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Halo Infinite Creative Director Leaves Company [Update: Lead Producer on Campaign leaves as well]

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Ocarina_117

Ocarina_117

Member
Oct 26, 2017
9,562
We are over a year out from this games release.

Microsoft haven't been about showing g
Bulby said:
"as a result, we got Cortana's story told with its raw emotional intensity. "

I dont wanna make a massive deal about this. But its literally the worst thing about Halo's campaign since Bungie left. This melodramatic, trying to be emotional crap. Its just bad.
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Cortana's story and its impact on Chief was the best part if the Halo 4 story!

I wish it was the main focus rather than the Didact and Librarian stuff.

Also that ending 😢

I hope Infinite follows on from 4's more introspective themes as opposed to whatever was going on in Halo 5.
 
VeePs

VeePs

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 25, 2017
17,357
Papacheeks said:
I just hope everything else he didn't have his hands in with infinite is going smoothly. Because we don;t have any footage to go on. December will show us at least how multiplayer is, Which going by how well 5's was accepted I Doubt there to be drastic changes unless that too was scrapped to way back to more old school halo?
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MP is a huge division in the fanbase. So... it's going to be interesting lol. I think 343 has stated they were happy with the way MP was in Halo 5 but they know they didn't deliver with the Campaign.

I did enjoy Halo 5s MP, but a good chunk of the fanbase wants the more traditional Halo gameplay back.

I have no idea how 343i should proceed on the mp front, and if any 343 dev is reading this good luck!
 
khamakazee

khamakazee

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
3,937
I'm hoping this doesn't mean development moving forward is going to be greatly impacted.

Saint-14 said:
Now this is a lie, there have been absolutely nothing about reconstructuring causing TLoU II delay, they simply couldn't make it this year.
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Saint-14 said:
Which isn't the same thing as you were claiming, they were trying to make the game in an unrealistic time and it wasn't possible.
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Question, are you even interested in Halo Infinite?
 
Outrun

Outrun

Member
Oct 30, 2017
5,782
Sankara said:
I remember when a bunch of leads left the Mass Effect Andromeda team mid-development. A bunch of people were all "no worries, this is perfectly normal, people always leave, the script is finished". And you all know how that ended up...

Same form of damage control by emotionally invested fans with Anthem.

It's never a good sign when lead creators leave, especially when it's something we haven't ever really seen.
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Here's the thing though.

Halo 4 and 5 were better games than Anthem or ME:A

One person leaving is not going to blow up the team.
 
headfallsoff

headfallsoff

Member
Mar 16, 2018
681
xeecee said:
look i like halo a lot and also don't see this news as a 100% clearly negative thing but i don't know if "last time this happened we got halo 4's weird cortana stuff!" is the example i'd want to use to calm people down
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Guys it's not the end of the world! Last time this happened we only completely blew our shot at making New Halo interesting and released a game that everyone hated!
 
Betty

Betty

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
17,604
Ocarina_117 said:
We are over a year out from this games release.

Microsoft haven't been about showing g

Cortana's story and its impact on Chief was the best part if the Halo 4 story!

I wish it was the main focus rather than the Didact and Librarian stuff.

Also that ending 😢

I hope Infinite follows on from 4's more introspective themes as opposed to whatever was going on in Halo 5.
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It was the main story, her rampancy was the driving force behind Halo 4.

Her missing was the main driving force in Halo 5 for Chief going hunting for her and the federation going after Chief

Her now being the main villain will likely be the driving force behind Infinite.

She is being overburdened with being the entire centre of the Halo universe and it's making the narrative so, so boring.
 
Welfare

Welfare

Prophet of Truth - You’re my Numberwall
Member
Oct 26, 2017
5,912
Oh God, Halo dad.

Fucking 4 years of dev and now they want to shake things up.

If it truly came down to it, Halo Infinite won't be delayed, so we pretty much have to just sit on our hands and wait.
 
Papacheeks

Papacheeks

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,620
Watertown, NY
op_ivy said:
serious question, what role would a creative director have at almost 4 years into a 5 year development? if you were thinking about leaving due to reasons entirely unrelated to the development of the title you are working on, wouldnt this be the time?
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It depends on the structure of the studio honestly. I remember when Cory left after god of war 2, stig stepped up and became creative director. He had worked besides cory and Jaffe for both games so he was very comfortable and versed for what that entailed.

Usually reasons why they would leave depend on if Lee had a lot of input and co-directed the studio with Longo. If that latter is true then yea tim could leave with very little impact on the development for the most part. Similar how people like Bruce left after uncharted 4, i believe he worked with Druckman before he left on outlining story elements for Last of us 2.

It all honestly depends on what role LEE has had, if he worked close if not along side Longo then things will keep on trucking without issues. If Longo had last say and was directing until people higher than he intervened for Lee to take over then it's a different story.
 
efr

efr

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account
Banned
Jun 19, 2019
2,893
khamakazee said:
I'm hoping this doesn't mean development moving forward is going to be greatly impacted.




Question, are you even interested in Halo Infinite?
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To the poster you're responding to's credit, Naughty Dog does make other games besides TLOU. 343 has only worked on Halo as far as I know.
 

Liam

Member
Oct 25, 2017
74
Papacheeks said:
Well they are also 500 strong correct? I think at most during final production naughty dog is like what 300?
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linkedin says naughty dog has 518 employes and 343 industries 502, both probably have a little bit more employes. and 343 said is avoiding church and taking things slowly, so who knows really.
 
Ryan.

Ryan.

Prophet of Truth
The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
12,876
People keep saying not worry and I would love to be proven wrong come launch, but I have my reasons not to hold my breath.
 
Betty

Betty

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
17,604
Outrun said:
You ever played Halo 4?
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It's pretty accurate actually.

343 are gifted the rare opportunity to start a whole new chapter in Halo and just focus everything on Cortana and end up leaning on the Covenant too much while the new enemies introduced are some of the worst in the series.
 
jem

jem

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,757
Scullibundo said:
Wait, what?

I thought the general (correct) consensus was that it was largely trash. Pretty, vacuous, trash with bad fan fiction pandering and hollow combat encounters.
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There's always a vocal minority who hate anything.

In reality the game reviewed well and is generally considered to be pretty good. A fair number consider the game to have one of the best stories in the series.
 
dodo

dodo

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,997
jem said:
There's always a vocal minority who hate anything.

In reality the game reviewed well and is generally considered to be pretty good. A fair number consider the game to have one of the best stories in the series.
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I'm being flippant about 4 because I love halo, not because I hate it. I don't think 4's campaign was good. The story took itself far too seriously and ruined characters I previously quite liked. the more linear structure is antithetical to what i think is important about halo's gameplay. the soundtrack was a huge step down. the multiplayer was full of questionable design decisions. the nicest thing i can say about halo 4 is that it looked stunning at the time, but that's pretty low on my list of priorities for halo. i certainly don't dislike halo 4 because i'll "hate anything" lmao

again, i don't think the creative director leaving is inherently bad news, i just think that using halo 4 as an example of it going just fine for a series previously does not inspire confidence in me.
 
Outrun

Outrun

Member
Oct 30, 2017
5,782
Betty said:
It's pretty accurate actually.

343 are gifted the rare opportunity to start a whole new chapter in Halo and just focus everything on Cortana and end up leaning on the Covenant too much while the new enemies introduced are some of the worst in the series.
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Equating an on-rails shooter to Halo is not accurate at all, in my opinion.

I liked the more intimate story of H4. It was a nice change after saving the galaxy.
 
DocH1X1

DocH1X1

Banned
Apr 16, 2019
1,133
Halo 4 Metacritic at 87. But honestly by this thread you would have thought it was 63....
 
jem

jem

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,757
xeecee said:
I'm being flippant about 4 because I love halo, not because I hate it. I don't think 4's campaign was good. The story took itself far too seriously and ruined characters I previously quite liked. the more linear structure is antithetical to what i think is important about halo's gameplay. the soundtrack was a huge step down. the multiplayer was full of questionable design decisions. the nicest thing i can say about halo 4 is that it looked stunning at the time, but that's pretty low on my list of priorities for halo. i certainly don't dislike halo 4 because i'll "hate anything" lmao
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Good for you.
 
DoradoWinston

DoradoWinston

Member
Apr 9, 2019
6,109
i ask myself every time why i bother clicking on these threads.

This isnt a brand new team, A team working on a new IP or even a reboot. Best of luck to the man but the train isnt gonna suddenly collapse a year away from the goal line.
 
Zeouter

Zeouter

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,605
Ireland
Personally I think hype goggles were real with some of those reviews.

Big shifts a few years in maybe feel like a pattern for 343.
They go in a direction, it gets to about 2 years to ship time and something dramatically shifts.

Payton & Halo 4.
Longo joining & poncho chief disappearing, Locke being emphasized.

But easy to read into these things.
 
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Complicated

Complicated

Member
Oct 29, 2017
3,333
Bulby said:
"as a result, we got Cortana's story told with its raw emotional intensity. "

I dont wanna make a massive deal about this. But its literally the worst thing about Halo's campaign since Bungie left. This melodramatic, trying to be emotional crap. Its just bad.
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Cortana melodrama has been a heavy part of the franchise since Halo 2 at least. You could easily argue it's present in Halo CE as well. 343 just added actual character development to the mix in Halo 4. The series has been described as a space opera ad nauseum since its debut, so complaining about melodrama comes off as a bit bizarre.
 
Neil98

Neil98

Member
May 2, 2018
2,042
Madrid, Spain
Why does this always happen to Microsoft games? It is also with the most promising Microsoft game I've seen since Scalebound... Let's see how this eventually turns out. At least Master Chief Collection is amazing at the current time of speaking.
 
Ominym

Ominym

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,068
DestroyerOfWorlds said:
That's okay. Games aren't made by a single person. I'm sure it will still turn out well.
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Yeah, it's pretty alarming how common the auteur theory is in video game development. Lots of people work on a game, many people leave and join without so much as a word, plenty of whom had great ideas (and bad ones) that influenced games you have played and will play. It'll be okay.

Not to mention this particular game has been in development a long time. At a certain point you can't be expected to put your career on hold for a deliverable; especially if a good opportunity comes your way.
 
TheHunter

TheHunter

Bold Bur3n Wrangler
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
25,774
xeecee said:
I'm being flippant about 4 because I love halo, not because I hate it. I don't think 4's campaign was good. The story took itself far too seriously and ruined characters I previously quite liked. the more linear structure is antithetical to what i think is important about halo's gameplay. the soundtrack was a huge step down. the multiplayer was full of questionable design decisions. the nicest thing i can say about halo 4 is that it looked stunning at the time, but that's pretty low on my list of priorities for halo. i certainly don't dislike halo 4 because i'll "hate anything" lmao

again, i don't think the creative director leaving is inherently bad news, i just think that using halo 4 as an example of it going just fine for a series previously does not inspire confidence in me.
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If you say you like Reach I'm gonna slap you.
 
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