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Shelve your party hats as no 'Halo 3: Anniversary' is scheduled

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.

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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.

Gabe Gurwin
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…
If you love game history, you need to try Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration
The Atari logo appears in gold.

Video game collections are becoming more common these days as companies look back on their past. That’s great for game preservation, but collections like Super Mario 3D All-Stars can ultimately feel underwhelming when the end product is little more than a simple port. Atari’s classic lineup of games is no stranger to this treatment; you can play an Atari 2600 game collection on pretty much any platform you desire. Due to the overwhelming amount of Atari collections out there, Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration might not seem like a compelling release at first.
That’s why it’s more of a surprise that it sets a new standard for this kind of game collection.
Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration Trailer
In practice, Atari 50 feels like a museum exhibit-turned-video game. It made me feel like I was walking through the Smithsonian’s The Art of Video Games exhibit for the first time, except everything is about Atari's 50-year history. Not only does Atari 50 contain everything from Pong to some of the weirdest titles the Atari Jaguar had to offer, but it embellishes those games with trivia, scans of game-related material from the time, and video interviews with people connected to them. Anyone who loves gaming history owes it to themselves to check out Atari 50.
Eclipsing other collections
Digital Eclipse has been bringing old games to new platforms for years -- it made Atari game collections for the original PlayStation. Over time, it has slowly put more effort into its approach, moving beyond mere emulation. Earlier this year, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection included the Turtle’s Lair, which had boxes, manuals, ads, catalogs, comics, TV show clips, and development document. Atari 50 takes that one step further by transforming similar content into exhibit-like Interactive Timelines.
From its title screen, you can immediately access almost all of Atari 50’s 100-plus game lineup. The real draw, though, is choosing one of five Interactive Timelines recounting Atari’s 50-year history. Arcade Origins focuses on the founding of Atari, its earliest success, weird prototypes, and classic arcade games that were released from 1971 to 1984. “Birth of the Console” is about the creation, hits, and triumphs of the Atari 2600, while “High and Lows” discusses the video game crash of 1983 and how the Atari 5200 and 7800 fared during it.
The context art is created in and the legacy it leaves behind are as important as the art itself ...

Meanwhile, “The Dawn of PCs” recounts Atari’s efforts in the PC space from the Atari 400 and 800 in 1979 until the rare Atari Falcon’s release in 1992. Finally, “The 1990s and Beyond” covers everything else, emphasizing the Atari Lynx handheld and 32-bit Atari Jaguar home console. Games will pop up as players navigate these timelines, and you can play them at the press of a button. As is always the case with Digital Eclipse collections, the emulation is smooth, and players can access various visual filters and even the instruction manuals when pausing.
On top of that, almost every game included has some piece of trivia, scanned development document or ad, preserved commercial, or relevant interview to check out. Notable former Atari developers like Pong creator Al Alcorn and programmer Tod Frye frequently appear in these videos, but other prominent industry figures like Double Fine’s Tim Schafer and former Epic Games dev Cliff Bleszinski show up to offer their thoughts. The context art is created in and the legacy it leaves behind are as important as the art itself, so it’s incredible to see Digital Eclipse’s effort to include all this supplemental information.

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Halo Infinite Season 3 delayed until 2023, split-screen co-op canceled
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After releasing in an unfinished state, Halo Infinite is still dealing with long-term woes that should come as no surprise to anyone who's been following the game. Today in a new Halo Waypoint blog, 343 announced that the upcoming Season 3 update to the game is delayed. Along with this news, the split-screen co-op, a staple of the Halo series, is completely canceled.

Halo Infinite | Update – September 2022

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Two Spartans side by side in Halo Infinite.

The upcoming cooperative mode for Halo Infinite won't include online matchmaking. Players assumed this feature was lacking due to co-op being in beta, but it turns out, online matchmaking won't be available when the mode launches in full later this year.

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