STACK #148 Feb 2017

FEATURE GAMES

in Halo 5: Guardians , the two stories are happening in parallel. We can’t go into too much detail about what might happen in the future, but I can definitely say [Atriox is] being embraced, and any future Halo titles will have the advantage of this new faction as a part of their story.” With CA coming in on a universe that was already so well established, Jensen notes the benefits in having a creative collaborator on such an expansive campaign. “ Halo Wars 2 ’s story developed organically during the development process. We pretty much sat down right at the beginning and said ‘Right, what are we gonna do?’ Everyone’s been waiting for this game forever! We didn’t really have a predetermined notion of what we wanted to do, but obviously there was a lot of talk back and forth about where we wanted the story to go. A lot of it was influenced by things we wanted to do gameplay-wise; we’d come up with a random mode or something you needed to do in the campaign that we needed to work backwards from, and we just went from there. Everything grew out of necessity.” Building on the already fertile foundation of the popular first title, both development teams were careful not to fix what wasn’t broken. HW2 takes the best parts of the original and builds on them. “There’s a lot more of what we had in the first one. New units, leader powers, game modes – everything’s been improved upon.” Jensen notes that the most significant addition in Halo Wars 2 is the amount of extra player choice. “If you want to focus on story, there’s the campaign mode, if you want the really epic multiplayer experience, there’s that, and then Blitz is this whole other experience.” We found out about the new Blitz mode (a card-based endeavour) first-hand in a short hands-on event in Sydney last month. We

Deathmatch could look like on the esports level – something 343 have definitely pondered. “Esports was considered right from the start. It’s something that right now we don’t have specific ideas on where we want to go, which was a very conscious decision because ultimately esports has to be organic, and come from the fans themselves. We definitely hope

We definitely want people to play Halo Wars 2 competitively - Blitz mode especially

spent a few hours on the prologue and first two campaign levels and a bit of multiplayer, coming away with the impression that Halo Wars 2 really is an RTS for those not necessarily familiar with the genre. Regardless of whether you’re a fan of the Halo series, RTS games, or you’re just here for Creative Assembly, it’s a hugely accessible title that takes no time to learn and is genuinely a Warthog full of fun – especially the multiplayer. One can only imagine what a fully-fledged

people want to play Halo Wars 2 competitively – Blitz mode especially was something that was conceived from an esports perspective. It’s every bit as fun to watch as it is to play. We are ready to embrace esports and we have definitely been thinking about it in terms of design, but it’s ultimately now in the hands of the gamers.” If all that isn’t enough to satisfy you, 343 also have a ton of post-launch content planned, with Jensen promising “six-plus months” of content on the way for the game. “There are new leaders, new units, new Blitz cards, lots of stuff. It adds a lot more depth and a lot more variety, especially

when you’re adding things like leader powers, it just enhances those dimensions even more. We can’t wait to see the players’ responses.”

• Halo Wars 2 is out Feb 17

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