Halo Online - The Billion Dollar Game?
A lot of sites today are posting about the rumor that the next Bungie project is going to be a Halo game that isn’t Halo 3, but does exist in the Halo universe as more of a prequel. I know what you are thinking, sequels suck but prequels are worse and I agree. This project is being called Forerunner, a refrence to the race of beings that created the Halo rings in the first place. Most sites are calling this pure rumor or speculation. It’s possibly an April fool’s joke.
Now, being that I am the mole and I love to banter about such rumors I have to put my two cents in on what is likely to happen. As you may already have read, I was pretty much right about the PS3 annoucements earlier this week, so maybe I can go 2 for 2 on rumor prediction for the week. Ok here goes:
The next game will be online. MMOFPS if you want to call it that. Let’s just call it Halo Online. Ok, so Halo Online will be all about being a huge multiplayer battleground. The battle will probably be for Earth and the player can pick a side and battle in huge battles - 100+ people trying to take over a base and 100+ people trying to hold the base. Instead of getting tons of XP to level a character as you would in a MMORPG, players will need to carry out missions to get better equipment, tanks, and just more bases. The game will probably launch this fall, let’s say around November or at the very least will be announced at E3. Halo Online will be as big as World of Warcraft and will be Microsoft’s first “billion dollar game.” Don’t be surprised if this game gets 10 million subscribers paying $10-15 a month within the first three years. That would be over a billion dollars a year in revenue.
I know this all sounds a bit crazy, but here is the reasoning. Bungie originally promised huge multiplayer battles and epic battles for earth in Halo 2. That didn’t happen, but I’m sure Bungie tried to make it happen. At the same time World of Warcraft has been making huge waves in the gaming world with it’s 6 million subscribers worldwide paying $15 a month just to play. A couple years ago those kinds of numbers would have been seen as pure insanity, but Blizzard’s near-perfect execution of the MMORPG genre in World of Warcraft made 6 million subscribers a reality. Bungie is one of the few studios who could make the same thing happen to the MMOFPS on a console. After all, Sony and Nintendo pretty much wrote off online console gaming before Halo 2 came out and lauched online console gaming into a viable business. Now even Sony is raving about how the PS3 games are going to be “Live” and online(just like Xbox games have been for the last couple years).
In short, Halo Online is just too big of an opportunity for Microsoft to pass up. It’s a billion dollar idea that if they don’t do they would be completely foolish. The Halo fanbase would go crazy for it and it would be the biggest game of the next generation. If Bungie and Microsoft make Halo Online happen, the Xbox 360 will will the next-generation console war. Period. Not only that, but a version of Halo Online playable on Windows Vista would ensure that gamers who don’t have an Xbox 360 will still upgrade to Vista.
March 16th, 2006 at 2:52 pm
It me the billion dollar idea, but with the rumours we heard before about a Halo MMOFPS and todays news I’m betting that the stuff we heard about today will be the single player, but the single player story ends where the multiplayer begins? Perhaps MC dies and it’s straight up humans versus Covenant? Or else they ready a huge store of Spartens for the fight. With support AI being normal humans and other covenant apart from Elites. Seem like there would be tonnes of design problems to work out though for a Halo MMO. It would probably be the huge battle that you mention but more like those of Battlefield or Joint Ops. If the game did get larger though the maps might not be as well built as they were in Halo 2. Everyone remembers every single corridor of maps like Headlong and Lockout just cause they are so brilliantly made.
March 16th, 2006 at 6:14 pm
Dont you think its a bit extreme to have to pay for Live AND subscribe to Halo Online?? Where does it end?? They should charge me everytime i open my console.
March 16th, 2006 at 6:52 pm
SillyMikey, you make a good point. However, that’s why I wrote $10 or $15. Since people already pay for Live, a subscription to Halo online would need to be cheaper. Possibly $7-10 a month. Right now Xbox Live is about $5 a month, so it wouldn’t be any more expensive than World of Warcraft.
March 16th, 2006 at 8:25 pm
I dont mind paying for a service, but if im gonna pay for a MMO, i shouldnt be paying for Live then. If MMO`s require money for the servers, then what does Live require money for?? Somethings got to give.
March 16th, 2006 at 8:35 pm
SillyMikey, I think what most people are saying is that $15 a month or even $10 a month would be too much. That is probably true and MMO’s have gotten fat these last few years by inflating prices from $7 to $10 to $15. There does need to be a cap on monthly fees, but I think that pretty much any MMO needs some kind of monthly fee to keep all the GM’s paid for all the support services they need to provide. I can’t imagine what it takes Blizzard to keep 6 million subscribers happy enough to keep paying each month. In the case of a console MMO on the Xbox platform, most companies that have talked about doing it talked like the monthly fee would be a bit cheaper. If Halo Online happened, I would expect a $10 per month price point. $5 a month would be too cheap and $15 a month would be too much.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:13 am
The one point of opposition I have to this is that the current success of H2 is due to its online matchmaking, which typically are games of a 5-15 duration of quick combat or objective-seeking. I think that the appeal of ‘quick combat,’ in-and-out, is very popular with large segments of the Halo fanbase.
So, if we throw a MMO into the mix, does this change the dynamic. Is the time-immersion and character development counter to the quick-combat allure of H2 matchmaking?
Bottomline: The MMO sounds very cool (I haven’t played many/any MMOs), but I hope that it is complemented with a lot of what make H2 so good today. I’m not saying I want H2 all over again, but there’s a lot in there that’s gold, and if you retain that, but with next gen graphics, audio, gameplay, AND give me the MMO (when I want it), that’d be a purty thing.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:42 am
Interesting idea Mole and it would be something if they pull it off. But the “4-player co-op” mentioned in the GI article would surely go out of the window in a MMO game….wouldn’t it?
Also we’ve heard from a bungie developer about some amazing AI he’s been developing for what will most likely be halo 3 or Forerunner or whatever its called, I can’t imagine that being incorporated for an MMO? But I supposed it’s possible.
Who knows, I just hope they don’t make a hugh departure from an already winning formula. I can imagine a lot of people wouldn’t bother spending the time with an MMO, all some people wanna do is log in, kill as many people as possible in 10 mins, brag about it afterwards then jump into the next game.
MMO…sheee…getting yer mates around for a halo killfest will never be the same…
March 17th, 2006 at 8:45 am
A cool idea and I would be happy to pay to play this kind of game but it would need to be server based and not use the peer to peer server system used in Halo 2.
I think there would be a big outcry from some sections of the community who are rabidly “why should I have to pay for anything”.
Maybe 2 games - one an offline single player follow up to Halo 2, one this MMOFPS you discuss.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:46 am
I think your “Billion-Dollar-Game” prediction is way off base.
First of all, SOE tried this already with Planetside. Planetside was moderatley successful, it certainly wasn’t any kind of worldwide smash hit.
The PC game market is ten times the size of any single console’s market. The MOST successful of any MMO game, WoW, has still only managed to land six million subscribers. If the 360 manages to sell 35 million consoles in the next three years, do you REALLY think a full third of their market is going to pay extra on top of their live service to play an action game online? It would never happen. They may be able to hit a higher percentage of their market than the PC market, but you’re still looking at a 1-2% saturation rate, leaving MS lucky if they get 2 million subscribers.
I agree that it’s probably a good idea. An MMOFPS would be a fun game and we’ll probably see one on the 360, but I somehow find it hard to swallow that it will be the raging success you seem to think it would be.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:52 am
deepio, instead of 4 player co-op in the traditional sense, you’d be doing co-op in the same way that WoW does it - huge raids, 40 person teams, etc… Also, I think bragging rights would be bigger in a huge MMO, especially if what teams did would have a real impact on the ongoing war. Imagine if you were the the guy who managed to lead a raid against a huge Covenant base and win. Or even better, what if you really did destroy a Halo device (like you did in Halo 1). That would be some serious bragging rights.
Also, all MMO’s have AI and endless quests against the computer, so I would imagine that Halo Online would need some wicked AI to make the game any kind of challenge.
March 17th, 2006 at 9:00 am
Thats all fair enough, and it does sound good! But you reckon you’d have the ability to just jump in and take three local mates into a team-slayer type battle if this turns out to be a MMO? Wouldn’t you have to go around looking for a fight first?
March 17th, 2006 at 9:18 am
Well we can see how well a MMOFPS will do on the 360 when Huxley comes out this year. Im sure it will drop before H3
March 17th, 2006 at 9:30 am
So Mole we finally meet.
Look, if this MMO goes down thats cool, but MS must take great heed in their approach and marketing. MMO’s, in time - as the genre grows will make Xbox live (gold) feel somewhat incomplete. For example, HBO when it started out it was one channel with a great deal of different programing. Within a day one could watch a great many different movies. As HBO grew so did its content. Eventually HBO the multi channel and the deversity/variety of the programing suffered do to repetative content. Many complaints were filed stating: “Why should I
March 17th, 2006 at 9:36 am
you guys keep forgetting the fact that you dont need LIVE Gold to play MMOs. you can have the free LIVE silver and your still able to play all of the MMOs you want. your not paying for the Gold service to play MMOs but every other game released.
March 17th, 2006 at 9:39 am
WHOOPS
CON’T
“Why should I have to pay for 3 channels for what I use to get in one.” In the end the people that opted for the the original HBO felt left out. So eventually XBOX LIVE GOLD will not be the premo Live. I guess when its all said and done there will be a :SILVER, GOLD, & PLATNIUM live level.
March 17th, 2006 at 10:06 am
this is a rumor dont freak out. Its just building false hype like when people said that the 360′ would have a dvd burner and tivo.please stop believing these people who say that its a rumor.
Once again dont believe the hype or else you’ll look live this fool….
RAVer:Dude i cant wait for the 360 with dvd burner and halo 2.5!!
thats gonna rool!!!
March 17th, 2006 at 11:55 am
That would be actually stupid of them, because not everyone has broadband. That would leave out like 50% of the people who bought halo 2. I don’t think they would make this type of game for the fact that they would lose sales to people who don’t have broadband. Unless “forerunner” won’t be a Halo 3, and they actually make a seperate halo 3.
March 17th, 2006 at 12:18 pm
Yea, BUT the 360 may not even have 10 million owners by the end of the year. If it does it wont be to much higher. And if YOU think 75 percent plus will do this, your more insane than i thought. NO way in hell bungie would do ythis….
March 17th, 2006 at 1:57 pm
i agree with geekinabox, what makes halo 2 so great is that there is no commitment, i can come in play for 10 15 minutes have a bit of fun and then leave, its the ability just come in and do my thing then leave, there are enough mmo’s out their and they for sure dont need another, besides they are all alike anyways weather if its WOW or HALO based when it boils down to it, it is the same repetative shit over and over again. I dont have to go through two years of playing halo levling up my character just to get to the point where i can actualy go and fight other people, and then when i finaly get everything and get my character all the way up, then they will come out with an expansion which introduces new levels or new items so now i have to run out and get those just to stay competative and thats takes even more time, screw that i think halo is fine the way it is.
March 17th, 2006 at 4:50 pm
you absolutely know i think it’s plausible.
http://m3mnoch.wordpress.com/2006/01/30/halo-3-is-an-fps-mmog/
m3mnoch.
March 17th, 2006 at 5:08 pm
m3mnoch, you obviously have put a lot of thought into this. I’m quite impressed. I hadn’t come across your blog post before, but I think you do a great job outlining what a Halo MMOFPS would be. Well done.
March 17th, 2006 at 5:48 pm
though i relise that there are alot of people with xbox live there are alot of people without live if not more. Though there are more than 10 million XBOX LIVE members, not all like halo and halo 2 so what makes you think that everyone will buy it?
don’t get me wrong i love the idea of the FORERUNNERS a pre-pre-prequel to the halo universe. But like war craft i think MMOs are just crap to big a battle sucks. PDZ with its 32 players (i think haven’t played it yet being that im in Australia) it’s more than enough. Personally i has a dedicated halo finatic would ahte to see them make an MMO, not to mention the massive lag you get with 200 people shooting at once and all thr bodies hitting the ground at the same time.
March 17th, 2006 at 6:42 pm
gay!!!! not just cause its a halo game but because the whole idea is. it would turn a mediocre game into a horrible game
March 17th, 2006 at 6:56 pm
it would be sturid if u have to pay every month $10-$15 cos not many people are gonna pay every month to play it would be better if 6-$9 or just pay in first to buy the disk then play it .just like the runescape game over 1m players its simple u can play free in free worlds but not to much gd stuff likr the second stronger dagger for free player but the strongest for members u have to suscribe $5.30 ea month and about 15 quests from free players but about 65 and over for members every new stuff they give for members ONLY thats y every1 is saying runescape is a great gam
anyway its a good idea tho.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:12 pm
leave it the way it is ,in and out .Half of its success is because it has a state of the art arcade feel. A mmofps will turn off more than half of its fans.N&out come home from work,play a minute then say hi 2 wife.[It will be pay back for bad guys,
cheif will train new spartans they will go to the home worlds of each speices in covenat to cripple there armies.They become renagade and they will start killing ever body. cheif will go planet 2 planet to hunt the traders down.The new spartans,being faster and smarter ,it is a challange for cheif, but with the help of the prototype( none crazy )next gen spartan & abatare.it might be possible.covenet finds the 4runners and lie to them to get them to fight there war for them,saying all of earth is responsible for the attacks]Although this H3 story is fiction,it would please people that do not like,or have time for mmofps .Do not forget this is part of what made this billion dollar hit .arcade & online tell you the.truth i first got hooked on halos story, action , skill it took to play.Only later did i find out that multi and online play was so adicting and fun.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:14 pm
Halo Sucks, Period… One Of The Worst First Person Shooters Ever Made, Slow Frames Per Second, Weak Gameplay, Boring Storylines… Could Go On & On How Bad This Series Is….
March 17th, 2006 at 8:18 pm
This is pretty dumb. Lets make a huge online playground so that anyone who doesn’t have AUSOME INTERNET can’t play without lag! Besides, your basing this whole arguement around the concept that Bungie is watching an MMORPG very closely…except they are aiming for completely different scopes of gaming. Bungie cannot come close to accomplishing the network that blizzard has created on the pc with the 360. Many people still enjoy first person shooter single player games and halo2 online players are still pissed about all the people who cheat online. I doubt bungie is stupid enough to think they can redo Halo Online without creating the problems they created last time. In the end, bungie and MS don’t need to do this to make money so they won’t, stupid.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:22 pm
haloISoverrated - piss off ya troll.
It’s certainly an interesting concept, if done well I’m sure a Halo MMOFPS would be outstanding, but only time will tell.
Monthly billing, given the bandwidth the servers would require to sustain a reasonably lag free environment it’d be a very expensive operation for MS/Bungie - I’d be VERY surprised if it didn’t have monthly fee’s, but for them to ask for a monthly fee they’d better be doing something very special.
As for broadband, it’s not an unreasonable requirement for games these days, I’m sure MS/Bungie aren’t too worried about shunning those gamers without broadband connections as they make up a minority of the typical 360 owner.
It’ll be nice to hear what Bungie are REALLY up to for sure..
March 17th, 2006 at 8:43 pm
Dude, this is great. It could be just like Planetside were they can support like 300-400 people on a single battle ground. Your skill level allows you to get certified to use other weapons, team work gets your level up.
And you already have the 3rd army to make it interesting!! You could start out as a marine and go up to hell jumper or something like that, would be cool beans if you ask me. Upgrading to the Spartan armor would be cool but wouldnt go completly with the story but they could fill it in. Driving those scarabs around giant maps…. omg…
Bombing missions…
Entire scopion tank platoons stiking a ring…
Leave the battle cruiser in a long sword fighter and assult the ring to capture a key control center on it….. bad freaking ass i say …
How about 10 warthogs rushing a base in a capture the flag type mission were you have to get some kind of artifact???
The universe? How about the entire solar system with the rings… holding each ring could give the holding team a special power on all the planets and such….
Bungie…. wake up…. please…. make this real… who cares if it screws up a dinky little story line or takes time to release…. just make it happen…
If it was just as fun as I think, I’d pay like $40 a month just to play it cause it just seems like it would freakin awsome.
March 17th, 2006 at 8:45 pm
But if it was like World of Warcraft and or went into something RPG like the Morrow wind I wouldnt even bother looking at the box art it would be a discrace.
March 17th, 2006 at 9:14 pm
If I could slap everyone who believes this lie rofl. MMOFPS… hmmm can we say huxley? Even if they DID make it, one Sonys Online NETWORK will put live to shame, The Halo franchise is not as big as everyone claims it to be, and mostly, only a dumbass would pay a subscription fee for a game that would lag the hell out of Live service. Not even BF2 can hold 100+ on the same field, Huxley is the first MMO thats going to since 2000+ players will be in one city on the same server at once. Whoever made this April fools joke up is pretty good though, and if you noticed, a name like Halo sounds kinda gay when its changed to soem BS called Forerunner. Thats like Calling UT2k4 or Cstrike Tribes 2. Get the picture? Im not flaming Halo in anyway shape or form, but I am flaming the fact that such a game that this rumor states indeed does not exist. Let the flaming from the HALO fanboys begin *waves*
March 17th, 2006 at 9:29 pm
I doubt it’ll be a billion $ game.
March 17th, 2006 at 9:37 pm
anil says gay!
March 18th, 2006 at 12:22 am
lordpomfrey Says:
March 17th, 2006 at 8:22 pm
haloISoverrated - piss off ya troll.
im a troll? whos the one who went out and bought the games cause he heard everyone else was getting it? thats right! that’s what a troll is.
March 18th, 2006 at 12:38 am
Ok your lordship i can see you do not like halo. I don’t play a lot of video games,so i do not care about frame rates on online games.I like the game becouse of the game play [well cheif could move and jump more true to life] but you can shoot a can off a stump 200 yards away and it was my skill that did it, thats why i like halo.I like sci fi so i like the story your hi-ness. Video games are going down two differant paths 1 path is on line gaming ,with the next-gen systems the on line experiance is going to be off the hook,although that is not my style of gaming.And path 2 is story based single player optional game ,that will be like interactive movies in near future. It seems that you played it so much that you now the flaws pretty good .But when H3 or what ever it will be called comes out you will buy a copy.the story can’t suck that bad,if hollywood knows they can make some mill bills off of the name,story,and popularity of it.
March 18th, 2006 at 11:25 am
haloISoverrated - you’re a troll because you show up, try and derail the discussion with something no one’s talking about and don’t even back up your claims. I bought Halo because I actually liked the game, the thing with ‘popular’ games, films etc is that they’re usually popular for a reason, while you may or may not like the game doesn’t change the fact that a lot of other people do enjoy it and as such they don’t care if you don’t like it.
Ae66 - you’re right, it almost certainly is a hoax - but hey doesn’t mean we can’t talking about it. Sony Onlines have a pretty poor track record, I’ll reserve my judgement on their services until I actually use it, making assumptions as to the quality of their service compared to live at this point doesn’t have any merit.
March 18th, 2006 at 1:39 pm
Halo should be a 2 disc game with one disc detacated to just single and co-oop games and the other to online gaming. You just payed 400 bones for the system you would probilly spend lets say 80-100 bucks on a double disc game.That would make a BILL TICKET.
March 18th, 2006 at 5:38 pm
“Sony Onlines have a pretty poor track record”
Yes..No Lag In Most Games & No Stupid Monthly Online Subscripton Fees……Yeah, Real Terrrible….
You X-Box Fanboys Always Have Something Stupid To Say….. You Trolls Go Run Out & Buy A Game Because Everyone Says It’s Good & No Matter How Bad It Really Is You Feel So Stupid For Wasting The Money On It, Yet You Try To Tell Yourself & Everyone Else That You Actually Like It & It Is A Good Game….You Can’t Even Compare Halo To Other First Person Shooters Out There Because Of How Crappy The Game Really Is, I Mean You Play A Normal First Per Shooter Running At A Normal 60 Frames Per Second & Then You Throw Halo In & You Feel Like Your Playing In Slow Motion… & With the First Halo Running At A Crappy 25 Frames Per second They Actually Made A Sequal That Only Ran Even Slower… At A Whole 12 Frames Per Second & At Times Slowing Down Into Single Digits…I Mean Even Doom 3 Ran At 30 Frames Per Second (Still Slow) But It’s Graphics Were Very Good Giving It A Reason To Be Running So Slow (Still Faster Then Halo) So Tell Me What’s Halo’s Excuse?….I Can Sure As Hell Tell You It Ain’t The Graphics, So What Is It?…. The Weak Gameplay…. Maybe The Soundtrack Is Too Much For The Game….There’s No Excuse For This Pathetic Attempt Of A Game, Both Halo Games Go Down In History As 2 Of The Worst First Person Shooters Ever Made, To Even Compare It To Other First Person Shooters Out There Is An Insult To Those Games.
March 19th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Ok you win your hi-ness,i do not like the play stations week ass game play and the short cuts they make to hide the true power of the systems.And i do not give my unwanted coments to play station fans.I just buy what i like and i zip my lips. I would buy a nin-rev before ps3 ,sony just is not able to make game play sensative analog controllers and games with complex control ,i might be rong i only played the system a couple of times Late ps2 games might have changed ,will sony be smarter with ps3 nope from the looks from those retarded looking controllers perhaps not.The way sony new controlers are made they will be unconfortable.But you don’t see me intering sonys web sites giving comments. the PS systems have the game play of pack man!.Are you a packy?,when halo came out ,what was better? i can’t hear you. I know u like online play now you have,just a little bit more people interested in that sort of thing and ther is a lot more trolls for for you a.k.a packies to play with. packies have very active mouths ,and bite off more than they can chew.
March 19th, 2006 at 1:02 am
Can sony revaltionize video gaming,where man,woman & child all play .Can sony rename video game consuls,to home entertainment system. for u packies that dont press pause to eat or sleep playing games on ps where looks are most important ,well just say theres a new kid on the block,with cheif leading the march ,who leads the way for sonys packies ,pack bandakoot or crash ? I’m just kidding your hi-ness i like halo but i don’t really care about this shit good or bad ,but when h1 came out you know it was the shit right you don’t hav 2 lie 2 kick-it .1 more thing you will play h3.f.r or buy it ,don’t be little packy !chomp… chomp…chomp beeeuu..beeu.skuee.Chomping on sonys hype with realallity chaseing after you, so run 4 your life.
March 19th, 2006 at 2:10 am
@ kyseec - “When halo came out, what was better” - when the ORIGINAL halo came out? xBox was still the new kid on the block and a lot of people condemned the console, as they did the PS2. I remember a mate telling me not to buy the PS2 cause “the DVD player was all green and bad quality”. Rumours like that. I personally think that no-one can make any judgements until PS3 comes out so we have to sit and wait i suppose.
PS: I sort of want PS3 to do better just so Microsoft doesnt gain TOTAL hold of gaming and stuff.. Sony are the only people who can really take Bill and his gang on.
March 19th, 2006 at 2:00 pm
xSLyPandex-I will buy one too if it turns out to be a quality machine.Competition is good for this buisess, games would be made poorly with out it . as of right now sonys still #1 its ,a house hold name like coke-cola.MS is dew-ing all right against sonys impire.
March 23rd, 2006 at 12:30 am
So I dont think MMORPG could work on the consoles but an MMOFPS (such as planetside) could work very well - god I’ve got myself all hot and bothered thinking about the prospect !
March 28th, 2006 at 1:30 pm
Why would Bungie make such dramatic changes to an already successful game? Don’t fix what isn’t broken. Bungie only stands to lose a fanbase and major profits from such a genre change. Why alienate so many fans? I’m sure they’ll stick with what has worked in the past.
April 12th, 2006 at 1:39 pm
I wonder if they’ll make a MMOFPS Billion Dollar Red vs Blue Online?? That would be neat. I bet that would slow down their productions times though. oh well.
-the four required words
April 13th, 2006 at 2:06 pm
[...] Hello all! For those of you who read blogcritics.org, you might have seen the Halo 3 / Halo Online post I made about a month ago show up there. It was basically a reprint of the origninal article, but once again it got a pretty good response. Anyhow, I’ve joined the sinister cabal of elite bloggers known as blogcritcs. How cool is that? Now I get to infest a sinister cabal with my sinister rumors! Wooohooo!!! Seriously, I’m pretty excited about this. It will definately be a great opportunity to improve on my writing and maybe even get some more visitors here. Either way, check out blogcritics.org. It’s a cool site with lots of great people blogging for them. [...]
October 14th, 2006 at 6:58 pm
how do i start to play.