Will Halo use Unreal Engine instead? This is what we do know.

Slipspaced.

 

What you must understand
According to a recent allegation from YouTuber Sean W, Halo Infinite’s battle royale, known as “Tatanka,” is moving to the Unreal Engine and might potentially use Halo itself.
Earlier this year, we exclusively unveiled Tatanka as a “battle royale-lite” Halo game intended to draw in new players.
Since Bonnie Ross, the franchise’s leader, left, many fans have been wondering whether Microsoft’s premier shooter series will change course at all.
We’ve been looking into Sean W’s rumours for the past week, and we think we may be able to confirm some of them.
According to recent reports, which we can at least tentatively confirm in part, Halo Infinite may be about to take a significant turn.

 

We exclusively disclosed last year that 343i and partner studio Certain Affinity were working on a battle royale-style mode for Halo Infinite, code-named Tatanka. After the leak, CA issued a statement reiterating its deeper dedication to the Halo series. As recently as last week, the company claimed that Halo Infinite is now the subject of “significant effort.”

 

Recently, there have been some problems with Halo Infinite. A lot of things about the live service have been lacking, and 343i has found it difficult to resume the essential rate of updates that live service shooters typically enjoy in rival games like Fortnite, Valorant, and Apex Legends. This week also sees the release of Overwatch 2, adding to the pressure on Halo Infinite to stay up.

 

The eagerly anticipated Forge mode of the game will launch later this year, but its third season of content has been postponed until Spring 2023, and season four will follow organically after that. Halo Infinite’s internal Slipspace Engine has been cited as the main cause of the game’s ongoing development in chats with 343i employees who wished to stay secret. The launch status of Slipspace’s developer tools was referred to as “non-existent” by two different sources. Contractors and new 343i employees were forced to deal with a “complex” engine that lacked adequate documentation and pipeline maturity, according to descriptions. Therefore, these new rumours might not be all that shocking.

 

YouTuber Sean W uploaded a video last week explaining some Halo Infinite rumours he’s heard, along with some conjecture on what might happen going ahead. Fundamentally, Sean W’s research said that Halo’s Tatanka battle royale mode might switch to the Unreal Engine. This might potentially entail abandoning a lot of the already completed work on Slipspace if it wasn’t there before.

 

I initially dismissed the report. It didn’t make much sense to abandon more than two years of work on Tatanka to switch to a new engine, but after chatting with Sean W and conducting my own research, it’s becoming clearer and clearer that Tatanka is either abandoning Slipspace or was never on Slipspace in the first place.

 

I learned from the initial Tatanka leak earlier this year that the game was planned to feature the Forge user-generated content tools from Halo Infinite as well as advancement from Halo Infinite itself. On the surface, changing it to a new engine could seem inconsistent with the design objective of merging Halo Infinite content, which would continue to exist on a completely different engine. However, the information we’ve acquired might point to a more significant shift in the Halo franchise’s course.

 

The Unreal Engine, which powers games like Gears of War, Fortnite, and many more, appears to be in the works for Halo. Along with several of our own sources, Jeremy Penter of ACG and Sean W’s report were all in agreement. Before writing a report, I wanted to get more information in an effort to present a more thorough picture of what is happening with Halo at the moment, but this is what we currently know.

 

Although there are still many unanswered questions regarding the specific strategy, there are some hints that this shift may not only apply to Tatanka but also to the entire franchise as 343i is getting set to look into the franchise’s future. Since Bonnie Ross, the creator of 343i, and David Berger, the architect of Slipspace, are no longer employed by the company, it appears that the studio is ready to investigate fresh approaches to adjusting to the quick rate of change in the shooting service game industry. Moving to a more well-liked engine with sophisticated tools and, perhaps more importantly, a skilled crew of game developers may be the key to determining Halo’s future.

 

But at the moment, it doesn’t appear as though Halo Infinite is actually coming to an end. Forge development as well as Season 3 and Season 4 development are continuing.

 

Reasons why this might be advantageous

 

The live service for Halo Infinite simply wasn’t ready when the game debuted to widespread praise from fans and the media last year. Everyone was willing to give Microsoft the benefit of the doubt despite concerns regarding the comparatively meagre selection of maps, modes, and advancement; after all, the business that invented the concept of a console service game would undoubtedly get Halo Infinite down pat. Right?

 

Today, we are aware that Halo Infinite’s live service was only unprepared. In a market where service games usually have one-month seasons, six-month seasons stand out. New battle passes laden with cosmetics offer a sense of advancement and reward while maintaining the competitive balance. When compared to other similar games, Halo Infinite’s seasonal updates have been somewhat weak, bringing few new maps and features.

 

It has been difficult, to put it mildly, to nail down a clear explanation for why this is. Former game director Chris Lee is held accountable by some of the people I’ve spoken to, whereas studio chief Bonnie Ross is held accountable by others. The Slipspace Engine, however, which has become rather infamous in comments around Halo Infinite for its challenging implementation, is the one constant source of annoyance.

 

From information and chats I’ve had about Tatanka, I know that Halo Infinite was meant to be incorporated into the game, and Certain Affinity was given the source code to create the implementation. Tatanka’s intended gameplay has been partially revealed via leaks in the Halo API, but if the game does switch engines as has been rumoured, it’s really anyone’s guess how much of the original design will be kept.

 

Tatanka might eventually develop to symbolise the next stage of Halo as a totally distinct, standalone experience rather than the continuation of Halo Infinite. Microsoft’s initial idea to combine the Forge mapping tools may fail on a different engine, but they might still be able to incorporate Halo Infinite’s cosmetics by making use of Halo’s social APIs.

 

A few months ago, Microsoft registered the “The Endless” trademark, which appeared to be a possible hint at campaign DLC for Halo Infinite. Although we are unable to confirm anything at this moment, there have been some plausible rumours that The Endless may switch to Unreal Engine as well and become a stand-alone experience in its own right.

 

The overall video game industry uses Unreal Engine extensively, and Microsoft inside teams like The Coalition and Undead Labs have a tonne of expertise with the technologies. While Slipspace is reported to be at best difficult to deal with, Microsoft and Certain Affinity both have internal tools and pipelines for working with the Unreal Engine already created. Since training new employees to utilise tools that virtually no one else in the games business uses creates a speed deficit, Microsoft’s use of contractors could further exacerbate the problems with Slipspace. Speed is crucial in today’s live service game environment.

 

Naturally, I would advise you proceed with caution until we receive any sort of official declaration from Microsoft or some sort of verifiable physical proof. However, as the proverb goes, there is currently a lot of smoke and no fire.