Prior to 343 Industries' recent statement regarding the future of the Halo series, rumours were swirling that the team had scaled back its Halo Infinite post-launch plans following a series of layoffs over at Microsoft. However, new reports are suggesting those rumours were false, and that 343's DLC plans were being misreported in the first place.
Over on Twitter, Windows Central's Jez Corden wrote this regarding Halo Infinite "campaign DLC":
"From what I've heard via multiple sources, Halo Infinite's "campaign DLC" never existed beyond conversations. Focus has been entirely on live service."
In short, Corden believes there was never any real single player add-on plans over at 343 Industries, and that a multiplayer live service was always the focus. For now, that focus is indeed all we've seen from the team, as no campaign content has been added since launch.
Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier has posted similar reports over on ResetEra. Schreier says 343 is "focused on multiplayer" and that he doesn't think much extra campaign content was ever planned in the first place.
"I ran these bullet points by a few people. While it's true that 343 is focused on multiplayer, the stuff about campaign DLC being scrapped is false (I don't think there was much of that planned in the first place), and a lot of this is either wrong or just speculation."
We'd have enjoyed more single-player content for Halo Infinite to be honest, but if these reports are true, they're not all that surprising. Halo doesn't have a huge history with single player DLC, outside of the Halo 3 spin-off - Halo 3: ODST.
Would you have liked to play more Halo Infinite campaign content? Let us know!
[source twitter.com, via resetera.com]
Comments 35
This just shows how much disconnect 343i has with the halo fanbase. Taking 6 years to continue the master chief storyline while preparing a game that is supposed to last 10 more years means a 16 year gap with one halo campaign. Halo is never going to be the top multiplayer game again. That ship has sailed. It needs to have both a strong multiplayer and a continuous campaign story if they want it to remain relevant.
Considering the year long delay and the panicked scramble to patch it up and produce content I didn't expect campaign dlc would have been shifted to the way, way back burner
@SplooshDmg getting destiny flashbacks for all the ten year plans.
It's official, they killed Halo.
Halo is dead, long live MCC... Till they ruin that too.
Ugh. This feels like the cliff hanger at the end of Heroes: Reborn we will never get to see. Lol
I don't remember any Halo having a Campaign DLC, but I might be wrong. Did 343i promised it?
I think people confuse their 'long term' plan for Halo Infinite to mean that it will also have to include Story content to keep it going. The start of a '10 yr' plan was interpreted to mean that they expected 'Halo:Infinite' to last 10yrs before any sequel came out.
The way Halo:Infinite is, its a F2P MP game which could have a 10yr plan to keep it going as long as possibly as the 'Halo' MP for the entire generation with 'no' plans to make another 'Halo' game with yet another MP suite when they can build upon HI's MP suite and, if they want, add Single Player content or make something different, something 'new' and still cater to Halo's MP community.
At the end of the day, I doubt 343 would have decided to make 'additional' Single Player content having had to get what they did up to a 'playable' state and then spend 'months' trying to get certain features working - like co-op campaigns, Forge etc so 'starting' on SP DLC would not be the best use of their resources.
I do think that '10yr' plan is what has lead to assumptions being made about what that means for the game and concluded that it can't last that long without additional SP content so must be 'like' Destiny with expected SP DLC as well as MP content too but maybe they were trying to say the 'MP' will be supported for 10yrs so they don't have to keep making a 'new' MP with 'every' full length Campaign when it could just be updated with new maps, modes etc over a longer time leaving them 'free' to focus on SP only games as a small team keeps HI MP content and updates coming. There was once talk of the MP and Campaign releasing separately at one point and Sony seem to be splitting MP from Last of Us 2 with their 'Factions' MP expected separately.
Well yeah, that seems to be the case. People just look for reasons to be upset, it seems.
Ugh 😑 was really looking forward to more campaign
@BAMozzy It's not that people are confused. It's that Microsoft underdelivered. They may not have used the term DLC but they said Halo Infinite would be a platform for telling several Halo stories. Seems like we are getting one story.
😂😂😂
Joke of business Microsoft.
There is only one guarantee Microsoft can make about their Xbox business model and new company Xbox slogan.
“ THIRD FOR LIFE”
"Never Existed". lol. Go away 343.
Jeez, all the MS news getting thrown around this month… Man, @kaloudz is right. The end of the campaign seemed like it was obviously designed for campaign extensions for that 10 year plan they kept talking about. Halo Infinite being financed with a mp only plan for 10 years… wow… I can’t imagine how much of a flop the game must feel like for Xbox. But hey, at least we’re getting Oreo themed skins, right?
@Kaloudz I mean, this news sort of recontextualizes the good will I had toward Infinite’s campaign. I felt like it was an excellent start to the adventure before. Now, though, now I sort of feel like it was an incomplete experience with a fun gameplay loop and neat, but limited open world. It’s hard to find any good news in the Xbox space these days. The Oreo themed skins are real, by the way.
https://www.purexbox.com/news/2023/01/xbox-is-releasing-new-halo-infinite-forza-horizon-5-sea-of-thieves-skins-thanks-to-oreo
The rumored BR is almost certainly an imaginary thing in the fans’ minds as well. Just… what… were… they… thinking. I’m at a loss right now. Lol.
343i: Halo is here to stay! With epic stories continuing MC's saga, and great multiplayer!
343i: We never planned on more story campaigns for the next 10 years. We're all about multiplayer content.
343i: Well, we don't really have much multiplayer content to add, we "planned" it but it'll come later.
343i: Why was our budget and staff cut from us?
@SplooshDmg The more we hear about the 10 year "plan", it sounds more like a "10 year goal" than a plan.
I mean I plan to be a millionaire in 10 years. Do I have any plan, process, steps, designs, or even ability to do that? No. But it's a 10 year plan. I'll figure out how as soon as I get split screen working.
@somnambulance Even at its best, we were looking at an "episodic" Halo experience...which still sounded like a mediocre plan. So we have at worst, an incomplete stand-alone campaign, and at best episodic Halo without an actual plan or episode 2 happening in the near future, and a halo multiplyer F2P GaaS they forgot to actually put the G into the aaS.....
@Kaloudz What's the depressing part, the lack of plans, the lack of episodes, or the Master Chef snack pack?
I'm looking forward to the Halo Infinite Charmin skins. But before that maybe we'll have Halo Infinite The Last of Us skins lol
@Kaloudz Of course 343 will only include Abby themed skins on the latter.
Maybe we can just settle on Halo Infinite Forspoken skins with an exclusive "bird flip" emote.
@NEStalgia @Kaloudz It’s not about reading between the lines. We’re all fools for doing exactly that! We should have just read the lines and taken them at face value! Lol. If any game ever felt distinctively designed to have expansions and perhaps episodic content, not since the first Life is Strange title did I feel any game matched the model more. Even if it felt unusual, I sort of liked the idea that they were potentially doing something unique with the GAAS model… but no, the fan backlash against Monster Energy skins turned into fan backlash into the multiplayer in general which turned into Oreo skins because, man, does 343 need snacks!
I hear you on MP. I used to be actually am-pro level by the time Halo 4 came out, but I just get frustrated playing mp now. After not playing a competitive online shooter (excluding Overwatch) from Halo 4’s heyday to the launch of Black Out on BLOPS 4, I found my competitive ability shriveled up into dust in those years in between and I don’t necessarily have the drive to bring it back unless I’m having a lot of fun. I’m just so darn casual with FPS titles now and the F2P format that they all take sort of keeps me far away. I can play a mean game of Splatoon though. Anyway, I was ready to go for the mantle with Infinite though. I was ready to go for the glory with all of my friends that used to play alongside me, and honestly all still almost exclusively play FPS titles. But then a week passed and we were done. Some went back to Destiny, some went back to Warzone, I went back to playing largely retro and single player titles. The week Halo returned. What a week that was.
@somnambulance "The week Halo returned. What a week that was."
LOL! I'm with you on Splatoon though. Literally the only MP game I play. At all. Part of it is because no voice chat though so it's just fun gameplay.
@SplooshDmg I agree on all the good will being lost. They were doing great and had solid momentum, then ABK happened and it all went to pot. The good games are still coming, I mean they own half the world's RPGs at this point. Bethesda gonna' Bethesda. Obsidian will Bethesda better than Bethesda and Bioware better than Bioware like they've always done. But I like Phil, and he's definitely good on intent with delivering what people want, but he says a lot of things that just make no sense. "I have a good feeling about Halo" (right before they punted it for a year then launched it incomplete), etc, etc, etc. Now he just hypes PlayStation and indies that are on Game Pass most of the time lol. You can't always keep Microsoft out of Microsoft's way, but Sonytendo's been so abusive you still can't help but like MS still.
@SplooshDmg Once you're in the tank for $3500 hardware you have to upgrade every other year to keep up, though, is there really a difference?
Lol.
No mixed messages then.
GaaS you say…..
They always go down real well….
@SplooshDmg Yeah, I used to tell myself that all the time
Honestly, if true it is bad. I don't know why they wouldn't do three or four campaign DLCs for Infinite and then release a definitive version with everything after. Whatever. I felt 343 Industries was OK with Halo, now it is just plain mishandling it.
It was definitely planned, this is either miscommunication or gaslighting. I remember them talking about the ongoing stories using your multiplayer spartan and not master chief. It sounded kind of like Halo 4 Spartan Ops.
@SplooshDmg yep, I kept telling myself that
@grumpypotato but doomguy already have a family after all he part of the Blazkowicz bloodline 😅
@Kaloudz 343 is such a baffling company. They have an apologize/hype PR cycle or something that never seems to end. Lol.
For me, I feel like I never play FPS titles anymore, but miss the genre. I think either Halo Infinite or Deathloop was the last FPS I’ve played to completion… man, Atomic Heart can’t come soon enough!
Yeah, I know what you mean. I get that warrior instinct too. I feel I can’t lose to a 13 year old. It feels wrong. Lol.
@Kaloudz I stomped my siblings into dust with games. Lol. I’m the eldest and definitely most invested into games. My son and daughter thought… I can’t wait for them to catch up to me. Lol.
I really enjoyed Deathloop. It’s on Gamepass, so it’s not much risk to try it. It’s got a 70’s aesthetic in look, but that’s about it. The level design is absolutely fantastic. I did feel the characters were a bit annoying, but I do love good gameplay and Deathloop has it in spades. Plus it’s meta-commentary on the FPS genre. It’s a smart game.
Translation: 343i effort to be honest "never existed" .
Please tell me snickerdoodle one staff that was fired.
@Kaloudz My son is five and my daughter is one. She wants to play so badly and meanwhile he does play badly. Lol. But… eh, he doesn’t get the benefit of the Game Genie like I did! I just know they’ll both have skill in time though. For me, I can’t wait for Goldeneye to release because that’ll bring my whole family together, as far as siblings go. It’s weird watching kids play games. It seems they magically get better at intervals.
@Kaloudz The thing that drives me insane is watching my son deliberately jump off a level over and over again. I’ve noticed that Minecraft is probably the most boring game in the world to watch a child play, but he’s actually developed a lot of skill just mucking about it creative mode. I’ve noticed he has more difficulty with 2D games than 3D games too, which is odd to me, since I’d figure 2D is simpler. For my daughter, I’ve let her “play” already, but she pretty much gets to “play” Flower and that’s it.
You’re definitely right that coaching a kid to play games can be something else! Your daughter’s got 7 years of experience now though. Give her two more years and she’s coming for you. Lol. What type of games does she play?
@Kaloudz It’s all about Minecraft, Mario, and Sonic for my son. He likes to “play” Psychonauts too, but usually that means someone else is playing stretches of the game, but at least he gets to hold the controller during the cutscenes. He’s been getting into Ratchet and Clank recently too. He tried The Pathless this past weekend and I could see that being his next game though. My daughter… it’s too soon. She seems to really want to play the Switch more than anything.
I’m thankful my kids haven’t picked up a Youtube habit. You have my sympathy. Lol.
@Kaloudz Lol. I hope I can hide from it as long as possible. Most of his friends are much older than him due to the neighborhood we live in, and thankfully they bond more over games than YouTube. I swear, it’s the most fascinating thing watching a group of like eight or nine kids aged from 1-12 just sitting together, watching each other play Minecraft. It’s frankly baffling for me.
You know, the aesthetics don’t really do it for me with Psychonauts either. The storyline is solid and the levels are really inventive visually. But it’s also one of the few games my wife has played solo and my son liked watching it. I think it’s a solid game, but perhaps a bit overrated. That could just be me not really liking the art style much though. Gameplay’s not as tight as I’d like for a platformer either. It feels more like a solid 3D indie platformer in the vein A Hat in Time or Yooka Laylee (which are good, don’t get me wrong) than it feels like Mario or Banjo. I can see a third title getting to that quality though with the MS budget instead of the indie budget they originally had.
@Kaloudz Hey, it’s no sweat to me. 2023 seems like the wrong year for backlog gaming at the moment anyway. The Developer Direct got me in a better place with where things are on Xbox. Hi-Fi Rush looks like a better priority to have, in my opinion. Jeez, we’re getting spoiled with an exclusive on each of the big three consoles this week. I’m honoring my two year old Forspoken preorder before I jump on anything else, but man I feel like I need to take a long vacation from work to prepare to have time for Hogwarts Legacy with all the greatness 2023 has to offer.
Deathloop though, I gotta say, as an FPS fan, you should think about it. They don’t use the lingo from the 70’s. It’s just the furniture, if you get what I mean. It feels very modern and now, despite the looks. I gave Deathloop an 8/10, but I’m always curious about how people interpret the game.
@Kaloudz I can't come to grips with the enormous hole Infinite left between it and Halo 5 storywise! WTF happened?
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