It’s hard to believe, but Halo 3 is quickly coming up on its 10th anniversary. The early Xbox 360 game promised to “finish the fight” between the humans, Covenant, and Flood, and though the series eventually continued with two more sequels, the game still holds a special place in our hearts. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like 343 Industries has any plans to remaster it.
Responding to a fan’s comment on Reddit, 343 community manager Brian Jarrard said that “there is no Halo 3: Anniversary,” which certainly limits the prospects of a new Halo shooter releasing in 2017. Xbox head Phil Spencer has already said that Halo 6 won’t be released in 2017 and it won’t even be announced at E3 next month.
This would be the first time a Halo game didn’t receive a full remaster for its tenth anniversary. Halo: Combat Evolved received the treatment for Xbox 360 in 2011, while Halo 2 was essentially turned into a new game as part of The Master Chief Collection in 2014, with entirely remade cinematics and sound effects that occasionally impressed us more than Halo 5: Guardians.
The game also suffered from severe matchmaking issues at launch and for several months afterward, with players often unable to join multiplayer matches at all. 343 Industries subsequently offered an apology gift to earlier purchasers in the form of Halo 3: ODST, which released as a standalone expansion for Halo 3 back in 2008.
We aren’t without a Halo game in 2017, however. Halo Wars 2 — a real-time strategy spin-off that takes place shortly after the events of Halo 5 — is quite a bit of fun in its own right, though players used to first-person shooters might find it challenging. The Halo series actually began as a strategy game before morphing into the shooter we know today. And if you still haven’t had enough Halo, you can always build a 1,000-piece Mega Construx replica of the giant Elephant vehicle.
