Does The World Really Need Another Halo Game?

In the current timeline, the multiplayer video game world is dominated by Tik Tok dancing, "where we dropping", battle pass leveling, loot, shoot and reboot Battle Royales. Eight years after the release of Fortnite, we have seen countless Battle Royales come and go. Some stay, many fail. That is the destiny of the trend chaser. Battle Royales seemed to be a never ending trend, with each big game throwing their hat through the shrinking Battle Royale window, many succumbing to the madness or losing their creative soul in the process. While the data suggests Battle Royales are as popular as ever, the gaming community has had the lingering question of "what's next?" But what is next?

Fortnite changed the landscape of online multiplayer gaming whether you like it or not. Sure, PUBG was before Fortnite, and H1Z1 if you go back even farther, and Minecraft: Hunger Games if you go back even farther, but none have had the impact that Fortnite has had. For the next five years the only trend was to turn anything into a battle royale, just to try and take a piece of the money pie Fortnite created. Battlefield tried and failed, Smite developer Hi-Rez tried and failed, Fallout 76 tired and failed and failed and failed. (To be fair that was just for everything they tried, because it all failed.) Titanfall tried and made it. Call of Duty tried and failed, but tried again and made it. PUBG was the pinnacle of the competitive battle royale, but has now "adapted" to become just another "clone with a twist" of Fortnite.

The battle pass, multiplayer seasons, a constant drip feed of content, free, cross-platform play, an entire generation of content creators, cross-IP collaborations, live events all became an industry standard because of the success of Fortnite.

Fast forward eight years to 2025, if you release a game with a multiplayer component without a mix of those things, good luck. Even if you have these things, you have to be doing something new and make it last. A report suggests that more than 63% of gamers in played only games 6 years or older. Why would they deviate from the games they have been playing for years, especially when they have spent considerable amounts of time and money in those?

Now, lets bring Halo into that landscape. In 2001, Halo: Combat Evolved, was true to its name. It revolutionized FPS gaming on the console. 21 years later and the graphical style, gameplay, story and soundtrack still hold up to this day. It continued on to be Xbox's flagship IP with Halo 2 revolutionizing online gaming on a console. Halo 2 blazed the trail for Xbox Live and competitive online FPS's on console. Halo 3 was the third iteration into an extremely successful trilogy that brought it all together as one of the definitive experiences of gaming. It also included the addition of a map editor giving creative gamers the opportunity to make their own wacky crazy game modes.

Halo Reach, Halo 4, Halo 5. One Bungie product and two 343 industries products. All three were essentially the same Halo formula with a twist, as they tried to compete with the evolving player base of Call of Duty. All three were met with varying levels of criticisms. Between choices in multiplayer like spartan abilities, class loadouts and the 'dreaded' sprint; to the direction of the story and level design, they all developed armies of people who didn't like the way the games were headed. They tried to change the formula that worked for 10 years too much. Halo was built on roots of the arena shooter with equal starts and map knowledge being just as important as your own FPS skill. Sadly, I believe these same roots may be tightly wrapped around Halo's neck chocking out what little hope it has left.

Halo slipped out of relevance probably around mid-2016 (maybe even earlier than that depending on who you ask), with many of the hardcore fans either still playing Halo 5 or the broken-at-the-time Master Chief Collection or they were on to something else, Halo in the rear view with a hope they could return one day to the game they had loved since 2001.

Silence from 343 on the next game lasted for three years. They began developing a new engine in late 2015 with the idea of developing Halo 6, but they were almost completely silent about the next game for years. That is a long time in the video game world. By this point unless you were playing Halo 5 still (a handful of people) you had moved on from Halo for a while. From the time of Halo 5's release in 2015 to the announcement of Halo Infinite in 2018 we saw the release of three Call of Duty games, Titanfall 2, Battlefield 1, Overwatch, all major FPS games sucking away at what little grasp Halo had left in the FPS space.

Then in comes Fortnite. In 2017, this game dropped for free on all the platforms and the rest became history. Fortnite was the only thing anyone could talk about for years. Battle Royale became the trend to chase. For years every game that featured shooting was labeled "the Halo Killer" in hopes they could surpass Halo and become the premiere online FPS. In 2017, while no one thought to label it that, Fortnite was the true "Halo Killer". Not because it was a 'better game' than Halo, but because Fortnite fostered in the next generation of gamers at a time when Halo was at its lowest.

In the coming years, it became what game was going to be the "Fortnite killer". We saw games like Fallout 76 and Realm Royale try. We saw games like Apex and Warzone succeed. A graveyard of attempted battle royales bursting at the seams while a handful remained at the top. The success these games were having seemed untouchable. All of the Call of duty studios became apart of the chugging Warzone machine. Respawn became EA's success story with a competitive Battle Royale that quietly has remained one of the most played games in history. And then Fortnite seemed to be breaking new ceilings every week with concert performances from Travis Scott or Ariana Grande, to movie premieres being played inside the game.

There was nothing stopping this train as it completely changed the landscape of what a multiplayer game was. Pre-Fortnite, live-service wasn't a descriptor thrown around very much. Outside of MMO's, and a handful of games like Overwatch, games usually launched for a price, and maybe had a plan for content drops (often time paid content) or patch updates between launch and the next game. Fortnite changed that. With the seasonal model and a battle pass to go with it adding huge drops of free content every few weeks, it kept players coming back week after week for years.

So to recap, during Halo's lowest point, multiplayer games and what attracted players was significantly changed. In 2007, Halo 3 went on to sell around 15 million copies, it was the pinnacle of FPS gaming at the time and the king of multiplayer. In 2017, 10 years later, A free game on all platforms was bringing in hundreds of millions of players with several million players playing at any given moment. Not only had the trend of what a majority of gamers wanted changed, but the space was so crowded there was no room for the king anymore.

From the announcement of Infinite in 2018 to the delay in 2020, to now three years after launch of the free multiplayer component, the number one discourse online about Halo has always been this... "Will it have a battle royale?" Actually the question went more like "Does Halo need a battle royale?" The hype for Halo was extremely high in 2021 after the reveal of multiplayer with fans of all ages excited for the next iteration of "The King". "The King was back!" people were saying this for months. Halo Infinite looked to promise that old Halo 3 magic returning to the roots of what the game was like in 2007 but bringing it into the evolved space of 2021. On top of this it was going to be free. At the time, Battlefield had just announced its $70 price, and Call of Duty was releasing yet another WW2 game no one wanted as cornmeal to supplement the Warzone machine.

Battle Royales did feel like they were hitting a point of decline as the big three had dominated for a few years. Cheaters were plaguing warzone, along with the introduction of a map no one liked. Fortnite felt like it was either kids playing Among us (the ripoff) or Bob the builder's who could build the Empire State building in 2.5 seconds. Apex still feels like the battle royale meant for the aspiring pro payers as the state of the game was no longer welcoming to casuals. It looked as if Halo was in prime position to regain former glory. They looked like they were doing everything right.

And to be 100% honest... they did do almost everything right. Halo Infinite was a true successor to Halo 3. It did encapsulate the magic of what Halo used to be. It lived up to its hype of what it was promising. For a few weeks. It felt like 343 Industries took Halo 3 through time, added modern elements, increased movement potential, refined the gun play to develop the ultimate Halo game that reinvigorated the love that was cherished 15 years ago.

Halo Infinite reached 20 million players within the first month, being a console exclusive this was a great feat for the return of the "King." Players of all ages from those who played Halo: Combat evolved the day it launched in 2001, to those who only knew of the Master Chief because he was the Fortnite guy. But that hype died fast. Complaints of progression were at the top of the list. "The battle pass was too slow to level up" they said. "There is not enough modes and maps" they said.

Mind you, this is all in December. The complaints about content, progression and several technical issues were already pretty heavy at this point.

When Halo 3 came out it launched with 11 maps, 19 guns and a collection of vehicles. Halo 4 launched with 10 maps, 24 guns, and a similar amount of vehicles. Halo 5 with 11 non-forge maps. Halo 5 had a huge collection of guns, but most of those were locked by REQ packs and for the Warzone mode where you bought the guns with consumable cards. Halo: Infinite launched with 11 maps with 3 of those being Big Team Battle maps. It's sandbox was decently sized with 22 weapons and a good number of returning and new vehicles. It did seem to lack a bit in modes available with BTB and a select amount of arena games and a light ranked mode. But overall, it isn't far off from past launch-offerings of the legendary Halo series.

So, what is different now? Gamers... sort of.

The landscape for multiplayer shooters changed and evolved so much since 2007 when Halo 3 launched. Its changed so much since 2015 when Halo 5 launched. Battle Royales and dripfeed content is what the people want.

Sure, older gamers (meaning 25+ year olds) were EXCITED for the idea of Halo the KING of arena multiplayer returning and bringing back all the great memories of their younger lives. All the nights staying up playing slayer on Pit with the boys, or riding around in the back of a warthog going for the enemy flag in CTF was well on the minds of millions including myself when they debuted that Halo Infinite multiplayer trailer. Every one and their mother was saying "Halo doesn't need a Battle Royale, this is the King returning to the throne." Streamers like Dr. Disrespect were getting called out because they said they wanted to see a Halo BR. The core and returning Halo community went up in arms against these streamers. Halo couldn't possibly need a BR it's the KING of Arena shooters.

But it didn't take long for that nostalgia to fade and several of the issues show their head. All the already mentioned problems with content, progression and technical issues got more apparent. Time went by with very little content changes. 343 changed many shop item prices after complaints of things costing too much for too little. But for months the only thing new was items in the store and a week long "event " that forced you to play Fiesta to complete challenges to unlock free cosmetics, but you could only do the challenges when they appeared in your short list of active challenges, and you only got so many for the week so you had to wait for the next event week a month later. Yea, it was as annoying as that long sentence makes it sounds.

For the first 6 months this game managed to get 20 million players across all platforms, and, also lose most of its player base in the same amount of time. My belief is that while it had some issues at launch, it was doomed from the start simply because it was just Halo.

Halo the KING of shooters is old and tired. No matter what coat of paint and Kitty-eared face mask you put over the classic 4v4 arena shooter, it will still be the same old game from 2001. Gamers today aren't drawn to arena shooters any more. That is coming from someone who literally grew up with Halo and loves arena shooters.

The return had its hype, but that quickly died out because it lacked the Fortnite-era pizazz. Except for the expensive micro-transactions, they managed to pull that off.

The multiplayer gaming scene has become so large compared to when Halo was in its prime. It has become a whole new landscape where people no longer want to team up and face four other people in an eight minute match, and the outcome is based purely on the skill, map knowledge and strategy of the team. All good things have to come to an end at some point, is there a time when games just need to be retired? Fortnite for better or worse has completely changed the way multiplayer is played.

So, to answer the question, "Did Halo need a battle royale to succeed?" I give another question, "Did the multiplayer gaming world, that is filled to the brim with shooters, battle royales, micro-transactions, emotes and battle passes, need just another Halo?"