Online multiplayer games are a huge reason for why many gamers play games. Incredibly successful IPs like Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Halo have become renowned for their innovations in big team firefights, and gamers have come to expect each new installment to expand and improve upon those fights. Halo’s traditional Big Team Battle (BTB) multiplayer mode will not be in Halo 5: Guardians at launch, but players will still have options for large-scale play.
Executive producer Josh Holmes responded to concerns from fans following the announcement, reminding fans that Halo 5: Guardians will feature a 12 versus 12 mode called Warzone.
“Warzone is the evolution of [Big Team Battle], on steroids,” he said, adding the team would “also be adding a more traditional [Big Team Battle] mode post-launch.”
Warzone, which Holmes refers to as “the evolution of BTB on steroids”, includes the biggest map the Halo franchise has seen to date, four times the size of anything previous. The map is an ode to Halo: Combat Evolved’s Silent Cartographer and has been described by Microsoft as the following:
“Clearing out the initial Covenant threats and controlling the Forerunner Spire in the center of the island is paramount to a team’s success and provides a central base of operations. If your team loses the Spire, don’t despair; players can use a system of caves or take to the beach to flank the base. Beware of the Covenant though, for they will not let you take this island so easily. They will counterattack and fight to retake their territory. Continue the push for control of the island and take out the opposition’s core… before you awaken something much worse.”
Nevertheless, if Warzone doesn’t appeal to some fans since it changes things up in a number of significant ways, Holmes statement that 43 Industries more traditional BTB coming after the initial launch should appease some fans concerns (although a time-frame for its release was not given).
The latest installment in the long-running sci-fi shooter franchise, Halo 5 will release exclusively on the Xbox One on October 27. Stay tuned for details!
