Halo Waypoint

Halo Studios (formerly 343 Industries) is an American video game developer based in Redmond, Washington, part of Xbox Game Studios. Headed by Pierre Hintze, the studio is responsible for the ''Halo'' science fiction franchise, and develops ''Halo'' projects themselves and in collaboration with other studios. Originally named after the ''Halo'' character 343 Guilty Spark, the studio was created in 2007 to oversee the franchise after original ''Halo'' developer Bungie regained its independence from Microsoft.

After co-developing downloadable content for '' Halo: Reach'', Bungie's final ''Halo'' game, 343 Industries released '' Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary'' and ''Halo 4'', the latter starting the studio's " Reclaimer Saga" of the mainline games.

History

Formation

Bungie was a video game developer working on their next project when they were acquired by Microsoft in 2000. Their in-development game, '' Halo: Combat Evolved'', turned into a launch title for Microsoft's Xbox console. Bungie and Microsoft's cultures never meshed, and after the release of ''Halo 2'' Bungie began renegotiating for better profit sharing for their next game, ''Halo 3''. These discussions led to Bungie announcing its independence from Microsoft in 2007. While Bungie was still contracted to deliver new ''Halo'' games, the rights to the franchise remained with Microsoft. Xbox general manager Bonnie Ross recalled that her colleagues felt ''Halo'' was a waning property and looked at contracting an outside company to produce new games; the series's deep backstory and universe appealed to Ross, and she argued for a different approach. Ross' pitch won over Microsoft Game Studios general manager Shane Kim, and she was put in charge of a new internal ''Halo'' studio, 343 Industries, named after the ''Halo'' character 343 Guilty Spark.

343 Industries started with a staff of roughly a dozen people in late 2007. Bungie staffer Frank O'Connor assisted in the transition, and quit Bungie to serve as 343 Industries' franchise director. Ross' vision for ''Halo'' also impressed Microsoft art director Kiki Wolfkill, who joined the team as a studio head. During the transition, 343 Industries worked with the company Starlight Runner to interview Bungie staff and compile a centralized story bible for the universe.

Early projects

In July 2009, it was announced that 343 Industries was working on a seven-part ''Halo'' anime series called ''Halo Legends''. Later that year the studio created Halo Waypoint, a downloadable application that tracks a user's ''Halo'' accomplishments. 343 Industries also increased staff for ''Halo'' development, recruiting staff from the defunct Pandemic Studios. 343 Industries also collaborated with Certain Affinity on ''Halo: Reach''s second and third map packs. The company was responsible for the remastered version of '' Halo: Combat Evolved'', titled '' Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary'', which was released on November 15, 2011, to celebrate the 10th year since the release of the first franchise installment on November 15, 2001.

Reclaimer saga

Following Bungie's completion of their last Halo title, ''Halo: Reach'', 343 Industries was eventually given complete control of the ''Halo'' franchise including servers and data on March 31, 2012. The studio's development of ''Halo 4'', which began in 2009, was completed in September. It was released on November 6, 2012, as the first title of a new ''Halo'' Reclaimer Trilogy which will include at least two more installments over the years. At E3 2013, Microsoft and 343 Industries announced the next "Halo" installment set for release on the Xbox One. Shortly after the announcement, the Reclaimer Trilogy was confirmed by Microsoft Studios corporate vice-president Phil Spencer to be expanded into a Reclaimer Saga. The following year at E3 2014, the official title was revealed as "Halo 5: Guardians" along with plans for its release on October 27, 2015. Microsoft, in a contract with Mega Bloks, is in conjunction with 343 Industries to manufacture a new line of toys and other memorabilia for the upcoming ''Halo'' saga. '' Halo 5: Guardians'' was released on October 27, 2015, with semi-exclusive content to those who purchased select Mega Bloks sets. 343 Industries has since released free monthly content updates since Halo 5's launch.

At E3 2018, Microsoft Studios and 343 Industries announced the next ''Halo'' game, titled ''Halo Infinite'', which was originally scheduled to launch in holiday 2020 for Xbox One and Windows PCs, in addition to being a launch title for the next Xbox console, the Xbox Series X. However, the game was delayed to release in 2021, in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the 343 staff to switch to remote work. ''Infinite'' was the first game to be developed using 343's in-house Slipspace Engine.

Rebranding

After ''Infinite''s release, 343 Industries supported the game via updates. On September 12, 2022, Bonnie Ross announced she would step down as studio head. Following her departure, her responsibilities were split into three positions. Pierre Hintze took over as studio head, Bryan Koski became GM of the franchise and Elizabeth Van Wyck took over business and operations. Amid wider layoffs in the tech industry and Microsoft, 343 Industries was heavily affected, and Bloomberg News reported the studio would be making large changes to its development structure going forward.

In October 2024, 343 Industries announced a rebrand as Halo Studios, amid a shift to Unreal Engine 5 for future project development, moving away from their in-house Slipspace Engine.

Games developed

References

External links

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{{Halo

2007 establishments in Washington (state)
American companies established in 2007
Companies based in Redmond, Washington
First-party video game developers
Microsoft subsidiaries
Video game companies based in Washington (state)
Video game companies established in 2007
Video game development companies
Xbox Game Studios