I can't imagine this was announced lightly but it really doesn't fill me with confidence about the end product at launch. Campaign co-op especially is a core feature of the Halo franchise. It was...
I can't imagine this was announced lightly but it really doesn't fill me with confidence about the end product at launch. Campaign co-op especially is a core feature of the Halo franchise. It was already bad enough when they removed couch co-op in the last one, it's hard not to read a lack of it at launch as anything but a forced error.
And as a forced error, that basically means that they need to ship the game out by a certain date come hell or a lack of core features.
This is especially unappealing when this is coming from the same company that took years (nearly a whole console generation!) to fix one of their last major products since it was broken and incomplete at launch.
Here's hoping the game is in a great state a year after launch.
I thought the humbling slap in the face that was the Xbox One launch would actually help push Microsoft into working extra hard and maybe come out at the top in the end. But it's been 6 years...
I thought the humbling slap in the face that was the Xbox One launch would actually help push Microsoft into working extra hard and maybe come out at the top in the end. But it's been 6 years since Phil Spencer started the "it's all about the games" angle. I actually believed him. I considered maybe getting an Xbox for console gaming (eventually got a Switch and a PS4 instead). But now, where are we?
There isn't a single AAA-ish exclusive of theirs in years that made much of an impact. Xbox Series X was their chance for a clean-slate reset and there's nothing. It can take a year or two for the first big hits to appear on a new console but we're nearly one year in and it seems like this is still it, they've bet everything on Halo Infinite and it seems to suck. How come Sony manages to find studios all around the world who consistently produce big GotY quality releases yet the moment MS touches a studio it starts producing nothing but flops? That can't be coincidence? That can't just be bad luck, right?
At this point, the reason I care is Bethesda. Microsoft paid a lot of money for them to not release their games on competing platforms and that sucks. But what's even worse is that the current pattern points to MS dragging Bethesda down with them rather them somehow lifting them up. I have no idea how on earth they'd manage to do that, but if there is a way to destroy Bethesda, they'll find it. It would make way too much sense for MS to basically have paid $7 billion for Starfield and it turns out to be a major flop. Not sure about the causality, here, but it would be the least surprising outcome. It's gotta be said: Their last major release was Fallout 76.
I can't imagine this was announced lightly but it really doesn't fill me with confidence about the end product at launch. Campaign co-op especially is a core feature of the Halo franchise. It was already bad enough when they removed couch co-op in the last one, it's hard not to read a lack of it at launch as anything but a forced error.
And as a forced error, that basically means that they need to ship the game out by a certain date come hell or a lack of core features.
This is especially unappealing when this is coming from the same company that took years (nearly a whole console generation!) to fix one of their last major products since it was broken and incomplete at launch.
Here's hoping the game is in a great state a year after launch.
I thought the humbling slap in the face that was the Xbox One launch would actually help push Microsoft into working extra hard and maybe come out at the top in the end. But it's been 6 years since Phil Spencer started the "it's all about the games" angle. I actually believed him. I considered maybe getting an Xbox for console gaming (eventually got a Switch and a PS4 instead). But now, where are we?
There isn't a single AAA-ish exclusive of theirs in years that made much of an impact. Xbox Series X was their chance for a clean-slate reset and there's nothing. It can take a year or two for the first big hits to appear on a new console but we're nearly one year in and it seems like this is still it, they've bet everything on Halo Infinite and it seems to suck. How come Sony manages to find studios all around the world who consistently produce big GotY quality releases yet the moment MS touches a studio it starts producing nothing but flops? That can't be coincidence? That can't just be bad luck, right?
At this point, the reason I care is Bethesda. Microsoft paid a lot of money for them to not release their games on competing platforms and that sucks. But what's even worse is that the current pattern points to MS dragging Bethesda down with them rather them somehow lifting them up. I have no idea how on earth they'd manage to do that, but if there is a way to destroy Bethesda, they'll find it. It would make way too much sense for MS to basically have paid $7 billion for Starfield and it turns out to be a major flop. Not sure about the causality, here, but it would be the least surprising outcome. It's gotta be said: Their last major release was Fallout 76.
For being such a core part of the game, co-op has always felt very half baked, like it was tacked on at the last second.
That just makes its absence all that much worse if true.
Infinite going open world makes the old implementation a lot less viable.
They said 3 months after the campaign releases.