Halo 4 is a sequel to 2007's Halo 3, but it is also meant to be a reinvention of the series. Halo creator Bungie is gone after nearly a decade and the success of the franchise rides on the shoulders of 343 Industries.
The new game has to appease fans of the series and at the same time it has to evolve to bring in the next generation of gamers. Bonnie Ross, head of 343 Industries, recently spoke about the difficult task in an interview with GameSpot.
"My biggest fear was that I was going to be the person that ruined Halo," Ross Told GameSpot. "I wanted to spend as much time as possible making sure 343 had the right foundations of the franchise so that we could be the right guardians of the Halo universe."
The studio spent a few years collaborating with Bungie to learn about the franchise and its history. According to the article, "The first thing that was immediately clear to Ross was how differently the two studios worked. In Bungie's case, the team presided over development of the Halo games but left the fiction and consumer products side of the business to another branch within Microsoft, which Ross says led to misunderstandings between Bungie and the Microsoft over the future of the franchise."
Ross decided to bring all things Halo related under one roof to avoid any potential issue from happening. She also developed her team and hired Kiki Wolfkill, the former Microsoft Studios art director who had previously worked on franchises including Forza Motorsports and Gears of War.
"It was an interesting time at Microsoft," Wolfkill says. "We had decided to take on a challenge as big and ambitious as you can possibly get. Not that we didn't understand what we were getting into. We're not scaredy-cats. There's an underdog mentality at 343 that I think is pushing us to great things."
One way that 343 Industries made sure that Halo 4 is attempting to appease fans of the franchise is by staying true to the lore and history of the series. Wolfkill said in the interview that the vision for the game was clear. The game had to focus on Master Chief.
"It was clear when I joined 343 that Bonnie's vision for Halo centered around the game's universe," Wolfkill says. "When we started to map out what we wanted to do with Halo 4 there was no question about it not being focused on Master Chief. Heroes are made through trials and tribulations. We wanted to turn Master Chief into a character that players connect to."
The development team was also deliberately of cautious while looking for the right balance of new and old in the game because they really did not want to disappoint the fan base.
"Halo 4 is a work of art, but ultimately what we wanted to do was prove to Halo fans that we've stayed true to the franchise," Ross told GameSpot. "The universe forms the foundation of the franchise and it means a lot to people. It's our first time taking the keys to the car and we don't want to mess it up."
Halo 4 will release worldwide on Nov. 6 with the exclusion of Japan where the game will be released on Nov. 8.
The first official Halo 4 launch trailer was produced by "Fight Club" and "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," director David Fincher and was directed by visual effects craftsman Tim Miller. You can check out the 'Scanned' trailer below.
Have you seen Microsoft's "Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn?" The new web series consist of five web segments. Here are the first four segments; Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3 and Episode 4. Don't forget to check back here tomorrow for the final episode of the series.
