It appears the fallout from Halo Infinite has had a severe impact on developer 343 Industries, as its future with the franchise is brought into question.
While Halo Infinite was the best game in the series to be developed by 343 Industries (who picked up the reins from Bungie after Halo Reach), the lack of support after launch meant it quickly fell from the multiplayer shooter conversation.
Some ex-employees at 343 have blamed Xbox management for the game’s failure, shortly after the team was affected by mass layoffs in 2023. Last year, known Halo insider Bathrobe Spartan suggested 343 was set to be taken off ‘active development’ of the Halo franchise entirely, as it pivots to overseeing work by other third party studios.
That same insider has now shared a new thread on Twitter, about the situation at 343, where he outlines how the studio has been downsized significantly over the past year.
According to Bathroom Spartan, who spoke to 12 ex-employees from 343, there are less than 280 people working at the studio as of May 2024, with roughly ’50 to 60 people let go’ on top of the prior layoffs.
Of those left, only 30% are apparently still working on projects related to game content production, with the rest mainly being ‘business orientated roles and producers’. It’s said the majority of employees have been working on other Xbox studio titles over the past year, with the most Halo Infinite content being handled by contracted studios.
This is said to be reflective of a ‘new production method’ at 343. According to the insider, the studio is now hiring lead positions to manage the concept and pre-production phases on future games, but it will outsource the actual work to other studios – something 343 did with Halo Wars 2 and developer Creative Assembly.
It’s claimed two projects are already underway with two contracted studios, but both are still in the pre-production phase. One is described as a ‘PvP bigger scale orientated project’ in line with Halo Infinite’s legacy, which might be the next mainline Halo game, while the other may be the rumoured remake of the original Halo.
According to the insider’s sources, however, these projects are at least two years away from any official release – so don’t expect to hear anything anytime soon.
This change in approach is described as a cost effective way to ‘help produce content for games at a reliable pace in the future’, in the ‘hope of not reproducing what happened to Halo Infinite’ in regards to production delays.
According to the sources, Halo Infinite did not meet its ‘commercial goals’, which led future content to be cancelled beyond what was already outsourced to other studios – such as the addition of the Forge which came out a year after launch.
While 343 has not officially commented on the situation, it is know that they were badly affected by the general Xbox layoffs from earlier in the year, and they’ve not announced any new project since Halo Infinite’s launch in 2021.
Despite having a strong showcase during Summer Game Fest this year, Microsoft hasn’t had the best time of late – thanks to its confusing changes to Xbox Game Pass – although it has been hinting that it will have a lot to talk about at Gamescom next month.
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