Halo Wars: What's in and what's out

by Dustin Burg { Feb 15th 2008 at 5:00PM }

Ensemble Studios just published their monthly Halo Wars update and this month they focused their talk to the topic of what will be a part of Halo Wars and what has already been scrapped. The biggest reveal (to us anyone) is what the team thinks the perfect time frame for how long a multiplayer match should be. Too long and gamers get bored / annoyed and too short of a game leaves gamers feel cheated. After their mathematical analysis they came up with a nice 15-30 minute plan for how long a match "should" last. Sounds spot on to us. Ensemble continues their monthly update with talk about the reasons for not including space combat in Halo Wars and informs us that milestones are being met, goals are being achieved and development is chugging along as planned. Make a quick hop over to the official Halo Wars website to read this month's juicy deets and be alert to look for the April issue of OXM in the coming weeks as they have the scoop on other Halo Wars goodness.

Tags: bungie, ensemble-studios, halo-wars, microsoft-game-studios

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Royale @ Feb 15th 2008 5:37PM

The question I pose to Dustin is: "Being the Halo fanatic that you are, will you play this game? and if you do, will it be because it is branded Halo or because you want to try out the RTS genre? seeing that you never tried Command and Conquer 3 which was a great game.

JakubK666 @ Feb 15th 2008 6:12PM

I don't think an RTS for Xbox 360 is the best way to start of with this genre. C&C3 demo still gives me nightmares. Instead of working on the "innovative controls", they should spend the money wisely, by bribing MS into Full USB Mouse Support.

There are some genres that shouldn't be ported onto consoles and RTS is one of them. Supreme Commander is going to be a BIG mistake.

Royale @ Feb 15th 2008 6:39PM

CNC3 wasn't that bad once you figured it out (especially if you are a PC RTS fan... I mean the figuring out)

But I agree 100% that RTS games are meant for the PC.

mike shea @ Feb 15th 2008 7:13PM

They can EASILY bring in mouse support.
Consoles dont use mouses though, Computers do.

seee where im going with this?

JakubK666 @ Feb 15th 2008 7:32PM

Console games don't require installation either :(

Game_playa @ Feb 15th 2008 7:54PM

@mike shea
Your Probably Aware the Ps3 Already has Mouse And Keyboard support and is already used in games. So when RA3 and WOC come to PS3 and have Mouse+Keyboard support I'll be LMAO at you Xboxers.

SadisticHam @ Feb 15th 2008 7:35PM

15-30 mins are they kidding?

It's a bloody RTS. The gayest thing that can have in a RTS is being rushed and that's basically whats going to happen if matches are that short.

Wow they must think a lot of the xbl community are lacking, i wont be picking this up if the games are that short. I'll buy a pc rts that'll have decent online games that involve strategy, teamwork, building up a decent base and force to take out the enemy.

Not a 15 min crapfest, that's not what a RTS is.

wickedpheonix @ Feb 15th 2008 8:35PM

Considering the fact that this is really being made for the console crowd, I'm not really surprised. That said, if it's 15-30 minutes of good quality gameplay then I'm all for it - my main problem with RTS's (besides the fact that I suck) is that after playing them for a couple days everything starts to feel repetitive.

IncredibleBulk92 @ Feb 16th 2008 6:01AM

+1 to SadisticHam

I really hate it when supposed RTS games forget what S stands for and change into rush fests, games should take longer than 15 minutes. Sup Com was a great RTS because it actually involved strategy, not micro managing.

Halo Wars is a stupid cash in on the Halo name. Bungie originally thought of Halo as an RTS but the changed it into a FPS because they realised it was going to be a mediocre at best RTS. Whatever Halo fanboys are going to vote me down now for nay saying the halo name