The long development of Halo has a lot of stories behind it. Bonnie Ross, head of 343 industries had an interview with Ryan McCaffrey recently, and she talked about various topics, including the Halo series. As it turns out, the future of the franchise was uncertain at one point. Also, she revealed that Borderlands 3 developer was considered to create Halo 4.
As you can remember, Bungie separated from Microsoft at one point, which made it unclear whether we would receive another Halo game or not. “When we spun Bungie out, the future of Halo was uncertain. We weren’t actually sure [if] Halo 3 was going to be the last game,” declared Ross.
That would have been a shame, as Halo 3 did have an ambiguous ending, that made it very easy to continue to the story. Most fans were worried about the fate of Master Chief.
Borderlands 3 Developer Considered To Create Halo 4
Ross explained that she tried to create an internal Halo development studio, but not everyone liked this idea. In fact, even Shane Kim, who was the Xbox boss back then, was against this development studio. Robbie Bach also added that it might be better to put an end to Halo since Bungie was out.
“Robbie Bach and Shane Kim were like, ‘Hey, Halo’s great, Bungie doesn’t want to do it anymore.’ Robbie and Shane were not people who were thinking just for the money, but it was basically like, ‘Hey, I think it’s maybe good for another game or two and [then] let’s just cut our losses and tell another story,” added Ross.
Therefore, Microsoft considered having an outside studio create “one or two other games.” The most popular option back then was Gearbox, which is the studio that created Borderlands and works on Borderlands 3. Gearbox is no stranger when it comes to Halo, as it developed the PC edition of Halo: Combat Evolved. Nonetheless, Ross didn’t agree to have an outside studio create a Halo game. Eventually, 343 Industries and Certain Affinity developed Halo 4.
Nora Reynolds is a major in biology and a minor in Biological Basis of Behavior, writing about science in general. She also likes to try new gadgets and sports about the AI new era.