Microsoft has 'nothing to announce at this time' regarding Halo remake rumors

by Alexander Sliwinski on Dec 1st 2010 10:30AM

Microsoft has responded to European chatter surrounding a Halo: Combat Evolved high-definition remake by saying, "Right now our focus is on supporting Halo: Reach. We have nothing to announce at this time." Putting that through the Joystiq PR Translation Machine pops out one thing: "42." Clearly, we need to call maintenance.

Eurogamer published the quote from Microsoft after Games Master magazine implied that a Halo remake was underway at 343 Industries (the current Halo custodian), using the Reach engine. Allegedly, the HD Halo would drop next November, to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the original Xbox shooter.

Source: Eurogamer

Tags: 343-Industries, Halo, Halo-Combat-Evolved, halo-combat-evolved-anniversary, Halo-HD, halo-reach, microsoft, xbox

Reader Comments (74)

If they could bundle a remake of Halo: CE and Halo 2 in one package, using the Reach engine, I'd be all over that.

@Chief Oddball

I'd buy that. Not sure if Combat Evolved would hold up by itself. Got into the series with Halo 3 and recently purchased the first Halo on LIVE/On-Demand and it has not aged well.

@M4L

I don't know. I think it's aged pretty well. I still love playing it from time to time. Same with Halo 2... well, actually, it's the same with all the Halo games. They're just so fun.

@sonicspike41 Dont change the weapons, Halo Combat Evolved was all along close range combat and maybe introduce Sprint to fit in with current trends in first person shooters and I think we have a winner.

This may be a nice "NOT" expansion pack, similar to how they developed ODST. We could see this before 343 even announces its Halo 4.

@M4L
At least Halo Combat Evolved had less auto aim. If you don't believe me google search it. However, they all have really bad aim assist.

@Chief Oddball; This is the best idea I've heard all year.

@JIAGPOS

i always hear talk of this, but what are you talking about? there's no more aim assist in halo games than in any other fps title. look at call of duty where you can continually snap the left trigger and auto lock on to targets, making it extremely easy to kill. you can't do this with any halo game as far as i'm concerned.

@Liquidfingers Fortunately enough for me, both CoD and Bad Company 2 have built in options that allow me to disable it entirely. I still love Halo, don't get me wrong, but being able to kill aim assist, and having first person driving would be amazing for me.

@Chief Oddball - I would preorder it, pick it up, and play it all the while not wearing pants; they would just be too tight to bear.

@Robborboy I don't know what games you're playing, but even when you turn off aim assist in CoD, it's still there, Halo just doesn't give you the illusion of disabling it.

@sonicspike41

Loved the multiplayer aspect of all the Halo games, just don't think the first one's single player part held up well compared to the Halo games that came after or to other games that come out at the same time, such as Metroid Prime.

@Liquidfingers

Well the aim assist they are talking about isn't the auto lock on like in COD, its the little nudge you get when your reticule passes an enemy that sort of follows they enemy. Its minuscule up to a point that people notice it. A good example is trying land a head shot on an enemy mid range when their teammate passes by and your reticule moves over to them like a millimeter. That's the aim assist they are talking about.

@Robborboy

First person driving would not be halo.

Vehicles controllers are designed to be driven in third person and in my belief their better for it.

Halo 1 was my favorite. I'd love to see a remake!!

@xreadmore
If they had a "what if six survived?" campaign I'd be all over it lol

@xreadmore

Agreed. So many memories from the first Halo.

Looks like now that Bungie is out of the franchise, Microsoft needs another cash cow.

@redmasc
I don't know. I think it makes sense to have a remake for the 10 year anniversary. 10 years! Kids have basically grown up with Master Chief.

I don't think so. Black Ops pretty much proved that a franchise will sell even though the developers have changed. I doubt most CoD or Halo players know or care who develops their game. So Halo will continue to be a cash cow for MS. Of course if the quality takes a plunge then the sales might go down eventually.

@xreadmore

We know.

These kids are the same ones who think Halo was the first FPS, is the first FPS they touched, and was probably the first system they touched.

They are also the same kids who scoff at every single video game prior saying "How could you play such crap?", as if their Halo is going to be the best thing ever in 20 years in graphics.

Read some YouTube comments sometimes. Seriously. These kids think Halo was the first FPS ever.

@Pure Black World Tendency

A small addendum. black ops proved a franchsie will survive the change in developers as long as it is still GOOD. i might not be a COD fan, but I can see that treyarch busted their collective ass putting as much extra content and fun extras in that game as they could. And all people really wanted was MW2 that wasn't horribly borked
.

@Van Faulk I haven't played either MW2 or BO, so I can't comment on the quality except for what I've read of people opinions online. But wouldn't you agree that Black Ops would have sold tons even if the game had been mediocre?

@Drakkenfyre You READ YouTube comments? They're almost the lowest form of trolls on the net.

@Drakkenfyre

Don't read Youtube comments ever. Seriously.

Well, if they had said "We don't comment on rumor and speculation", we'd KNOW it was coming.

...now we're just pretty sure.

I'd drop some cash on Halo:CE... I would look forward to it being LIVE enabled. (additional MP maps too)

Man, nearly 10 years ago...

Ooh, maybe when they remake it, they can change it so it isn't the same building over and over and over and over and over and over and oooh...that's new....wait, no just a different angle...and over and over and over and over and over and over...

@Dalrint

haha, ok. i don't recall it being THAT bad.

Unless it's an outright no, looks like this is confirmed.

@Vaancor

Yup, count it.

Not sure if this is better or worse than "Microsoft does not comment of rumors or speculation."

Eh, it's totally gonna happen eventually.

this would be awesome.

Oh come on, guys.

Ever since they dropped support for Xbox's online, we all knew that Microsoft would come back and remake the original two games with online capabilities. It's way too obvious. Cut off support for the original, spit shine it up a bit, and recharge a sizable chunk of our original Halo 2 online community for a new game.

It makes too much sense for them not to do it.

@Alexisonfire

Kindof like sony taking out back compat only to sell it back to people 2 games at a time, right?

Or like nintendo forgetting about all that innovation they promised us and just putting out sidescrollers that 3d models aside, could have been on the nes and still worked fine.

Don't let's single someone out for somehting everyone is doing. And if we end up with a twin snakes/goldeneye style reimagining, that would be pretty awesome. What halo fan wouldn't want a version of CE with more than 9 weapons and no recycled levels?

@Alexisonfire

At least I can actually play the campaign from my ORIGINAL Halo: CE disc on any 360 already. It didn't even have online multi anyways.

@Van Faulk

Hey, Hey. I'm not singling out Microsoft here. What I'm saying is that this is what you're saying without being as explicit (except without the Nitnendo bashing). I'm saying that don't you think for a second that Microsoft wouldn't do the exact same thing the other two companies would do in this situation: Make a profit.

@Chibi Chaingun

My comments were more directed toward the second game in terms of pass removal of services, but I do believe that if they were to include a remake of the original Halo, they would do as I said: spit shine it and add online.

Now, I'm in no way saying that remakes are a bad thing .Personally, I support something like the Halo 1 situation describe above. And, say, the Metroid Prime Collection on the Wii is a huge advancement over the original gamecube games due to the control scheme.

I'm just saying that everyone should be expecting that Microsoft will make a remake of a game they could make millions of dollars off of. Because it's sort of obvious.

Speaking of anticipated remakes, has anyone heard any recent information about Black Mesa, the Source engine remake for the original Half Life game?

I have been anticipating its arrival ever since i heard about it a year ago, but it seems to have fallen off the radar:(

*fingers crossed*

@vrplumber

SPEAKING OF CROSSED FINGERS, I hope RC Pro Am gets a AAAA remake with neckst gen grafux.

If you gerl that way then that would surly be more of a reason to purchase it with the reach engine, no?

Having never played a Halo game I'd be all over this.

"nothing to announce at this time" linguistically implies they will have "something to announce at a later time."

@ChomskyKnows MS usually says "we do not comment on rumours or speculation" when they want to confirm something without confirming it.

They are being tricksy here.

Still have my original Xbox copy and I would buy it again. I would love to see Halo running on the Reach engine!

Remake and shine up games?? Why not? Hollywood has been doing it to original movies. A CE and H2 game combined would be great. Flood zombie mode on-line!

This seems unnecessary. HALO is still the best of the original trilogy and still holds up fairly well, graphically speaking. (Those grass textures will always be gorgeous.). It'd be more interesting for 343 Studios to make a companion game, perhaps placing the viewer in the boots of an ODST who is operating on the ring while Master Chief's doing his thing. (And yes, I realize that the ODSTs made their first appearance in HALO 2, but a little retconning never hurt anyone.)

What about making the current Halo reach 720p?

@Tereso

Reach is a gorgeous game as it is.

zip it, son

@Tereso

i'm fairly certain that Reach runs at 720p natively.

@maveric101
Actually it runs at 640p.

I'm very skeptical about this. While yes, i believe it's coming, I don't think it's going to be a $40 collection of the first two Halos like it should be. I think they're going to go the Capcom RE route and charge $50-$60 just for Halo 1. Now I would pay $60 for Halo 1 and 2 with completely redone graphics via the Reach Engine, online coop and the firefight and mulitplayer stuff, no problem with that at all, I just think Microsoft is more greedy than that.

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Microsoft has 'nothing to announce at this time' regarding Halo remake rumors

Reader Comments (74)

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:33AM Chief Oddball said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:03AM M4L said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:46AM sonicspike41 said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 12:03PM ll features ll said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 12:03PM JIAGPOS said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 12:59PM Mouthsmasher said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 2:29PM Liquidfingers said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 3:16PM Robborboy said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 5:20PM Nintendo Tim said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 5:32PM TheDarkWayne said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 5:39PM M4L said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 8:29PM philmcfail said

Posted: Dec 2nd 2010 5:56AM This Little Man Says His Name Is said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:35AM xreadmore said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 12:07PM Demaar said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 1:29PM thisredengine said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:35AM redmasc said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:47AM xreadmore said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:51AM Pure Black World Tendency said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:00AM Drakkenfyre said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:11AM Van Faulk said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:26AM Pure Black World Tendency said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:26AM TasticBycrom said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:49AM epicmuffin said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:36AM bigwhiteyeti said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:40AM majg said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:48AM Dalrint said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 2:35PM Liquidfingers said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:51AM Vaancor said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:58AM grayskul said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 10:57AM Mach2 said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:00AM EDZiLLUH said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:03AM Alexisonfire said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:14AM Van Faulk said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 12:52PM Chibi Chaingun said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 3:03PM Alexisonfire said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:03AM vrplumber said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 1:01PM Chibi Chaingun said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 3:02PM Pete207 said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:11AM Hunter2223 said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:12AM ChomskyKnows said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:17AM Van Faulk said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:13AM ObiBen8 said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:19AM sqeric said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:28AM Architecture said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:39AM Tereso said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 12:26PM Commando1162 said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 2:53PM maveric101 said

Posted: Dec 2nd 2010 3:15AM Problem Medic said

Posted: Dec 1st 2010 11:42AM Hoops said

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