In an interview with Game Informer this week, Halo Franchise Development Director Frank O’Connor discussed 343′s intentions regarding the expansion of the Halo universe through games not part of the main series and other media, such as novels, comics, and even a short web series in the works to be premiered on Halo Waypoint in the weeks leading up to the release of Halo 4.

While there is no doubt that the dauntingly vast Halo universe could successfully be expanded upon almost without limit, 343 has decided to focus their efforts on the new trilogy for the foreseeable future.

These things are successful.  And they’re fun, and- Halo Wars.  People love Halo Wars.  It’s not something we’re working on right now, but the universe can support these different experiences….  I think the Halo universe can support more games.  I think that we just have to be careful not to oversaturate the- at least the console part of the market….  Try to keep people focused on the mainline core of our universe, which is ultimately the games and specifically the sequential ones.  So that’s our main focus and that’s definitely going to be our main focus moving forward.

This is a step away from Microsoft’s previous requests for expansion, which resulted in original developer Bungie contributing two additional games (a side story in Halo 3:  ODST and a prequel in Halo:  Reach) as well as commissioning famed strategy game developer Ensemble Studios to finally give life to Halo‘s original conceptualization as a real-time strategy game.

The resulting game, Halo Wars, became one of the best selling and most popular console RTS titles ever released, proving that games set in an expanded universe could enjoy the same success as their main series counterparts.  Per usual, 343 gave as vague an answer as was acceptable (I can think of exactly one time I’ve heard Frankie give a straight answer) when asked about a possible sequel, but it seemed to indicate that a hypothetical Halo Wars 2 wouldn’t be coming to shelves (or even the drawing board) anytime soon.  This may be the best choice, since Ensemble Studios sadly closed its doors shortly after Halo Wars was released in 2009.

Fans of the Halo series are still waiting to see if the franchise will survive one change in developer, let alone two.

Find the original interview here.
Source:  Game Informer

About Eileen Murphy

Writer. Reader. Thinker. Gamer. Addicted gamer, you might say.

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