The History of the Halo Series

For my research, I looked into the history behind the Halo franchise. The Halo games are mostly about the main protagonist, Master Chief also known as John-117, and his fight to protect humanity against the Covenant, Flood, or Prometheans. As the game progresses, the player learns more and more about the galaxy, the enemies, Master Chief, and the story becomes very intriguing, complex, and interesting for the player. The first Halo game started being created by Bungie originally in 1997. The game idea started out as a real-time strategy game, but developers thought that strategy games were too common during that time, so they decided to make a third-person-shooter. Those of you who have played Halo before know that the games are not third person, that’s because after deciding on third-person, they changed their minds and made the game a first-person-shooter instead. The very first Halo game, Halo: Combat Evolved, was published by Microsoft Game Studios on November 15, 2001 for the Xbox. The game was an instant success, and so far, there have been a total of 12 major Halo game releases, with a new game, Halo Infinite, supposedly set to release in 2021. There have been many other Halo arcade games, minigames, and board games, but there are 12 AAA Halo games that have been released under Microsoft. Because the original Xbox was released shortly before Halo: Combat Evolved, the game is credited by many as being the reason the Xbox became such a popular console. Halo 2 was released for the Xbox on November 9th, 2004. The game was just as successful as the original Halo, but after including a multiplayer feature, the game stuck around for a lot longer and became the best selling game for the original Xbox. Bungie and Microsoft worked together to release a total of 3 major Halo games; Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, and Halo 3, all of which were extremely popular games and surpassed the previous one in sales. Bungie also made Halo 3: ODST, and Halo Reach, which were not considered major releases at the time but both were still very successful. Halo: Reach, was a prequel to the first Halo and would be Bungie’s last Halo release. Bungie and Microsoft had somewhat of a falling out. Bungie wanted to work on other games, but was stuck under a contract with Microsoft stating they could only make Halo games. Bungie left to make the Destiny game series and 343 Industries took over the development of Halo games. 343 created Halo 4, Halo 5, and is currently making Halo: Infinite. Despite Bungie no longer working on the series, Halos 4 and 5 both did extremely well upon release and Halo 5 currently is the best-selling Halo game of all time. Over time, Microsoft released the “Master Chief Collection,” which is all of the major Halos on one game, and so far Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2 have upgraded graphics and mechanics. In all, Halo is one of the most recognizable game franchises of all time. Some of their releases are in the conversation for best video game of all time and most are frontrunners for the best first-person-shooter of all time as well. It has done extremely well financially with every release so far, and there is a lot of anticipation amongst fans and critics alike for the newest release.