Microsoft Planning Halo Wars DLC?

[Evil Avatar]

UK tech site Electricpig has an exclusive quote (http://www.electricpig.co.uk/2009/01/27/halo-wars-dlc-a-maybe-says-microsoft/) from Producer Jason Pace, hinting that DLC may be in the works for Ensemble's swan song, Halo Wars.

We spoke to the game’s lead producer, Jason Pace, at a sneak peek of the game for UK journos, where he let slip that “additional downloadable content is something we’re looking in to.”

Understandably, that got us excited, so we pressed the Microsoft Game Studios man for more details.

“We are committed to supporting the franchise,” he said, but added that “there’re no definite plans yet.”

[BGSS]

I thought this was a given? I mean come on, it's a Halo game.

[Zander]

In other news companies like to make money.

[BScookies]

I wonder how they're going to do this, seeing as Ensemble isn't really going to be around.

[Demo_Boy]

Here is what I think is going on.

HW DLC is being made during normal development, then locked behind licensing DRM.

Release the game, the DLC will be in there already, cloaked.

Later, flip a switch and the DLC offer to buy becomes available. Player downloads the license to use it. Voila. You don't even need to do a title update.

Now issue is, don't want to suffer the wrath of the internets admitting that the DLC development effort took place during the retail product development effort. You don't want ppl accusing you of chopping part of the game out for DLC do you? So you have to speak about it in the "looking into" category.

But how else would you get DLC made for a game that has no dev studio?

[ElektroDragon]

I wonder how they're going to do this, seeing as Ensemble isn't really going to be around.

Sigh.. Microsoft disbanded Ensemble but rehired most of the devs internally. It's those devs that will make the DLC. Not too hard to figure out.

[ElektroDragon]

And if you want to know why they did the above, look no further than the stunt Bungie pulled on MS.

[ldi222]

Stunt? What Stunt did Bungie do to MS? The parting ways was a year in the making from what I understand and Microsoft made out pretty well in that deal. It seems to me the Stunt is Microsoft breaking up a long standing and perfectly good studio and cherry picking some of its talent for an internal IP that it owns thanks to another studio it bought in the past that was smart enough not to allow being broken up. Am I missing something here? Oh yeah then there is that big F YOU to PC Gamers for good measure.

[saulob]

I keep thinking.. the game isn't released yet. What happens if the game is BAD?

Will you all be excited?

[Wyrm]

And if you want to know why they did the above, look no further than the stunt Bungie pulled on MS.

If by stunt, you're referring to them gaining some sort of freedom from developing the same fucking game and churning out sequel after sequel for ten more years.

I loved Halo, but it's very clear that Bungie hadn't planned on having to love it that much.

[Wyrm]

I keep thinking.. the game isn't released yet. What happens if the game is BAD?

Will you all be excited?

I have a few friends who played it at CES this year, a near final build, and said it was fantastic. You can take that for what it is: second hand information. Still, those are people I know and trust when it comes to video games. People I've been playing games with for many years.

So, I'm not that worried. When has Ensemble made a bad game, anyway?

[Amalor]

If by stunt, you're referring to them gaining some sort of freedom from developing the same fucking game and churning out sequel after sequel for ten more years.

I loved Halo, but it's very clear that Bungie hadn't planned on having to love it that much.

I agree with you on that one, Bungie is much more than Halo. I'd love to see them return to the Myth franchise, those games were brilliant and I loved the narrative.

[Phhhh]

More than likely the new studio that is forming post Ensembles closure will be doing the DLC.