All future Halo games will be developed in Unreal Engine 5, and will be created by a new studio at Xbox, sort of. Xbox announced on Sunday night, during the Halo World Championships, that developer 343 Industries will be changing its name to Halo Studios to signify a “new dawn” for the Halo franchise.
In addition, it was revealed that Halo Studios has multiple games in development.
“If you really break Halo down, there have been two very distinct chapters. Chapter 1 – Bungie. Chapter 2 – 343 Industries,” studio head Pierre Hintze said. “Now, I think we have an audience which is hungry for more. So we’re not just going to try improve the efficiency of development, but change the recipe of how we make Halo games. So, we start a new chapter today.”
As part of that change, Halo games will no longer use the Slipspace Engine that was created specifically for Halo Infinite. This opens up developers to work on the new games as opposed to simply upkeep the engine itself. The move to Unreal Engine 5 for Halo will allow for better development games for fans thanks to the benefits the engine offers developers.
“Respectfully, some components of Slipspace are almost 25 years old,” said studio art director Chris Matthews via Xbox Wire. “Although 343 were developing it continuously, there are aspects of Unreal that Epic has been developing for some time, which are unavailable to us in Slipspace – and would have taken huge amounts of time and resources to try and replicate.”
“We had a disproportionate focus on trying to create the conditions to be successful in servicing Halo Infinite,” Hintze said. “[But switching to Unreal] allows us to put all the focus on making multiple new experiences at the highest quality possible.”
As far as the new games in development, Halo Studios says they’ll release when the company feels they’re at the right state to be released.
What do you think of the changes at the former 343 Industries, now Halo Studios? Does the move of Halo to Unreal Engine 5 have you excited about its future? Join the discussion below or at the official Insider Gaming Forums.
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