On the finish of the 2024 Halo World Championships, 343 Industries made some huge bulletins about the way forward for Halo. The studio is rebranding as Halo Studios, and future Halo titles will now be developed in Unreal Engine 5, reasonably than Slipstream Engine. This transfer has additionally reignited hypothesis about Halo video games doubtlessly showing on PlayStation 5. And in line with trade specialists, this may make porting Halo so much simpler.
“From a multi-platform recreation growth perspective, transferring to Unreal Engine 5 will surely be simpler for the developer than porting throughout the prevailing Slipspace engine,” mentioned Digital Foundry’s Wealthy Leadbetter through Eurogamer. “It stands to purpose that an engine designed for deployment throughout a number of platforms could be simpler to work with than current expertise constructed for Xbox and PC.”
Earlier this yr, The Verge reported that Microsoft was contemplating bringing extra video games to PlayStation 5, together with Halo. Whereas Halo is likely one of the main Xbox franchises, cross-platform releases have already confirmed to be useful for Microsoft. Sea of Thieves discovered a brand new viewers on PS5, and Bethesda has introduced plans to carry Indiana Jones and the Nice Circle to the console following just a few months of exclusivity on Xbox Collection X|S.
Whereas switching to Unreal Engine 5 may result in extra titles being ported to PS5, that in all probability wasn’t the first purpose behind the change. Unreal Engine 5 is extensively used within the online game trade, and there are extra programmers skilled with that engine than programmers who’re well-versed in Slipstream Engine. Which means new additions to Halo Studios ought to be capable to bounce into their tasks with none retraining.
Halo Studios hasn’t set a date for the following Halo recreation, however the twenty fifth anniversary of Halo: Fight Advanced is barely two years away. Microsoft has already indicated that it has plans to have fun that milestone in 2026, which is able to coincide with the twenty fifth anniversary of the unique Xbox. For now, we are able to solely speculate whether or not that celebration will embody a brand new Halo recreation.