Halo's Longtime Franchise Director Has Left Microsoft

Good riddance!

@grumpypotato Nah. Microsoft is finally stepping and righting the ship. First Bonnie Ross, then Kiki Wolfkill, and now Frank O'Connor. Everyone who has been responsible for the failure of the halo franchise is now being shown the door.

EDIT: He responsible for bullcrap like: It's kind of like porn," "You know it when you see it."; We had people who we hired who hated Halo because of 'X,'”; Created the character mister chief who criticized player for not liking req packs.

Winds of change...

Change 343's name and let them work on something fresh.
Give Halo a rest for a few years.
Once people few nostalgic and start clamoring for Halo, remake/reimagine the original trilogy and then take Halo 4 in a completely new direction.

On one hand it is the logical time for people to leave a project when the franchise is only supporting the infinite title. The future is also uncertain for the franchise and it might be appealing to make something else their next project.

On the other hand it seems that the Halo franchise is getting a complete overhaul. Not really sure where it goes from here. Will the fresh talent go in a bold new direction or try to stay true to the old favorites? Personally, I'm down for either. Reboot it, continue it, get away from master chief/ cortana. They can really go anywhere from here.

My hope is the next Halo game takes place away from Master Chief. Different part of the wars, different characters or just a different style of game.

Another day, another high level member of a Microsoft studio leaves.

In other news, Halo just left Halo. More details at noon.

Fresh new minds new to work on Halo and bring it up to a new standard and even reboot the series. Problem is Halo still has a decent size following that wants halo to look and play like the first 3, any change good or bad will be met with backlash. Hence Halo infinite going back to its roots of play and style. I have said this one this site many times before. Halo infinite is a very solid game, it is just missing maps and content to keep players engaged and has some technical issues to iron out. But overall i still gave it a 8 out of 10 and played the multiplayer for a little over 100 hours. But 100 hours of the same 3-4 maps tires quickly. Now for those that flat out disliked the game well i ain’t here to change your opinion. But i viewed the game as a early success for the studio and IP, but quickly learned the content and updates were no where to be found and that turned me off and i have played maybe 15 matches of season 3. Still pretty fun but overall i think it’s time to reboot it and have new devs come in and give it new love. Xbox is simply better with a great Halo game and even if it ain’t your game, you should want Xbox to have a great Halo experience.

@somnambulance i was about to tag you to this article haha

@Green-Bandit they need younger blood that grew up with the franchise to direct halo . These guys are jaded and now out of touch with halo.

it’s crazy how they can’t get the look of halo down either , just take CE remastered and build from there .

also infinite is trash . can’t really even put it in the same category as halo 1-reach .

it’s in the same group with 4/5 coincidence? i think not 😂

@nomither6 i agree there is some out of touch with this series, but i also think there is a non roadmap to producing the game. Every story i heard was no teams agreeing on direction and even not talking and working together as a team. That alone makes game development an uphill battle and this showed from the beginning and hasn’t gotten much better. I still like the gunplay and mechanics of the game. I still find some enjoyment in Halo Infinite, but overall to me it is a big miss and needs new direction and a new team that knows what they want to create and work together to see it become it’s best from start to finish. I don’t expect to see anything from Halo for a while as they shift talent around and probably just add onto Infinite. But i hope to see whatever it is they have planned next to be a big hit. I have always been a much bigger Gears of War fan than Halo, but i want to see Xbox have a great Halo game on it’s console even if it will no longer be played by nearly as many players as a Fortnite or Apex.

I never liked Frank's direction of 343. I remember him saying a while ago that he hired alot of people who didn't like Halo and hated aspects of Halo, instead of you know, hiring people who love the franchise and are super passionate. Always seems like a really wierd decision, especially bragging about it.

@Green-Bandit halo infinite can still be saved , waiting forever for the next halo i dont think is ideal. hell, look how long youre waiting for gears 6 !

@Utena-mobile that was pretty evident with halo 5, atleast infinite has a foundation though to say the least

Fantastic news. He was a bad egg

@BBB haha! Awesome! Always look on the bright side of life... 😄

Who's even left at 343?

The words "rats" and "sinking" come to mind.

Poor Halo. MS have not taken the restructuring chance to draw a line under 343's sorry reign and give the franchise to better hands.
Simply watching more and more old hands leave is doing nothing at all to take the title back to where it should be.
I appreciate that some people have enjoyed infinate, but I'm not one of them and completing that dismal campaign will go down as one of my worst gaming experiences in an entire life of enjoying and playing games. I tried very hard as the fundemental mechanics were so right.
We can only hope a reboot puts it back at th top of the pile.

This is fantastic news! Frank O’Connor can pretty much be tied to the downfall of Halo post-Bungie through his public statements.

So glad Microsoft cleared house. I don’t think Infinite will ever regain popularity but it certainly won’t get worse.

Just looking at the History of Video Games, especially those IP's that have lasted more than a decade, the vast majority have not been negatively impacted by losing their 'Original' developers, creators or writers.

Tomb Raider, Doom, Wolfenstein, Fallout etc are all made by different people today than those that created them. I know Doom is still at id Software - but most, if not all that created Doom no longer work at id. Tomb Raider too has been made by various different Studios, different lead writers, directors etc and arguably had its 'best' sales when made by Crystal Dynamics and Published by SE - not Eidos.

A lot of 'creatives' want to 'create' new projects, new ideas so move to set up their 'own' or take-over a studio - Jade Redmond, Amy Hennig, Vince Zampella, Glen Schofield, John Carmack, John Romero etc etc

Part of the Problem with Halo is that it hasn't 'evolved' that much from the early days. When Halo launched, the FPS genre was still in its infancy. Goldeneye was a 'success' but on PC, Arena Shooters like Quake and Doom were 'king'. Halo brought the FPS MP to console and a bit more 'evolved' than the arena shooters so became a success. Even during the 360 era, there was games all trying to be the 'Halo Killer' - even Sony had Killzone and Resistance but it was the more 'grounded' CoD that killed Halo. CoD had to evolve during the last gen cycle - they tried Advanced Movement but it was PUBG and the Battle Royale format that took over - so CoD had to 'evolve' and create their own BR, Warzone, to compete and stay 'relevant'. Halo though is still stuck somewhat in the past and hasn't really 'evolved'. Some of that may well be down to not wanting to upset the 'fans' who expect a 'Halo' experience and not alienate them but to me, the MP particularly feels like a 20yr old game - not something 'fresh', exciting. Not something evolved from the 'best' shooters today (like Halo:CE felt like when it launched - an evolution of Goldeneye, Doom, Quake etc).

I also don't think 343 have really been that focussed on the Single Player. 4 was very short, 5 was a 'mess' and Infinite seemed more like Act 1 - not a 'complete' Story. Its the 'ONLY' area they can flex their creativity as the MP is generally an updated version of its predecessor with minor tweaks. Halo has superb lore and Story potential and could easily 'compete' with the 'best' stories in games but seems more a 'secondary' concern behind MP because MP can 'earn' more (Season Passes, MTX, DLC etc) and keep people spending money on that single title.

@Moonglow we're not sure how much Microsoft is to blame but a pretty consistent theme coming from ex-343 staff is that higher ups were a big issue.

I think in general 343 are turning it around now. They definitely have some passionate team members who want to deliver. Even to people like Frank O'Connor, Bonnie Ross and Kiki Wolfkill I wish success in the future. I think they have passion and drive but I think that it would have been better served in a new IP not Halo.

I'm ok with this. O'Connor was just one of those guys lucky enough be at right place, right time, got picked by default. Really no one special. Really not even qualified to hold that position.

If he never worked at official Xbox magazine, probably still be reviewing games for some lesser known website, trying to get by in life. Are tons of more qualified people do that job than Frank.

@nomither6 Agreed, i hope they can turn infinite around and get it loads of good maps and modes, not sure the player count will be there for it, but at least it will be there for the fans that want it. Yeah been waiting on Gears 6 for a long time and even more than Gears 6 i just want the first 3 in a collection using UE5. I don’t see that happening anytime soon, nor my Red Dead 2 next gen update.

@somnambulance As they should. Next best move would be to fire outright that hypocrite snickerdoodle. She's without a doubt the biggest Karen they ever had from start of her employment at 343i.

Getting rid of that deadweight be huge boost to trying turn halo around.

@BAMozzy To your point about infinite seeming like act 1, you are correct. Pretty sure you already know was supposedly planned for "next 10 years".

What does that 10 year elevator pitch sound like? If anyone said destiny, you won the prize. What game was bungie heavily involved in before destiny? If you guessed halo, congratulations on your two prizes today.

343i is basically the wannabe bungie farm team. At least how I see it.

@GuyinPA75 That, coupled with the 'disaster' it was looking like it could be, so cutting a LOT of content to focus on polishing and improving that one big area so that it at least runs and/or looks improved certainly didn't help either.

Soon after that E3 game-play demo, a LOT of content was 'cut' so they could focus on optimising and improving a 'smaller' section - less work and more realistically achievable to at least get something out in time...

This is a good move, and a step in the right direction

@BAMozzy its so much halo can do to keep up. they just need enthusiastic new blood

Truly disgraceful what MS allowed to happen with this franchise and Frank O'Connor played no small part in it spiraling downward. Unfortunately the only studio I'd trust to save the series is now Sony owned and even if it wasn't I'm still not completely sure the new Bungie could fix things. Starting to think it might just be best to let Halo end and make DOOM the new flagship exclusive FPS for the Xbox brand.