343's O'Connor: New Strategy For Halo Franchise-Building

Author: by Staff

In a new Gamasutra feature interview, series franchise director Frank O'Connor says the franchise's approach to story will change drastically with Halo: Anniversary and onward. O'Connor works for 343 Industries, Microsoft's internal Halo franchise team. "We made a decision a couple of years ago to make sure that all the fiction that we added to the game actually mattered, and actually had a purpose," O'Connor told Gamasutra. "We always used to say, 'Okay, if we’re going to tell a story in Halo Wars, we have to make this so that it doesn’t impact the rest of the universe. And I think that is a really unhealthy, unsatisfying, and ultimately unfair way to add story, because it meant that the creators who were working have all of these handcuffs on." "It wasn’t fair. They weren’t able to have meaningful impact on the universe. So we changed our strategy and our philosophy with that, so every single piece of story that we tell is going to have some deeper meaning or resonance in the universe." This week's release, Halo Anniversary, which is a remake of the 10-year-old original Halo: Combat Evolved, follows this strategy, said O'Connor. "We’ve added some fiction to the game as well... So it's fully animated 3D and CG animation, with fairly high production values, and a fairly approachable story. It tells the story of 343 Guilty Spark on the Halo, with his hundred thousand years of isolation, and it gives you some really cool background on the Halo itself, and some hints at the story of Halo 4." While the series has spawned a number of successful media spin-offs, including animation and books, O'Connor says "we don’t want to have a situation where you have to read a book to understand the game." "I think that would be super dissatisfying for both sides -- but if you have read all the books, and you have played all the games, you’ll definitely notice cool connections, and hopefully just feel a little bit more depth than you might ordinarily." The full interview, in which O'Connor details technical and design hurdles involved in the development of Halo Anniversary, is live now on Gamasutra.