Halo: Campaign Evolved Faced Multiple Problems During Development—Especially Related to Game Engine

Just last week, Halo: Campaign Evolved—a remake of the original game—launched on PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PlayStation 5, and seemed to have succeeded in bringing the franchise back into the spotlight, earning quite favorable reviews from the gaming press. However, as it turns out, the game’s development was plagued by problems that directly affected its quality and are already having real consequences.

In a new video, Rebs Gaming, which has connections to Halo Studios, has shared a wealth of behind-the-scenes details about Campaign Evolved's development. It turns out the game struggled with a host of issues tied to the Blam engine, which developers used to preserve the spirit of the original, even though the game ultimately ran on a hybrid system built around Unreal Engine 5. As is known, the studio titled Abstraction had also previously been working on the game until it ended its contract with the lead studio. Rebs Gaming reports that the transition from Blam to Unreal Engine 5 proved more complicated than expected, leaving some elements struggling to function properly and forcing certain features to be cut entirely.

That's not the only issue surrounding Halo: Campaign Evolved that surfaced recently. According to Alinea Analytics, the game’s sales across all platforms sit at just 1.5 million copies, clearly falling short of what Halo Studios and Xbox were hoping for. On top of that, according to SmashJT, layoffs have already started at the studio, as evidenced by developers' LinkedIn profiles, as you can check out in his comments below:

“The warning signs have been there for months leading up to the launch of Halo: Campaign Evolved. Between reports of troubled development, weak engagement, and employees publicly announcing layoffs, this isn't just an isolated restructuring... Asha Sharma brought the HAMMER. Behind the scenes, Halo Campaign Evolved reportedly faced a difficult development cycle, with multiple reports describing production challenges and internal issues before launch. I'll have my video covering this out later today.”

We also know Halo Studios has recently canceled two projects —a multiplayer title (Project Ekur) and a single-player title, with no details available on the latter. Beyond that, the developers apparently aren't working on any game right now—even the rumored Halo 2 and Halo 3 remakes haven't been given the green light yet.

Halo: Campaign Evolved is now available on PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PlayStation 5.