedIn post. He says some interesting things, but also some confusing and contradictory things, like this: “I miss the days when you were there with us earlier on. Bonnie, Chris, Josh, Kiki, everyone was so fun to work with.” So, saying he misses the old leadership?? Despite also complaining about the old leadership minutes after, and saying: “Imagine telling a studio (loudly) almost daily how to succeed for 13 years, 7 of them were spent educating a clueless executive team (with a purely corporate publishing background and no real hands-on coding or art and in some cases, gaming, experience) how to actually make something” And then, he says: “Like this is how bad it got: they released the game without an industry standard in-game player reporting feature. It came down to me seeing a female streamer being harassed by male gamers while she played and I looked for a feature I just assumed the UX team would have built a robust version of. Nope, nothing. So me, an animator, had to lead this charge and literally design the UX wireframes for the in-game reporting feature POST LAUNCH and then force Jerry Hook into a meeting in which he basically lambasted me for taking on the work myself (even though we basically had nothing going on except the occasional bug to fix)” Where he admits he didn't really have much animation work to do in the months leading up to being fired. I commend him for doing some sorely needed UX work instead though, and sounds like Jerry Hook was an idiot for getting mad at his initiative. Idk man, this guy is all over the place with his opinions and is definitely bitter, and a bit full of himself, which makes me skeptical of what he's saying. I fully believe the old leadership was bad (despite him missing them...?), and am somewhat concerned by him saying negative things about Pierre, but I also think he wasn't actually working under Pierre that long, and the fact he wasn't even actively animating anything in that timeframe shows his opinion of Pierre isn't that informed, as his role was kind of redundant and not being utilized in that short window he did work under Pierre. - The contradictory statements are pretty telling. I’m not sure if he’s wrong though just based on the products we have received speaks for themselves. That said, professional workers who are good at their jobs don’t typically go on LinkedIn and shit all over their old workplace. It’s a total lapse in judgement that doesn’t happen with people who just do their jobs and do it well. Some future employer can see that and instantly tell this guy will probably cause problems. - The fact that this guy has positive things to say about Bonnie, Frank and Kiki leads me to believe he's just not right in the head.
Pierre Hintze became the new studio head in 2022. He was not in charge of the 2021 drop of Halo infinite or any of the previous halo games. Ever since his take over of the leadership, steps have been taken in the right direction including the most recent announcement. There is still much to do before they can have the trust of Halo fans back again but there is a chance things are different. The less we listen to old employees that are not Bungie OGs the better
@@orielsythat is true but literally what he said was right. Since 22 halo has been crawling to the right direction. Big very very big emphasis on crawling
Also, if I’m correct, Pierre was also the one to get MCC all fixed up and loaded with content. I remember MintBlitz making a video about him becoming the Halo Infinite head
Not only did this ex employee say he liked the old studio heads, (the ones that got axed during the fire 343 event), but Pierre Hintze has a really good chance to make a good Halo since he was put in charge of repairing HALO MCC. I think this twitter nobody is just mad all his 343 buddies got kicked out and replaced by actual good workers.
@@momsspaghetti4064 I have zero intention arguing with you, a 343 fanboy that knows nothing about the thing he's crying about. Go take a break from spamming RUclips comments.
One of the biggest problems with 343 since the beginning is that they never understood the magic behind Halo. Instead of taking what Bungie created & creating a natural evolution to that they tried to make Halo into their own thing, without understanding the magic that made Halo so successful. So instead of more Halo we got something else with Halo’s name on it. I’m not convinced “Halo Studios” is going to understand Halo either. But hopefully I’m wrong.
I’m convinced. There’s no way they come out and tell everyone they’re changing the recipe from the ground up if it weren’t a result of that realization
@@SovettaParmetta At this point I genuinely believe the only team that would truly understand what made Halo great is a team of competent & passionate fans of the Bungie era Halo games that understand in detail why those games resonated with so many people. Which I feel is entirely up to the hiring managers at Halo Studios to find those types of people. But, Microsoft is managing it so I am highly skeptical. I don’t think that’s what the hiring managers will be prioritizing. Halo studios need to prove themselves through their actions at this point, they’ve failed to understand Halo for too long. All we can do is remain hopeful & give the new team a shot.
@@AetherMomon I truly believe at this point Microsoft has finally realized exactly what you are saying and what everyone is saying and I think that is the reason for ALL of this change. I think they will take things very slowly with their first game from halo studios probably releasing around this time in 2026, and if that doesn’t absolutely hit it out of the field I’m certain they will pass the torch to an entirely different company. It looks very promising so far though
Gaming has been primarily about money for years now. It's rare to get a game that doesn't have publisher or executives sticking their uncreative noses into it. There was literally nothing stopping these organisations from making games like halo 3 or mw2 (09) completely mtx heavy. Purely because the culture of mtx hadn't hit yet. Games used to be entertainment that people put their heart and soul into to create. Now it's been reduced down to just being a soulless product purely for capital gains.
So some people tried to switch Halo to Unreal before Halo Infinites production, so like 2017-2018? A lot can change in 6-7 years ago. I personally think switching to Unreal before Halo Infinite might have been met with negativity from both the devs and the fans. I think they've absolutely learned from Infinites launch and all the problems that occured with the SlipSpace Engine, it's no doubt one of the reasons they switched to UE.
The fans at the time had no idea about the reason why going to unreal would be good, managament deciding this means they care more about publicity than the product itself which again proves 343/Halo Studio is not ran to maintain/carry on halo as a franchise but to milk it dry of money with no risk or effort
@@decat4 How does using Unreal mean it's for Publicity and not the product? Halo Infinite was notoriously difficult to make due to the engines limitations. The gap between Halo games was also due to the engine. Switching to Unreal will eliminate those problems.
@@DammitCrispin Its a self digged grave. If they never went this hardcore competitive balanced sweaty pvp route than the desync wouldnt be that obvious. But they created their pvp so hardcore competitive that 10ms can decide a gunfight on high elos. I cant count the times where one single hickup costed me a death resulting in a 49-50 or a lost position which lead to a full breakdown of the flag point. The game is just way to competitive. Even normal rounds feel like the freaking world cup finale.
@@cyberkingproductions you misunderstand me, I meant the executives at 343 refused unreal because they thought it would be bad for the reputation of infinite since everyone would expect the og engine, so they saw it as a risk, they should’ve switched to unreal the moment they decided their devs should be contracted instead of hired
Imagine working somewhere for 13 years and then just give you the boot. A FU you can say. Being "disgruntled" only makes 100% sense ya fool. 😂 Have you even had a job for 13 years yet ever there guy. Probably not huh? 😅
I don't care if it is disgruntled former employee screeching or not. Everything they've said either lines up with actions 343 has taken in the past or because no one can trust 343/ Halo Studios It just sounds believable. Regardless, unless a miracle happens i ain't buying anything Halo related anytime soon.
@@b.rangerreaper907seems like ex employee crying about being laid off… I’ll be buying every halo game that comes out because I support my childhood game always
@@wolfofumbra8332 they Only fired half of team and believe it or not they fired the whole entire team that helped make halo infinites campaign so it's gonna be very messy seeing halo have unfinished story and restarting over and over again like they done did before with each halo game. It's just aggravating waiting six years constantly for each game to be another let down. 343 will never be successful at halo because they don't know the magic that was used that made us fall in love with halo decades ago and were talking about the same team that have no clue how to make halo infinite split screen at all yet some random RUclipsr was able to glitch the game to make the split screen work. Lol
@@wolfofumbra8332 and when they fail your expectations again, what then? When they change their name to Master Chief studios, will you again have faith? You are as blind as the covenant was in their belief in the Great Journey.
I agree but Microsoft causes this by not being transparent. They should have given it to a completely new studio. They bought so many with their acquisitions.
@@LEGOAgenda Halo Studios is not the same 343 that it was last year, more so the same ones that developed Halo Infinite. If I was in charge of a studio that has bad reputation in which me nor 90% of my employees took a part of, I’d at least rebrand too. Halo Studios IS the new studio. We haven’t even given them a chance to show us one new game yet, and people are still hating. I do agree with you in that Microsoft has a lot to blame, and that they should help Halo Studios in case they need it, but in the end, we are the ones in control of ourselves. Being overly negative (which is WAY too common nowadays in Halo community) also hurts Halo in the big picture of things. I’d dare to say I’ve seen more people being overly negative more so than dangerously positive.
@@isidro7882 actually many are still the same . There plenty of reaction videos of people talking about a lady with a rainbow 🌈 flag still working there shown in the trailer . Idk just saying . Half new and half old employees doesn’t mean it’s a new studio . It’s just a glorified rebranding. She is one of the heads besides the other main boss Perrie. Only time will tell if they can make anything good happen . But yea I get you .
@@corey552 Im willing to be proved wrong in that most of the old 343 still works at Halo Studios. Noted that by “old 343” I mean the ones that made Halo Infinite.
@@thehomelessproject3784 or just leave Halo 3 as master chiefs last story and have 343 create there own character for the next future halo games. Even Bungie didn't want master chief to have anymore stories after Halo 3 because once they finished making halo 3 Bungie moved on to making Halo ODST and Halo Reach which had nothing to do with master chief.
I'm not convinced that Halo needs to have the same exact physics as 20+ years ago. In my view what made Halo's physics great is that they were very advanced for their time. Games coming out during that Halo 1/Halo 2 time period were pushing boundaries with more advanced in game physics. I think if new Halo games had very advanced physics then it would be better than just having the same exact physics from 20+ years ago.
They should have the physics that feat the overall game loop, if the loop was so tired to how the physics worked, than it's important to have'em, for sure. Halo is not a simulator, is an arcade shooter, the overall gameplay is set towards it, or else, it doesn't feel like Halo at all.
Advanced physics doesn't = fun, which is the problem. Halo's physics are very important to the overall experience. It's the way a box moves when you punch or nade it. It's the way you grenade jump or bounce off objects. It's the way a warthog travels over rough terrain and rolls over. It's the way bodies fall after being exploded or punched. When you don't think about this stuff it seems like pretty basic stuff that isn't all that important, but these are all parameters highly unique to the Halo experience. It's why any fan game or recreation of Halo feels off. If you simply were to make the physics advanced, you'd get something too realistic or too restrictive. People don't play the Halo games and marvel at their advanced physics. They don't think about it, they just know it, and to them it's the "Halo feel". Not something you can easily replicate since it affects every single aspect of the game.
@@jaybee6382 The pay is really the only thing sometimes. Not everyone can just walk away from what they know pretty well. It got comfortable financially, but probably uncomfortable for when it came to the culture.
@@laughintrollface Reach takes place before halo 3 story wise, so ofc reach is included. 4 on the other hand, in terms of a halo story, I wouldn't consider it "halo"
I wish Halo 3 gets revisited by someone competent, he’ll even get the whoever wrote 2 cause 3s story was serviceable, but not nearly as good in quality as 2s, despite everything else being a step up and fantastic
I hated what they did with truth and the arbiter and I blame fans back then and MS and Bungie givin in to please fans mad about the cliffhanger. I’ll keep dreaming
@@laughintrollface If they didn't change the art too much, stuck with Chief's H3 armor style and didn't insert so much soy in their 'Cortana dying Chief feel sad and lost' story plus not y'know kill didact in a book then yes, it would've been a solid entry I reckon.
Hey, Rebs gaming's source said some pretty different stuff than what we see in this video, i recommend checking that out before trusting that ex employee (not your source, the bitter high management guy).
@@PackHunter117 Yeah! That too, but rebs source pointed out that the new leadership was harsh on other projects they were working on to quickly move to UE, that's the main criticism that diverges from this vid as far as i can remember.
@@guijpc4145 Yeah honestly I don’t know what to believe anymore. I’m going to remain very cautiously optimistic. I’ll judge them when they announce the next game. And especially when a trailer comes out
F those ex devs and Bony Ross they stole a living at 343i by doing absolutely nothing. The new lead Pierre Hintze came in and kicked their lazy asses out the door. Good for nothing devs. He has now rebuilt and rebranded the whole studio replaced all the dead wood. And fixed The MC Collection a game so old and still needed fixing this is how useless Bony Ross and those ex devs were.
I wouldn't celebrate too soon. The people in charge of a company get to set the workplace culture, but once it is well established, replacing those in charge does little to affect it. 343 Incompetencies was literally founded by people who hated Halo, refused to work with anyone from Bungie until Joseph Staten showed up (I don't count Frank O'Connor), actively ruined the lore, characters, art style, and themes, then mocked fans for pointing out why the franchise has declined. Also MCC still has some unresolved issues, and I despise how they added some complete s**t into Halo 3/Reach that clash with the art style. "jUsT tOgGlE." I love the ODST, SPI, and some of the Elite armor added in, but hate the rest. I would be weird seeing everyone wearing Mark VI armor knowing that is not the case. As far as I am concerned, "Halo Studios" is just 343 Incompetencies in hiding. Maybe if they retcon and apologized for everything released after 2010, I might given them a chance, but until then, not a cent for anything with their name on it.
For the longest time fans wanted upper management to go, they did, and large chunks of middle management got the boot to, great. Now some of those ex-employees are complaining and going to Monday morning QB it, w/e. All I follow are actions and not words. The old guard gave us a busted MCC, Pierre was put in charge and fixed the mess so much so that more fans want that over Infinite which is yet again something the old guard at 343i gave us. The 3 headed devils at 343i at the time never would have agreed to switch to UE, it was evident. Once they were all gone, oh look, we're going to switch to UE. Also the whole 18 month contractor thing isn't a "MS" policy, other studios don't do it, but many studios in general bring in others to help do work as well. When's the last time anyone sat through all the credits in one of these games? They're not all working at 343i/MS. Look at any AAA title in the past 10 years and you'll see how many other smaller studios get contracted to help on games. It's a industry norm.
It is but games that outsource a lot are likely more expensive to keep running it we see lots of older games now where the developers are studios like DoubleFine or one of those studios that give post launch content for games it's just odd to see how the industry has evolved into this wierd thing.
Exactly. He doesn’t understand that when he brought up the contractors. Microsoft has to do that because of Washington state laws. Switching to unreal will help a lot to offset the contractor issues, because so many devs have experience with it.
Where the f is the MCC fixed? Yeah maybe not the insane mess when it launched on the x one but its not even close to halo 3 or halo reach. We dont have persistent lobbys, we dont have map vote, the maps which are on rotation are almost all the time extremely sheit, the weapon and player spawns are all over the place and many players also report more and more cheaters. (I myself never encountered one though) But hey they gave us an piss awful bunch of the ugliest cosmetics ever seen in a video game. And a "season pass" so damn pointless. Oh and did I talk about the hilarious desync? Ever tried to snipe someone or hit someone with a Tank? For me as a german its also not even possible anymore to play on Europe Servers. I only get queued on US East 2 Servers. Dont know if its just not enough players or they simply shut down europe servers.
@@threedog27Idk if you played MCC from 2021-2023 it was golden multiple seasons new maps. It all came when Pierce join my guess is that he left after becoming head and resources don’t go into MCC anymore.
Marcus Lehto says that Pierre is awesome and is praising the announcement. He also says that Chris Matthews as the AD is a great pick. I found on Twitter(X) that he also said that all of the moves have been good (meaning who has been hired or promoted). No disrespect to Mr. Waltz, but Lehto played a massive role in Halo while 343 has been iffy the entire time. I value the thoughts and opinions of Lehto more. I would be interested to see what Joseph Staten and Marty think about it.
@@infernaldaedra I don't know this for sure, but it really seems like he saved that story. Right when he was hired, the game was delayed for an entire year, meaning he saw a lot of work needed to be done. My guess is that 343/Microsoft were on the verge of releasing a bad and half working game and then updating it over time. Which is what half of the games now end up doing.
@@Spendingryan I don't remember his name, but he obviously hasn't had a major impact, as guns are not a complaint I have in Halo Infinite. I'm a gun owner, 2A advocate, and have been trained on multiple weapons platforms while I have been in the Navy. My friends and I go shooting all the time. I can't comprehend how someone can be so afraid of guns and not instead afraid of crime.
but didn’t pierre save mcc? maybe they didn’t want to switch because they didn’t want to lose the halo feel and they were trying their best to keep the engine but it just wasn’t worth in the end maybe they were trying to not be so innovative with halo because it blew up in their face with 4 and 5 idk i just hope they can make great halo games
someone also mentioned that since people were talking about ue5 since before infinite's development (2017-2018) that's 6-7 years for opinions and managers to change (which they have). And it was likely infinite that inspired that change. From what I remember 4 and 5's engines were'nt that bad, especially compared to slipspace.
@@jurassicarkjordanisgreat1778 Didn't all of us whine and complain for several years until he arrived, about how MCC was broken and wouldn't work? Then he was brought in, fixed, and yeah he may have monetized a few things, but the man did his job and fixed the freaking game. Don't act like because he monetized it, that his significance is trivial.
Note that the MCC was purely technical problems, not gameplay ones. Creating an entirely new (and good) Halo title is vastly different from fixing technical aspects of the MCC.
Let's be real the community knew the game was messed up and what had to change was pretty obvious they did do a good job with MCC bringing progression into the game though.
It's still messed up. Me and my brother a year ago could not play Halo 2 campaign together without some levels constantly crashing and kicking us off the game. It was a disaster.
@@katon4525there just shills. they werent there when Bungi was developing halo and they dont care. they have no idea what halo is. and there just NewAge Marxist Dipshits who have a massive Ego
Don’t get it twisted 343 took over because someone had to due to Bungie abandoning Halo and it’s community so imho they are valid they had to take on everything they had no prior experience on then Bungie went and made Destiny then ruin it with Destiny 2 and lie about promises 😐 fyi Destiny 2 was supposed to be open world not hub worlds ✌️
@@easydayezjust bc you hate bungle doesn’t mean 343 is anything better. Bungie made 1 of the greatest video games ever, to only abandon the golden goose. What fools they are for abandoning the golden goose. And well 343, they r c4nc3r on halo & have always been a c4nc3r. Both gaming companies suck so bad it’s not even funny at this point. IMO.
@@LPhooligan well that’s why I think starting with a CE remake isn’t an awful decision. They already know that CE’s story was good, and let’s face it, 343 also had issues with releasing incomplete games. I think the smart idea is to make the remake, which would allow them to focus on creating a game with good mechanics that runs well, basically showing that they fixed one of 343’s well known issues, and then they can move on to a new title, and that’s where they can show that they’ve gotten better with the story aspect as well. I don’t want them jumping off the deep end right away if it just means they fail and drown.
I dunno maybe, just maybe, Will got fired because he’s part of the problem. Boasting about being an employee for the last 13 years (some of halos worst times) 3:09 bit cocky here too. Classic 343.
I honestly think halo 4 was the last good halo game story wise. I miss how it used to be. I hate open world and hate it when they kick out characters from previous games just to “get back to OG” gameplay
I think we are forgetting that a lot has already changed in 343/halo studios, halo infinite was a huge step in the right direction, even if a lot more things have to improve, we have to admit 343 have come a long way since halo 4, so we have to wait to see how much improvement we have with halo studios.
but an engine that is an massive upgrade from the original one allows them to do thing that was never possible within any of the Halo engines previously so i'm interested with what they have in store but most likely i won't be buying the next game and will be sticking with the MCC
@@lugismansion2400massive upgrade is subjective. You loose a good junk of identity with the change and you’re basically at the mercy of epic for new features to the engine where as making your own engine lets you do what you want
@@goobot1 Not true. Unreal Engine is source-available. You can download the source code of the engine right now, for free, and modify it how ever you see fit, then build it, and develop a game using your modified version of UE. Features need not come from Epic Games. The only limitation here is you can't publicly distribute their modified version of UE, bound by Epic's EULA, which allows you to download the source and do as you see fit. They also have a royalty fee that kicks in after some $1 million in revenue or so which is how they make money on the engine withstanding this rather lax approach to licensing. Now, Halo Studios doing that would be mildly counter productive as they are moving to UE5 for the explicit purpose of removing the need for engine upkeep - effectively offloading that to Epic Games. But nevertheless the option is there for them to do with what they like.
Thing that the people within the Halo community don't get is that it wasn't 343i that was the issue, it was for the most part Microsoft. People forget that Bungie was bought by Microsoft but rebelled being fully immersed into Microsoft, 343i was made by Microsoft for Microsoft so they didn't have the luxury to rebel against Microsoft execs Now 343i leadership isn't clean either but it's the Microsoft execs that are/were the biggest issue but the community focuses more on 343i than Microsoft. As far as the new leadership, we haven't seen what they can do yet, so it's not fair for us to judge them, and people should take a grain of salt from disgruntled 343i devs. I was wrongfully terminated as a cook from a resort I worked for, I still snowboard there, i hate the exec/ and head chef for doing me dirty but there are former coworkers of mine that love them. Does that make the restaurant horrible? No, does that make my feelings invalid? No. But I'm not going to use my bad exp with the restaurant leadership to ruin others experiences, and I'll continue going there as a boarder. These guys are obnoxious and just need to let Halo cook and the community to judge for themselves
Fire the suits that fired the creative teams and decided to make the game for a wider audience. Fire the suits that pushed Infinite out early. Fire the suits that let Halo die
Don’t be duped by the name change, it’s the same female DEI hired stunning and brave girl bosses with no video game experience who are in a position of authority because of their skin color and gender like Melissa Boone and Xbox president Sarah Bond who have run Xbox studios into the ground because they care more about inclusivity and diversity than making amazing games.
While switching to unreal will not fix all Of halo’s issues . The biggest issue that halo infinite had was that it took waaaay too long to introduce new contact . Changing to unreal should help that . If halo infinite had 3 month seasons with maps and weapons added with playlist being able to be easily added it would’ve overcame all of the micro transaction problems . If they can pump out quality content then that will be a huge improvement
Gotta look at what Pierre has lead to be done with MCC. He turned that gane into something special, and many of the good new aspects of Infinite were done under his leadership. Seems a bit more than 50/50 that things will go much better than they have.
Ex devs are pissed off and you are still here supporting, happy for the future of halo Imagine and swallow that, low T crowd of fanboys. Want a change? Stop buying and playing
😂dude I am currently recovering from being in a coma for about two years and that happened about ten years ago and I have just now woken up so to see 👀 is amazing 👏 ❤HALO for life 🎉❣️
someone who uses pronouns shouldn't be taken seriously. just comes over as salty. Not defending 343 but with all the DEI crap that the gaming industry (and the entire world) has tried to push because some insecure idiots have no backbone, you just can't take someone who's using pronouns serious.
Can never be good news for long can it. With ex devs coming forward like this it’s hard not to be conflicted about Halo’s future again. Only good thing I can say without doubts is that Unreal will be better for Halo. Slipspace led to needless setbacks and prolonged Infinite’s struggles. Unreal will remedy most of that, and be a better tool for new employees to work with. This is not an ideal situation. Halo Studios needs to be better if they truly want Halo to prosper.
Unreal Engine is garbage... Of course a senior animator wanted Unreal. It's designed for movies. It's NOT designed with quality gaming in mind. Unreal would've made THIS guy's life easier and would've made the game itself hot garbage. Of the hundreds of games made with Unreal Engine in the last TWO DECADES you can count the number that don't suck on one hand with fingers left over. Every dev that made a good game with it was only able to do so after coding their own stuff from scratch. Things Unreal was SUPPOSED to do on it's own. They want Unreal Engine for one reason: they can hire cheap outsourcing companies for it. Unreal is NOT good for gaming. I'm sure it's great for film and TV production but, to give a descriptive example: Halo is silk and steel, Unreal games are burlap and plastic. Making a AAA dev's job easy doesn't have anything to do with making a good, quality gaming experience. They could've taken the money spent on DEI consultants and spent it on creating an upgrade to the Slipspace Engine to solve all their problems, but LOOKING good is more important that BEING good to these people. What was the problem with Halo Infinite? Did it look bad? No... Did it play bad? Hell no... it still has that 'Halo' control and feel. Smooth as silk. If Halo could have been made with Unreal Engine it would have been already by the hundreds and hundreds of others who have lusted after Halo's gaming experience over the years. 343 and Microsoft failed Halo. NOT the engine. They failed it from a writing perspective, they failed it from a creative perspective, they failed it from a marketing perspective, and they failed it from a support perspective. Using Unreal on Halo is a stab in the back of all the hard work done by OG Bungie and the fans of the franchise. Calling Unreal 'innovation' is a corporate euphemism if ever there was one. Halo is dead. Microsoft killed it. The same way Star Wars is dead, the same way Star Trek is dead, the same way Battlefield is dead... I could do this all day... People who have no business holding the positions they do making decisions for the rest of us... Motivated by short term greed or personal agendas or just plain incompetence. It pains me to say this but the age of Halo has passed. Let it die with dignity and respect. Don't use Unreal Engine to piss on its grave.
Anyone who who gets sacked is going to be sour, so you cannot believe every word they say because it's often said with resentment. I couldn't care less what he says, they are finally moving to Unreal, which is a good thing. There are always two sides to every coin, so I'm going to remain optimistic until we see more of the next game. People do change their minds, and change has to start somewhere. Keep the faith.
TBH these people just sound like disgruntled ex-employees that are PISSED most of 343i got fired before the new studio announcement. we got to be real there is only a few people still working there from 343i before the name change. this is mostly a new studio as from what I see the people still there from 343 are mostly community managers and stuff in other words folks not making decisions. Pierre came in 2022 got promoted to studio head and from outside appearances CLEANED house.. even this incel ex -employee said as much
4:21 bruh. THATS A GOOD THING. The other chapters that we had were nightmares. The last 13 years of halo were terrible. It’s a dam good thing this new chapter doesn’t feel like the rest.
told yall this didnt address the workplace or 18 month contacts... but lets just forget about that and be happy its a new team, screw the old devs and new ones who get dropped after 18 since we can replace them even easier now since were on UE.
Pierre saved mcc from the complete dumpster fire that it was. Sounds like ex 343 are salty they got axed, though I do agree with the fact Microsoft hiring method sucks.
Heeding this as being cautiously optimistic. Never disregard someone who has worked there for a long time and lines up with a lot of issues with the company.
So basically 343 is still 343 and the name change and “layoffs” meant nothing lol. Guess I was right to not be excited about this announcement and not automatically say “Halo is Saved” for the hundredth time. Halo simps will never get out of this abusive relationship with this shitty company, at first it was hilarious but this is just sad at this point.
No the heads of 343 are all gone Peirre joined in 2021 and handle Halo MCC you know when all those armors and seasons were coming out that was thanks to him. He’s the head now so hopefully halo gets back on track.
@@antoine121 I am not convinced. The people in charge of a company get to set the workplace culture, but once it is well established, replacing those in charge does little to affect it. 343 Incompetencies was literally founded by people who hated Halo, refused to work with anyone from Bungie (until Joseph Staten showed up to be the fall guy), actively ruined the lore, characters, art style, and themes, then mocked fans for pointing out why the franchise has declined. "Halo Studios" is just 343 Incompetencies rebranded.
@@antoine121 I hope he can deliver but remember, MCC was a collection of games that were already made, it took them years to fix those games that they broke and add some new features but these things are nothing compared to releasing a full packaged game, that entails a full campaign, split screen and online co-op, matchmaking, working custom games, forge, firefight, working theater, working file browser, all social and competitive game modes, veto system, party up lobbies etc. on day one. Bungie was able to accomplish these things with Halo 3 & Reach on older/inferior hardware yet 343 has yet to accomplish this with any of their titles.
@@alexanderrobins7497 If the entire leadership and large chunks of the workforce are let go the culture can change pretty rapidly. Which is what happened here.
The E3 nostalgic teaser trailer for Halo Infinite wasn’t gameplay footage or game atmosphere. It was merely cinematic CGI. Whereas this “Foundry” is actual Unreal Engine game background and character models…so that’s already more promising. Remember the difference between Halo Infinite teaser trailer and then the gameplay footage a year before launch…real bad.
Must be painful to be an ex-343 developer, recommending UE, getting pushed out for it, then seeing it adopted. I really hope Halo Studios is open to working with any devs that "dissented" previously (who were right all along)...
Good to see my initial concerns were not unfounded. Had a bad feeling "Halo Studios" was just a name change. As long as its the same captain flying the ship, the end destination will remain the same.
isn't pierre the guy that said something like 'infinite was baked with the same recipe as all the other halo games and it's time to switch up the recipe"? dude is taking the piss
No need to wait. It's still 343, despite the name change. Nothing will change, and Halo will still continue to suck and be killed off by these DEI hires.
People on the Reddit discussion on this yesterday called out a lot of contradicting things this guy said in his tweets. Also odd and unprofessional to say some of the things he did. Taking it with a grain of salt.
I can definitely believe that Microsoft is a big part of the problem. There was a reason why Bungie was so quick to get out from underneath of Microsoft after they bought Bungie, and then Bungie avoided Microsoft like the plague afterwards.
Them saying how the unreal engine is going to revolutionise reminds me about how good it was going to be on the slipspace engine. Graphical fidelity ≠ good story
I believe action more than words. Even if it is true. Pierre has made MCC and Infinite better. He doesnt talk much but he is lead. Im cautiously optimistic about the reboot. And hoping it brings the nostalgic back plus some new things. But what Will has been saying is definitely a disgruntled employee who got favored by the old management and when it got changed he wasn't favored anymore and got bitter.
I just don’t have much trust in anything a 343 dev says. With what we got in halo 5, and a majority of halo infinite I feel like it may be valid to have their “creative ideas” cut.
What happened to Halo to me is heartbreaking - this was always way more to me than just a game: in that I played over and over with my kids and wife and we lived the experience. From 2001 through to the downturn of 4,5,6. Now it's most likely Microsoft corporate interference, from the top. I think the top corporate management let them run for many years now they have the screws tightened for shareholder benefit as a priority.
Sounds like every other company. The suit who's in charge think they know best, run a product into the ground and then blame the people who told them it was a mistake. For their mistake. To their bosses.
@@Nobody_important_at_all that’s the scumbag bosses should not be involved in the creation process of any game
Honestly, the more I work the more I notice that property managers, bosses etc always think they know best but never are in the field to actually choose what’s the best course of action. Some do & some don’t but damn it’s sad to see Halo have management that doesn’t 😤
Pretty much. Doesn't rally matter what industry you're in. In my company the joke is the bad employees get promoted to managment while the good ones remain in field. Every new manager comes up with the same old "consolidation" of skills while the sales team oversell capabilities. 😂 Who gets to solve the problems? People in the field. It's not always true, but after being at my job for 20+ years I see the pattern baring out.
Not only that but guess who is probably behind the new HaLO studios
@@kingineazzy A real leader is one who is 'down in the dirt' with the rest of the workers, using their expertise to not only guide workers in the right direction but also DOING THE WORK WITH THEM. If a worker has trouble, a leader is one that shows them the way. A manager is one that complains they aren't working fast enough.
People forgot how terrible Bonnie Ross steered the ship for years.
And she's been gone for a long time
Two years, that's all. I feel Microsoft were gonna just sack everything at this point. They scrapt sooo much from Infinite, it's not funny. Guess who was still in charge? @@Lumbago-box
Also nick is still employed (idk how honestly)
@@Lumbago-box yeah... two years is not a lot, and by that time Halo was already pretty much dead. and you know... bringing the dead back amongst the living is difficult
@@Lumbago-box*”She’s been gone a long time”…I’m sorry but how many Halo games have they made in the time since she’s left? As the studio head we’ve seen many (unfinished) titles under Bonnie Ross. We haven’t seen any games yet since the shakeup of the hierarchy at Halo Studios.*
- Lifts Rock - hope this goes well... - Pulls rock back down -
oh ur back! nice
Might as well bury the rock and never come back 😂
@Yueymosthated - Pushes rock up just hair - Sir are you aware that your shirt is on backwards? - goes back under rock -
@@KookieKatKid-knocks on rock- are you sure it isn’t my pants that are on backwards? Also your rock has a smudge on it -walks off-
@@dpchief_216- Activates windshield wiper on rock as the smudge melts away -
So when Piere was head of MCC fixing team, everyone in 343 praised him, but as soon as he became studios head, ex staff complaing about him?
Sorry but i cant take these reports seriously
Yeah that’s where I’m at too. This guys talking about stifling creativity but we all saw how much of a mess the slipspace engine was and how it limited content. My guess is when Pierre became studio head he narrowed the focus on just getting the game to a better place and moving on. Which was the right move imo. I’ll reserve judgement on the new studio until they drop a game.
Factual
@@c_rock3512 feels like the entire studio is just confused from top to bottom, needs more than just a mere restructuring
Didn't he want to add MTX to MCC originally, though? That's what I've been hearing, at least. haven't watched the video yet so I'm unsure if this is addressed.
@@oo--7714 they pretty much cleaned house I think that’s enough personally
343 dev is mad? Sounds like things are going perfectly
I want to post these interesting replies some people made about this “ex 343 dev” situation that I saw on Reddit:
- For those curious, here's a link (couldn’t paste link here on YT) to the LinkedIn post. He says some interesting things, but also some confusing and contradictory things, like this:
“I miss the days when you were there with us earlier on. Bonnie, Chris, Josh, Kiki, everyone was so fun to work with.”
So, saying he misses the old leadership?? Despite also complaining about the old leadership minutes after, and saying:
“Imagine telling a studio (loudly) almost daily how to succeed for 13 years, 7 of them were spent educating a clueless executive team (with a purely corporate publishing background and no real hands-on coding or art and in some cases, gaming, experience) how to actually make something”
And then, he says:
“Like this is how bad it got: they released the game without an industry standard in-game player reporting feature. It came down to me seeing a female streamer being harassed by male gamers while she played and I looked for a feature I just assumed the UX team would have built a robust version of. Nope, nothing. So me, an animator, had to lead this charge and literally design the UX wireframes for the in-game reporting feature POST LAUNCH and then force Jerry Hook into a meeting in which he basically lambasted me for taking on the work myself (even though we basically had nothing going on except the occasional bug to fix)”
Where he admits he didn't really have much animation work to do in the months leading up to being fired. I commend him for doing some sorely needed UX work instead though, and sounds like Jerry Hook was an idiot for getting mad at his initiative.
Idk man, this guy is all over the place with his opinions and is definitely bitter, and a bit full of himself, which makes me skeptical of what he's saying. I fully believe the old leadership was bad (despite him missing them...?), and am somewhat concerned by him saying negative things about Pierre, but I also think he wasn't actually working under Pierre that long, and the fact he wasn't even actively animating anything in that timeframe shows his opinion of Pierre isn't that informed, as his role was kind of redundant and not being utilized in that short window he did work under Pierre.
- The contradictory statements are pretty telling. I’m not sure if he’s wrong though just based on the products we have received speaks for themselves.
That said, professional workers who are good at their jobs don’t typically go on LinkedIn and shit all over their old workplace. It’s a total lapse in judgement that doesn’t happen with people who just do their jobs and do it well. Some future employer can see that and instantly tell this guy will probably cause problems.
- The fact that this guy has positive things to say about Bonnie, Frank and Kiki leads me to believe he's just not right in the head.
this needs to be pinned
@@B-SybrZaku-ThendHaloAirsofting agreed
@halofollower
^^^^ This, this comment right here lol.
They sound like a disgruntled employee
Pierre Hintze became the new studio head in 2022. He was not in charge of the 2021 drop of Halo infinite or any of the previous halo games. Ever since his take over of the leadership, steps have been taken in the right direction including the most recent announcement. There is still much to do before they can have the trust of Halo fans back again but there is a chance things are different. The less we listen to old employees that are not Bungie OGs the better
Department heads have varying degrees of influence across the entire staff.
@@orielsythat is true but literally what he said was right. Since 22 halo has been crawling to the right direction. Big very very big emphasis on crawling
@@derekhowe672he basically work with the things he got
Also, if I’m correct, Pierre was also the one to get MCC all fixed up and loaded with content. I remember MintBlitz making a video about him becoming the Halo Infinite head
I couldn’t agree more
Not only did this ex employee say he liked the old studio heads, (the ones that got axed during the fire 343 event), but Pierre Hintze has a really good chance to make a good Halo since he was put in charge of repairing HALO MCC. I think this twitter nobody is just mad all his 343 buddies got kicked out and replaced by actual good workers.
They didn't get fired. Wtf you talking about? 😂
They left. They have families and stuff unlike basement dwellers here in comments. 😂
Im on varsity@@momsspaghetti4064
@@momsspaghetti4064cope and seethe
@@momsspaghetti4064 I have zero intention arguing with you, a 343 fanboy that knows nothing about the thing he's crying about. Go take a break from spamming RUclips comments.
One of the biggest problems with 343 since the beginning is that they never understood the magic behind Halo. Instead of taking what Bungie created & creating a natural evolution to that they tried to make Halo into their own thing, without understanding the magic that made Halo so successful. So instead of more Halo we got something else with Halo’s name on it.
I’m not convinced “Halo Studios” is going to understand Halo either. But hopefully I’m wrong.
I’m convinced. There’s no way they come out and tell everyone they’re changing the recipe from the ground up if it weren’t a result of that realization
@@SovettaParmetta At this point I genuinely believe the only team that would truly understand what made Halo great is a team of competent & passionate fans of the Bungie era Halo games that understand in detail why those games resonated with so many people. Which I feel is entirely up to the hiring managers at Halo Studios to find those types of people. But, Microsoft is managing it so I am highly skeptical. I don’t think that’s what the hiring managers will be prioritizing. Halo studios need to prove themselves through their actions at this point, they’ve failed to understand Halo for too long. All we can do is remain hopeful & give the new team a shot.
@@AetherMomon I truly believe at this point Microsoft has finally realized exactly what you are saying and what everyone is saying and I think that is the reason for ALL of this change. I think they will take things very slowly with their first game from halo studios probably releasing around this time in 2026, and if that doesn’t absolutely hit it out of the field I’m certain they will pass the torch to an entirely different company. It looks very promising so far though
@@SovettaParmetta "changing the recipe from the ground up" is what got us Infinite lmao.
Honestly I just want the studio to cut from Microsoft
Gaming has been primarily about money for years now. It's rare to get a game that doesn't have publisher or executives sticking their uncreative noses into it. There was literally nothing stopping these organisations from making games like halo 3 or mw2 (09) completely mtx heavy. Purely because the culture of mtx hadn't hit yet.
Games used to be entertainment that people put their heart and soul into to create. Now it's been reduced down to just being a soulless product purely for capital gains.
So some people tried to switch Halo to Unreal before Halo Infinites production, so like 2017-2018? A lot can change in 6-7 years ago. I personally think switching to Unreal before Halo Infinite might have been met with negativity from both the devs and the fans. I think they've absolutely learned from Infinites launch and all the problems that occured with the SlipSpace Engine, it's no doubt one of the reasons they switched to UE.
The fans at the time had no idea about the reason why going to unreal would be good, managament deciding this means they care more about publicity than the product itself which again proves 343/Halo Studio is not ran to maintain/carry on halo as a franchise but to milk it dry of money with no risk or effort
@@decat4 How does using Unreal mean it's for Publicity and not the product? Halo Infinite was notoriously difficult to make due to the engines limitations. The gap between Halo games was also due to the engine. Switching to Unreal will eliminate those problems.
@@DammitCrispin Its a self digged grave. If they never went this hardcore competitive balanced sweaty pvp route than the desync wouldnt be that obvious.
But they created their pvp so hardcore competitive that 10ms can decide a gunfight on high elos.
I cant count the times where one single hickup costed me a death resulting in a 49-50 or a lost position which lead to a full breakdown of the flag point.
The game is just way to competitive. Even normal rounds feel like the freaking world cup finale.
@@cyberkingproductions you misunderstand me, I meant the executives at 343 refused unreal because they thought it would be bad for the reputation of infinite since everyone would expect the og engine, so they saw it as a risk, they should’ve switched to unreal the moment they decided their devs should be contracted instead of hired
The problem was contract workers which ms won’t give up
It kinda screams "disgruntled former employee" tbh....
I agree it does give off that vibe but we have to remain vigilant
Imagine working somewhere for 13 years and then just give you the boot. A FU you can say. Being "disgruntled" only makes 100% sense ya fool. 😂
Have you even had a job for 13 years yet ever there guy. Probably not huh? 😅
I don't care if it is disgruntled former employee screeching or not. Everything they've said either lines up with actions 343 has taken in the past or because no one can trust 343/ Halo Studios It just sounds believable. Regardless, unless a miracle happens i ain't buying anything Halo related anytime soon.
@@b.rangerreaper907seems like ex employee crying about being laid off… I’ll be buying every halo game that comes out because I support my childhood game always
The DEI screams everything
Let the 343 cycle start again
No. This time, it will be done right and halo will see a new and better age. I have faith in them
@@wolfofumbra8332 😂😂😂 it sounds like we,ve heard that multiple times.
@@NathanielStobbs still do though. The team is different. They actually fired 343
@@wolfofumbra8332 they Only fired half of team and believe it or not they fired the whole entire team that helped make halo infinites campaign so it's gonna be very messy seeing halo have unfinished story and restarting over and over again like they done did before with each halo game. It's just aggravating waiting six years constantly for each game to be another let down. 343 will never be successful at halo because they don't know the magic that was used that made us fall in love with halo decades ago and were talking about the same team that have no clue how to make halo infinite split screen at all yet some random RUclipsr was able to glitch the game to make the split screen work. Lol
@@wolfofumbra8332 and when they fail your expectations again, what then? When they change their name to Master Chief studios, will you again have faith? You are as blind as the covenant was in their belief in the Great Journey.
Blind optimism is wrong, so is being negative just because. The Halo community should stop going on one of those extremes and balance it instead.
I agree but Microsoft causes this by not being transparent. They should have given it to a completely new studio. They bought so many with their acquisitions.
@@LEGOAgenda Halo Studios is not the same 343 that it was last year, more so the same ones that developed Halo Infinite. If I was in charge of a studio that has bad reputation in which me nor 90% of my employees took a part of, I’d at least rebrand too.
Halo Studios IS the new studio. We haven’t even given them a chance to show us one new game yet, and people are still hating.
I do agree with you in that Microsoft has a lot to blame, and that they should help Halo Studios in case they need it, but in the end, we are the ones in control of ourselves. Being overly negative (which is WAY too common nowadays in Halo community) also hurts Halo in the big picture of things. I’d dare to say I’ve seen more people being overly negative more so than dangerously positive.
@@isidro7882 actually many are still the same . There plenty of reaction videos of people talking about a lady with a rainbow 🌈 flag still working there shown in the trailer . Idk just saying . Half new and half old employees doesn’t mean it’s a new studio . It’s just a glorified rebranding. She is one of the heads besides the other main boss Perrie. Only time will tell if they can make anything good happen . But yea I get you .
@@isidro7882 I keep seeing this being parroted everywhere. Most of 343 now works for Halo studios. Stop spreading lies.
@@corey552 Im willing to be proved wrong in that most of the old 343 still works at Halo Studios. Noted that by “old 343” I mean the ones that made Halo Infinite.
I just want what Halo Infinite was supposed to be :(
@@0rsoBartholomew what was infinite supposed to be? You mean the huge load of removed content from the campaign?
We need to forget infinite and move back to halo 3 and carry on from there
@@thehomelessproject3784youre just so right
@@thehomelessproject3784 or just leave Halo 3 as master chiefs last story and have 343 create there own character for the next future halo games. Even Bungie didn't want master chief to have anymore stories after Halo 3 because once they finished making halo 3 Bungie moved on to making Halo ODST and Halo Reach which had nothing to do with master chief.
Me too. Well said
I'm not convinced that Halo needs to have the same exact physics as 20+ years ago. In my view what made Halo's physics great is that they were very advanced for their time. Games coming out during that Halo 1/Halo 2 time period were pushing boundaries with more advanced in game physics. I think if new Halo games had very advanced physics then it would be better than just having the same exact physics from 20+ years ago.
They should have the physics that feat the overall game loop, if the loop was so tired to how the physics worked, than it's important to have'em, for sure. Halo is not a simulator, is an arcade shooter, the overall gameplay is set towards it, or else, it doesn't feel like Halo at all.
Advanced physics doesn't = fun, which is the problem. Halo's physics are very important to the overall experience. It's the way a box moves when you punch or nade it. It's the way you grenade jump or bounce off objects. It's the way a warthog travels over rough terrain and rolls over. It's the way bodies fall after being exploded or punched.
When you don't think about this stuff it seems like pretty basic stuff that isn't all that important, but these are all parameters highly unique to the Halo experience. It's why any fan game or recreation of Halo feels off. If you simply were to make the physics advanced, you'd get something too realistic or too restrictive. People don't play the Halo games and marvel at their advanced physics. They don't think about it, they just know it, and to them it's the "Halo feel". Not something you can easily replicate since it affects every single aspect of the game.
@@Rkcioejfieje28 "New stuff always means good! Old stuff always means bad!" Ahh comment💀😭💀💀💀
@@Rkcioejfieje28 You're arguing with yourself, I never made these arguments. I had actual points you never responded to
Then why work there for 13 years, it's hard to believe it was that bad.
Golden handcuffs most likely
Money.
There's many other companies that would love a guy who worked on Xbox flagship game.
@@jaybee6382 The pay is really the only thing sometimes. Not everyone can just walk away from what they know pretty well. It got comfortable financially, but probably uncomfortable for when it came to the culture.
I'm sure you've worked a job you hate for the money.
AFAIC, story-wise, everything after Halo 3's ending is fanfiction.
reach and 4 were fantasitc games
@@laughintrollface Reach takes place before halo 3 story wise, so ofc reach is included. 4 on the other hand, in terms of a halo story, I wouldn't consider it "halo"
I wish Halo 3 gets revisited by someone competent, he’ll even get the whoever wrote 2 cause 3s story was serviceable, but not nearly as good in quality as 2s, despite everything else being a step up and fantastic
I hated what they did with truth and the arbiter and I blame fans back then and MS and Bungie givin in to please fans mad about the cliffhanger. I’ll keep dreaming
@@laughintrollface If they didn't change the art too much, stuck with Chief's H3 armor style and didn't insert so much soy in their 'Cortana dying Chief feel sad and lost' story plus not y'know kill didact in a book then yes, it would've been a solid entry I reckon.
Hey, Rebs gaming's source said some pretty different stuff than what we see in this video, i recommend checking that out before trusting that ex employee (not your source, the bitter high management guy).
I will check it out!
rebs gaming is so far up 343s ass you cant trust him either
Not to mention Marcus Lehto has praise for the news also
@@PackHunter117 Yeah! That too, but rebs source pointed out that the new leadership was harsh on other projects they were working on to quickly move to UE, that's the main criticism that diverges from this vid as far as i can remember.
@@guijpc4145 Yeah honestly I don’t know what to believe anymore. I’m going to remain very cautiously optimistic. I’ll judge them when they announce the next game. And especially when a trailer comes out
*Microsoft probably wanted to keep everything in-house to save as much money as possible. Hence why it took them so long to switch to UE5.*
@@PackHunter117 well if thats what they were hoping for it sure backfired!
The only reason they have to switch to walmart brand is because of microsofts terrible business practices not retaining employees.
@@zetahalo I agree
Who cares. 343 isn't getting a FOURTH chance just because they changed names. Stop being victims to this abuse. Halo... It's finished.
No I think we're just getting started..
F those ex devs and Bony Ross they stole a living at 343i by doing absolutely nothing.
The new lead Pierre Hintze came in and kicked their lazy asses out the door. Good for nothing devs.
He has now rebuilt and rebranded the whole studio replaced all the dead wood.
And fixed The MC Collection a game so old and still needed fixing this is how useless Bony Ross and those ex devs were.
Idk how he didn't kick out Nick
I wouldn't celebrate too soon. The people in charge of a company get to set the workplace culture, but once it is well established, replacing those in charge does little to affect it. 343 Incompetencies was literally founded by people who hated Halo, refused to work with anyone from Bungie until Joseph Staten showed up (I don't count Frank O'Connor), actively ruined the lore, characters, art style, and themes, then mocked fans for pointing out why the franchise has declined. Also MCC still has some unresolved issues, and I despise how they added some complete s**t into Halo 3/Reach that clash with the art style. "jUsT tOgGlE." I love the ODST, SPI, and some of the Elite armor added in, but hate the rest. I would be weird seeing everyone wearing Mark VI armor knowing that is not the case.
As far as I am concerned, "Halo Studios" is just 343 Incompetencies in hiding. Maybe if they retcon and apologized for everything released after 2010, I might given them a chance, but until then, not a cent for anything with their name on it.
The other two leads do not inspire confidence.
For the longest time fans wanted upper management to go, they did, and large chunks of middle management got the boot to, great. Now some of those ex-employees are complaining and going to Monday morning QB it, w/e. All I follow are actions and not words. The old guard gave us a busted MCC, Pierre was put in charge and fixed the mess so much so that more fans want that over Infinite which is yet again something the old guard at 343i gave us. The 3 headed devils at 343i at the time never would have agreed to switch to UE, it was evident. Once they were all gone, oh look, we're going to switch to UE.
Also the whole 18 month contractor thing isn't a "MS" policy, other studios don't do it, but many studios in general bring in others to help do work as well. When's the last time anyone sat through all the credits in one of these games? They're not all working at 343i/MS. Look at any AAA title in the past 10 years and you'll see how many other smaller studios get contracted to help on games. It's a industry norm.
It is but games that outsource a lot are likely more expensive to keep running it we see lots of older games now where the developers are studios like DoubleFine or one of those studios that give post launch content for games it's just odd to see how the industry has evolved into this wierd thing.
Exactly. He doesn’t understand that when he brought up the contractors. Microsoft has to do that because of Washington state laws. Switching to unreal will help a lot to offset the contractor issues, because so many devs have experience with it.
Where the f is the MCC fixed? Yeah maybe not the insane mess when it launched on the x one but its not even close to halo 3 or halo reach.
We dont have persistent lobbys, we dont have map vote, the maps which are on rotation are almost all the time extremely sheit, the weapon and player spawns are all over the place and many players also report more and more cheaters. (I myself never encountered one though)
But hey they gave us an piss awful bunch of the ugliest cosmetics ever seen in a video game. And a "season pass" so damn pointless.
Oh and did I talk about the hilarious desync? Ever tried to snipe someone or hit someone with a Tank? For me as a german its also not even possible anymore to play on Europe Servers. I only get queued on US East 2 Servers. Dont know if its just not enough players or they simply shut down europe servers.
@@threedog27Idk if you played MCC from 2021-2023 it was golden multiple seasons new maps. It all came when Pierce join my guess is that he left after becoming head and resources don’t go into MCC anymore.
Yeah I remember people who were play Infinite at the time wanted the MCC team to come to Infinite.
Marcus Lehto says that Pierre is awesome and is praising the announcement. He also says that Chris Matthews as the AD is a great pick. I found on Twitter(X) that he also said that all of the moves have been good (meaning who has been hired or promoted). No disrespect to Mr. Waltz, but Lehto played a massive role in Halo while 343 has been iffy the entire time. I value the thoughts and opinions of Lehto more. I would be interested to see what Joseph Staten and Marty think about it.
Joseph Staten did a lot for Infinite also feel like he helped make the campaign a full experience
@@infernaldaedra I don't know this for sure, but it really seems like he saved that story. Right when he was hired, the game was delayed for an entire year, meaning he saw a lot of work needed to be done. My guess is that 343/Microsoft were on the verge of releasing a bad and half working game and then updating it over time. Which is what half of the games now end up doing.
@@infernaldaedra Joe staten saved Infinite from being microsoft's Concord. he's our sgt. Johnson
That "I don't like glorifying guns" 343 guy is still one of the directors or leaders or whatever of halo studios.
@@Spendingryan I don't remember his name, but he obviously hasn't had a major impact, as guns are not a complaint I have in Halo Infinite.
I'm a gun owner, 2A advocate, and have been trained on multiple weapons platforms while I have been in the Navy. My friends and I go shooting all the time. I can't comprehend how someone can be so afraid of guns and not instead afraid of crime.
but didn’t pierre save mcc? maybe they didn’t want to switch because they didn’t want to lose the halo feel and they were trying their best to keep the engine but it just wasn’t worth in the end
maybe they were trying to not be so innovative with halo because it blew up in their face with 4 and 5 idk i just hope they can make great halo games
someone also mentioned that since people were talking about ue5 since before infinite's development (2017-2018) that's 6-7 years for opinions and managers to change (which they have). And it was likely infinite that inspired that change. From what I remember 4 and 5's engines were'nt that bad, especially compared to slipspace.
It wasn't to fix MCC, It was to monetize it. He is formally from EA. MCC wasn't saved. Its a mess infested with hackers and crashes.
@@jurassicarkjordanisgreat1778 Didn't all of us whine and complain for several years until he arrived, about how MCC was broken and wouldn't work? Then he was brought in, fixed, and yeah he may have monetized a few things, but the man did his job and fixed the freaking game. Don't act like because he monetized it, that his significance is trivial.
@@jurassicarkjordanisgreat1778 also what do you mean monetize it. You can't purchase mcc Spartan points. Yes I checked.
Note that the MCC was purely technical problems, not gameplay ones. Creating an entirely new (and good) Halo title is vastly different from fixing technical aspects of the MCC.
Wasn't Pierre Hintze brought in to fix MCC, and didn't he?
Let's be real the community knew the game was messed up and what had to change was pretty obvious they did do a good job with MCC bringing progression into the game though.
It was for a little while . Now mcc is unplayable with all the cheaters .
It wasn't to fix MCC, It was to monetize it. He is formally from EA
It's still messed up. Me and my brother a year ago could not play Halo 2 campaign together without some levels constantly crashing and kicking us off the game. It was a disaster.
@@jurassicarkjordanisgreat1778 That's irrelevant, factually speaking without him the MCC would still be a buggy mess of a game.
He/him in the bio is hilarious.😂
Disgruntled ex employee complaining about being laid off after working there for 13 years. It's not even authentic at this point anymore.
Yeah it happens to alot of people nowadays. Only people that dont work/pay taxes disagree. 😊
I guess a long time dedicated employee speaking on their experience with the studio and management some how means nothing. Riiight..
Bro don't even know what 13 years even is yet. 😂
@@katon4525there just shills. they werent there when Bungi was developing halo and they dont care. they have no idea what halo is. and there just NewAge Marxist Dipshits who have a massive Ego
Let's just keep in mind that this is all "alleged", could be some truth to it but we have zero proof atm
Halo ended in 2010
Halo Studios is just 343 with a fresh coat of paint
Don’t get it twisted 343 took over because someone had to due to Bungie abandoning Halo and it’s community so imho they are valid they had to take on everything they had no prior experience on then Bungie went and made Destiny then ruin it with Destiny 2 and lie about promises 😐 fyi Destiny 2 was supposed to be open world not hub worlds ✌️
"Don't get it twisted" is the wildest thing to say before spewing absolute autism.
@@easydayezjust bc you hate bungle doesn’t mean 343 is anything better. Bungie made 1 of the greatest video games ever, to only abandon the golden goose. What fools they are for abandoning the golden goose. And well 343, they r c4nc3r on halo & have always been a c4nc3r. Both gaming companies suck so bad it’s not even funny at this point. IMO.
Can someone go back in time and fix halo?
I wish. But unfortunately, no.
The way to fix halo is for 343 to stop making halo forever.
@@NathanielStobbs
And for everything made after 2010 to be no longer cannon.
I'm on it chief. You'll know I succeeded if one day you think back on Halo and see success after halo reach 🫡
Marty O' Donnel sends his condolences.
Why is no one talking about the logo? "hALO Studios" Did they have caps lock on? 😂
The logo is so shit they could of just went with the original font Bungie made 😂
That logo is hot diarrhea.
I honestly couldnt give a shit less about the logo. It could look like a a pile of turd for all I care as long as the games they make are good.
@@Ravensbite same, the logo looked a bit off to me first time i saw it but u get used to it its just a logo after all.
From my understanding, it's based off an early logo concept for Halo CE. Regardless, the logo is the least of my concerns.
They can have the best graphics ever, but the story is what they should take priority
And gameplay
@@LPhooligan well that’s why I think starting with a CE remake isn’t an awful decision. They already know that CE’s story was good, and let’s face it, 343 also had issues with releasing incomplete games.
I think the smart idea is to make the remake, which would allow them to focus on creating a game with good mechanics that runs well, basically showing that they fixed one of 343’s well known issues, and then they can move on to a new title, and that’s where they can show that they’ve gotten better with the story aspect as well.
I don’t want them jumping off the deep end right away if it just means they fail and drown.
@@fireheart8878it also means they can completely destroy a good game’s legacy
If a 343 employee dislikes something, then I'll automatically like that thing.
I dunno maybe, just maybe, Will got fired because he’s part of the problem. Boasting about being an employee for the last 13 years (some of halos worst times) 3:09 bit cocky here too. Classic 343.
I went to HCS 2023 and spoke to some people that worked at 343. They said they liked the new leadership style at the time
my words for this : "Wait and See the next Halo game"
I think Halo studios is going to poo into the master chiefs helmet just as much, if not more than 343 studios.
I expect that you're probably correct; but we will see.
Why?
@@maddoxortiz3458 because at this point it is abnormal to treat the IP with any form of respect.
Would like us to play as other well established characters (buck) or Noble 6 (he's alive in a cave on reach somewhere)
@@ArouzedLamp I wouldn't mind seeing the whole of Gamma 6 during one of their other high-profile adventures; pre-becoming Spartan IVs.
I honestly think halo 4 was the last good halo game story wise. I miss how it used to be. I hate open world and hate it when they kick out characters from previous games just to “get back to OG” gameplay
I think we are forgetting that a lot has already changed in 343/halo studios, halo infinite was a huge step in the right direction, even if a lot more things have to improve, we have to admit 343 have come a long way since halo 4, so we have to wait to see how much improvement we have with halo studios.
I’m excited about a new diverse and inclusive version of Halo. I hope they make Master Chief black and gay
@@MrBrown-jj9bf might aswell bring in master cheeks as well make him cannon!
Bro get off the internet if diversity bothers you that much. Like what is wrong with you
Dawg take your flood-smelling ass back to a Yellowflash2 comment section, people like you make this fandom fucking disgusting to listen to.
absolutely not
these big companies like blackrock will contiuntue to pour money and propaganda into gaming . its not for gamers anymore .
Oil up
why because we're about to get f*cked?
@@HaloFollower-Ron shouldn't the one fucking get oiled instead of the one being fucked?
@@HaloFollower-Ronand cooked🔥
This comment is Diddy approved. Lol 😆
Probably.
No one cares about ex 343 developers
Edit: Any dev that defends old lesdership shouldnt be taken seriously, its why they were removed.
unreal engine isnt the savior they think it is, there was PLENTY WRONG with halo that has nothing to do with the engine
but an engine that is an massive upgrade from the original one allows them to do thing that was never possible within any of the Halo engines previously so i'm interested with what they have in store but most likely i won't be buying the next game and will be sticking with the MCC
@@lugismansion2400massive upgrade is subjective. You loose a good junk of identity with the change and you’re basically at the mercy of epic for new features to the engine where as making your own engine lets you do what you want
@@goobot1 better with Unreal Engine than Unity
@@goobot1 Not true. Unreal Engine is source-available. You can download the source code of the engine right now, for free, and modify it how ever you see fit, then build it, and develop a game using your modified version of UE. Features need not come from Epic Games. The only limitation here is you can't publicly distribute their modified version of UE, bound by Epic's EULA, which allows you to download the source and do as you see fit. They also have a royalty fee that kicks in after some $1 million in revenue or so which is how they make money on the engine withstanding this rather lax approach to licensing.
Now, Halo Studios doing that would be mildly counter productive as they are moving to UE5 for the explicit purpose of removing the need for engine upkeep - effectively offloading that to Epic Games. But nevertheless the option is there for them to do with what they like.
Thing that the people within the Halo community don't get is that it wasn't 343i that was the issue, it was for the most part Microsoft. People forget that Bungie was bought by Microsoft but rebelled being fully immersed into Microsoft, 343i was made by Microsoft for Microsoft so they didn't have the luxury to rebel against Microsoft execs
Now 343i leadership isn't clean either but it's the Microsoft execs that are/were the biggest issue but the community focuses more on 343i than Microsoft.
As far as the new leadership, we haven't seen what they can do yet, so it's not fair for us to judge them, and people should take a grain of salt from disgruntled 343i devs.
I was wrongfully terminated as a cook from a resort I worked for, I still snowboard there, i hate the exec/ and head chef for doing me dirty but there are former coworkers of mine that love them. Does that make the restaurant horrible? No, does that make my feelings invalid? No. But I'm not going to use my bad exp with the restaurant leadership to ruin others experiences, and I'll continue going there as a boarder.
These guys are obnoxious and just need to let Halo cook and the community to judge for themselves
everything after old bungie is just noncannon to my eyes.
So they fired everybody that knew how to create a game in SlipSpace. now they fucked themselves so they had to switch to "copy and paste" Unreal 5????
Fire the suits that fired the creative teams and decided to make the game for a wider audience. Fire the suits that pushed Infinite out early. Fire the suits that let Halo die
Infinite didn’t come out early and the suits that that wanted a wider game audience are gone
Don’t be duped by the name change, it’s the same female DEI hired stunning and brave girl bosses with no video game experience who are in a position of authority because of their skin color and gender like Melissa Boone and Xbox president Sarah Bond who have run Xbox studios into the ground because they care more about inclusivity and diversity than making amazing games.
remember cortana waking up john?
that never happend. he is still asleep out in space
*I’m sorry but Will Waltz sounds like he’s got a hammer…and everything related to 343 is a nail.*
3:35 He was being sarcastic
Let's see their first game. Then we'll discuss more. I would like to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Pronouns in bio, immediately discard opinion.
exactly
While switching to unreal will not fix all
Of halo’s issues . The biggest issue that halo infinite had was that it took waaaay too long to introduce new contact . Changing to unreal should help that . If halo infinite had 3 month seasons with maps and weapons added with playlist being able to be easily added it would’ve overcame all of the micro transaction problems . If they can pump out quality content then that will be a huge improvement
Gotta look at what Pierre has lead to be done with MCC. He turned that gane into something special, and many of the good new aspects of Infinite were done under his leadership. Seems a bit more than 50/50 that things will go much better than they have.
Mcc is still riddled with bugs and hacking and infinite has hardly gotten better
@@RANDOMPEPSIBOTTLESFortunately, UE5 handles all of those technical shortcomings.
Ex devs are pissed off and you are still here supporting, happy for the future of halo
Imagine and swallow that, low T crowd of fanboys. Want a change? Stop buying and playing
😂dude I am currently recovering from being in a coma for about two years and that happened about ten years ago and I have just now woken up so to see 👀 is amazing 👏 ❤HALO for life 🎉❣️
someone who uses pronouns shouldn't be taken seriously. just comes over as salty. Not defending 343 but with all the DEI crap that the gaming industry (and the entire world) has tried to push because some insecure idiots have no backbone, you just can't take someone who's using pronouns serious.
343 Rebranding to Halo Studios
Me: "Were it so easy"
my only gripe is that i want to play a game without haveing to read 50+ books to know the back story of every character that appear
Can never be good news for long can it. With ex devs coming forward like this it’s hard not to be conflicted about Halo’s future again.
Only good thing I can say without doubts is that Unreal will be better for Halo. Slipspace led to needless setbacks and prolonged Infinite’s struggles. Unreal will remedy most of that, and be a better tool for new employees to work with.
This is not an ideal situation. Halo Studios needs to be better if they truly want Halo to prosper.
Unreal Engine is garbage... Of course a senior animator wanted Unreal. It's designed for movies. It's NOT designed with quality gaming in mind. Unreal would've made THIS guy's life easier and would've made the game itself hot garbage. Of the hundreds of games made with Unreal Engine in the last TWO DECADES you can count the number that don't suck on one hand with fingers left over. Every dev that made a good game with it was only able to do so after coding their own stuff from scratch. Things Unreal was SUPPOSED to do on it's own. They want Unreal Engine for one reason: they can hire cheap outsourcing companies for it. Unreal is NOT good for gaming. I'm sure it's great for film and TV production but, to give a descriptive example: Halo is silk and steel, Unreal games are burlap and plastic. Making a AAA dev's job easy doesn't have anything to do with making a good, quality gaming experience. They could've taken the money spent on DEI consultants and spent it on creating an upgrade to the Slipspace Engine to solve all their problems, but LOOKING good is more important that BEING good to these people. What was the problem with Halo Infinite? Did it look bad? No... Did it play bad? Hell no... it still has that 'Halo' control and feel. Smooth as silk. If Halo could have been made with Unreal Engine it would have been already by the hundreds and hundreds of others who have lusted after Halo's gaming experience over the years. 343 and Microsoft failed Halo. NOT the engine. They failed it from a writing perspective, they failed it from a creative perspective, they failed it from a marketing perspective, and they failed it from a support perspective. Using Unreal on Halo is a stab in the back of all the hard work done by OG Bungie and the fans of the franchise. Calling Unreal 'innovation' is a corporate euphemism if ever there was one. Halo is dead. Microsoft killed it. The same way Star Wars is dead, the same way Star Trek is dead, the same way Battlefield is dead... I could do this all day... People who have no business holding the positions they do making decisions for the rest of us... Motivated by short term greed or personal agendas or just plain incompetence. It pains me to say this but the age of Halo has passed. Let it die with dignity and respect. Don't use Unreal Engine to piss on its grave.
Anyone who who gets sacked is going to be sour, so you cannot believe every word they say because it's often said with resentment. I couldn't care less what he says, they are finally moving to Unreal, which is a good thing. There are always two sides to every coin, so I'm going to remain optimistic until we see more of the next game. People do change their minds, and change has to start somewhere. Keep the faith.
TBH these people just sound like disgruntled ex-employees that are PISSED most of 343i got fired before the new studio announcement. we got to be real there is only a few people still working there from 343i before the name change. this is mostly a new studio as from what I see the people still there from 343 are mostly community managers and stuff in other words folks not making decisions. Pierre came in 2022 got promoted to studio head and from outside appearances CLEANED house.. even this incel ex -employee said as much
We are cooked.
@@margini6795 maybe 🤨
lets just hope that their multiple project arent soulless trend chasing. Battle Royal, Helldivers, Hero shooter ....
An ODST style extraction shooter could be cool but as a spin-off
@@c_rock3512 yes ofc, but i mean is that whatever they're making, make it with a soul.
Halo: DEI Evolved
4:21 bruh. THATS A GOOD THING. The other chapters that we had were nightmares. The last 13 years of halo were terrible. It’s a dam good thing this new chapter doesn’t feel like the rest.
This franchised is more doomed than Doom guy’s foes themselves.
I don’t think so. Pierre is what got infinite to be at least cool for what it is and pretty much fixed MCC.
Wait. Isn't Halo Studios the old name for 343 back when they developped Waypoint c. 2008m
told yall this didnt address the workplace or 18 month contacts... but lets just forget about that and be happy its a new team, screw the old devs and new ones who get dropped after 18 since we can replace them even easier now since were on UE.
That guy is just mad he and his friends got fired. Pierre is the guy who fixed MCC and it was good until he was off the MCC team.
Pierre saved mcc from the complete dumpster fire that it was. Sounds like ex 343 are salty they got axed, though I do agree with the fact Microsoft hiring method sucks.
I’m hoping that they learned their lesson and not repeat the same mistakes because I really don’t want to see Halo crash and burn.
Heeding this as being cautiously optimistic. Never disregard someone who has worked there for a long time and lines up with a lot of issues with the company.
So basically 343 is still 343 and the name change and “layoffs” meant nothing lol. Guess I was right to not be excited about this announcement and not automatically say “Halo is Saved” for the hundredth time. Halo simps will never get out of this abusive relationship with this shitty company, at first it was hilarious but this is just sad at this point.
No the heads of 343 are all gone Peirre joined in 2021 and handle Halo MCC you know when all those armors and seasons were coming out that was thanks to him. He’s the head now so hopefully halo gets back on track.
@@antoine121
I am not convinced. The people in charge of a company get to set the workplace culture, but once it is well established, replacing those in charge does little to affect it. 343 Incompetencies was literally founded by people who hated Halo, refused to work with anyone from Bungie (until Joseph Staten showed up to be the fall guy), actively ruined the lore, characters, art style, and themes, then mocked fans for pointing out why the franchise has declined. "Halo Studios" is just 343 Incompetencies rebranded.
@@antoine121 I hope he can deliver but remember, MCC was a collection of games that were already made, it took them years to fix those games that they broke and add some new features but these things are nothing compared to releasing a full packaged game, that entails a full campaign, split screen and online co-op, matchmaking, working custom games, forge, firefight, working theater, working file browser, all social and competitive game modes, veto system, party up lobbies etc. on day one. Bungie was able to accomplish these things with Halo 3 & Reach on older/inferior hardware yet 343 has yet to accomplish this with any of their titles.
@@alexanderrobins7497 If the entire leadership and large chunks of the workforce are let go the culture can change pretty rapidly. Which is what happened here.
The E3 nostalgic teaser trailer for Halo Infinite wasn’t gameplay footage or game atmosphere. It was merely cinematic CGI. Whereas this “Foundry” is actual Unreal Engine game background and character models…so that’s already more promising.
Remember the difference between Halo Infinite teaser trailer and then the gameplay footage a year before launch…real bad.
Pronouns in profile?
Imma head out.
This sounds like someone mad that they were fired/let go. it Could not be, but thats what it feels like. Guess will see.
Must be painful to be an ex-343 developer, recommending UE, getting pushed out for it, then seeing it adopted. I really hope Halo Studios is open to working with any devs that "dissented" previously (who were right all along)...
Tbh the 343 dude seems like a disgruntled employee.
So this joker was at the front lines of halos downfall from the start? Why would we take anything they say seriously?
Bro also has “he/him” on his Twitter. I don’t trust him lol
He doesn't have Twitter lol
Good to see my initial concerns were not unfounded. Had a bad feeling "Halo Studios" was just a name change. As long as its the same captain flying the ship, the end destination will remain the same.
4:00 your optimism is doing more harm than good. Stop the sugar-coating you disingenuous sellout.
Your negativity is why halo is in the place it is, you disingenuous halo fan.
I've never read a more pathetic comment
isn't pierre the guy that said something like 'infinite was baked with the same recipe as all the other halo games and it's time to switch up the recipe"? dude is taking the piss
New studio is full of DEI.
"Trade one villian for another" this is ither going to be the most true statement for this situation or hopefuly it dosnt become the case
I say wait till we see their first game and then judge them
No need to wait. It's still 343, despite the name change. Nothing will change, and Halo will still continue to suck and be killed off by these DEI hires.
@@TheTGRproductions its not the 343 that did 4 5 and infinite. They got fired but didnt change name instantly. Now they finally did
They already have a product out: Halo Infinite, they need to clean up the mess first.
@@TheTGRproductions oh boy ur one of those…
@bobby1129 Someone with pattern recognition and common sense? Indeed I am
I’ve laid Halo to rest in my head , I will remember the memories.
People on the Reddit discussion on this yesterday called out a lot of contradicting things this guy said in his tweets. Also odd and unprofessional to say some of the things he did. Taking it with a grain of salt.
And so begins the *Drama* .
Can’t trust anyone with pronouns in their profile 😂
@@Riosx24 🤡 comment
Yeah I wouldn’t trust him, he’s part of the problem
There goes anybody working for Halo Studios.
@@azca.Nah mate, take a look in the mirror
@@FullOnMetalHead1995 didn't know pronouns hurt your feelings. cry more
I can definitely believe that Microsoft is a big part of the problem. There was a reason why Bungie was so quick to get out from underneath of Microsoft after they bought Bungie, and then Bungie avoided Microsoft like the plague afterwards.
0:39 Pronouns detected, opinion rejected....
Grow up
Huh? They didnt even... what?
Them saying how the unreal engine is going to revolutionise reminds me about how good it was going to be on the slipspace engine.
Graphical fidelity ≠ good story
I believe action more than words. Even if it is true. Pierre has made MCC and Infinite better. He doesnt talk much but he is lead. Im cautiously optimistic about the reboot. And hoping it brings the nostalgic back plus some new things. But what Will has been saying is definitely a disgruntled employee who got favored by the old management and when it got changed he wasn't favored anymore and got bitter.
I just don’t have much trust in anything a 343 dev says. With what we got in halo 5, and a majority of halo infinite I feel like it may be valid to have their “creative ideas” cut.
What happened to Halo to me is heartbreaking - this was always way more to me than just a game: in that I played over and over with my kids and wife and we lived the experience.
From 2001 through to the downturn of 4,5,6.
Now it's most likely Microsoft corporate interference, from the top. I think the top corporate management let them run for many years now they have the screws tightened for shareholder benefit as a priority.