IndustryGamers - Informing the Games Industry

Halo 4 Was Considered Before Halo: Reach

Posted June 28, 2010 by M.H. Williams

Halo: Reach will serve as the culmination of nine years of Bungie work on the Halo franchise. The new game takes place directly before the events of the first title, Halo: Combat Evolved. However, according to Bungie Community Director Brian Jarrard, the company had planned to do Halo 4 at first.

Spoilers follow for those who have not finished Halo 3 yet.

Bungie planned for the game to pick up after that game’s ending. "Even before the idea to build a game based around Reach came about, a lot of other concepts were explored, up to and including a proper Halo 4, where Master Chief was going to wake up from cryo-sleep and we were going to tell that story," Jarrard told MTV Multiplayer.

Ultimately, Bungie decided that another sequel “just wasn't as interesting to the team to just pick up where that left off and all the baggage that came with it." The team was also reluctant to start a new story for the Halo franchise, knowing that it would be their last title.

"We don't want to open up a whole bunch of doors that we're not going to close," Jarrard said. "By the end of this, it's all going to come to a nice, neat finish, and if people want to then go play the Halo trilogy, I think they'll have a better understanding of what's going on, but it's not required at all."

Halo: Reach is set for release on September 14, 2010.

M.H. Williams has been writing in some form or another for ten years and has been a hardcore gamer since the NES first graced American shores.  You can catch him on Twitter as @AutomaticZen, Google+ as himself, or on his personal Facebook page.