Microsoft Pulling the Plug on Halo Wars Forums

[Logan Westbrook]

Microsoft Pulling the Plug on Halo Wars Forums

If you've got anything that you'd like to post on the Halo Wars forum you better do it soon, because come mid-December, it won't be there anymore.

In an effort to keep all the Halo discussion in one place, Microsoft has made the decision to shut down the forums for the RTS spin-off Halo Wars and make the Halo section of Xbox.com, Halo Waypoint, the official home of Halo chat.

The announcement actually came last week, as forum moderator "Cocopjojo" broke the news to an understandably upset community in a post [http://www.halowars.com/forums/1/953396/ShowThread.aspx] that detailed what was happening, and when. The Halo Wars site, in its entirety, will go down on December 15th. The online statistics tracking that was a significant component of the online play will also go down, and the game will receive a patch to make sure that the multiplayer continues to work after the site is gone.

Cocopjojo said that the move was to provide Halo Wars players with "lively, active, and well-moderated set of forums for discussion," and that while the loss of stat tracking was unfortunately, it was unavoidable and not a decision that had been taken lightly. Microsoft doesn't plan to transition any content from the Halo Wars forums, but veterans of the site can get an exclusive forum avatar so they can recognize each other in their new surroundings.

Having worldwide communities for videogames is still something of a new idea, for console games at least, so this kind of readjustment is going to happen from time to time. It sucks for the people it affects, but as developers and publishers fine-tune how they handle the web, it will become increasingly rare.

Source: Eurogamer [http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-11-22-microsoft-closing-halo-wars-website]



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[njsykora]

First comment on that thread.

"Game is dead. F*** you."

Stay classy Halo fans.

 

[the_pleasure_is_mine]

Well this is a good thing in my opinion.

Have all your Halo resources in one places.

Though it will be sad to see Halowars.com go ):

 

[MurderousToaster]

There's a Halo Wars community?

Well, whatever. Halo Wars wasn't that good. Still better than most console RTSes though.

 

[GamingAwesome1]

Judging by some of the posts in that thread, no wonder they've decided to euthanise the forums.

A quote from a user named "nliimbo" in response to a post from "Stun Lock":

Stun Lock: You guys are aware that the decision to end online stat-tracking effectively makes the game a dead game... right? If that was your goal you could have saved us all a lot of time and not reset the LB. Do you really think people from halowars.com will move on to the waypoint forums after you kill their game? Seriously...

"nliimbo" This. Why don't you respond to statements like this instead of ducking under your skirt Cocock? Just go break your neck in a car crash or something and forget about this site.

Classy, tell the guy who isn't even responsible for the decision to go and break his neck. The phrase "Don't shoot the messenger!" apply here?

No wonder they're killing the forums.

 

[MorteSphere]

Turquoise sure is one ugly colour.

I don't even understand why they tried to make a Halo RTS. RTSes require a far longer attention span than most Halo fans have the ability to muster.

 

[ThreeWords]

Jesus, i'm scared to join any forum other than this one because of how much of a cesspool the internet is.

Nice to see a healthy dose of xenophobia there. Paranoia keeps you ready for when they come for you.

I see this so often that I wonder if the inter-site opinions/biases/fears/prejudices are stronger than those between countries...

There's a Halo Wars community?

I know, right? Total brain melt...

 

[DazBurger]

Wait.. They want to concentrate all Halo related chatter on Waypoint?

Thats not gonna happen any time soon.. Even after Bungie have stopped making Halo's, the main place for halo fans is Bungie.net...

 

[archvile93]

Turquoise sure is one ugly colour.

I don't even understand why they tried to make a Halo RTS. RTSes require a far longer attention span than most Halo fans have the ability to muster.

It's probably because Halo was originally planned as an RTS.

 

[imnot]

Turquoise sure is one ugly colour.

I don't even understand why they tried to make a Halo RTS. RTSes require a far longer attention span than most Halo fans have the ability to muster.

hey I find that offencive!

 

[Just_A_Glitch]

I know a few people who will be none to happy about this.


EDIT: Scratch that. Completely misread the article.

 

[Dogstile]

There's a Halo Wars community?

Well, whatever. Halo Wars wasn't that good. Still better than most console RTSes though.

Eh, handled the best out of any console RTS i've seen and gave me some truly epic one on one battles which came way to close.

Also attracted mature people with mics, so i'm saddened by the loss of a specific halo wars forum

 

[sir.rutthed]

People still play Halo Wars? Good lord, that game was terrible, even for a console RTS.

Wait.. They want to concentrate all Halo related chatter on Waypoint?

Thats not gonna happen any time soon.. Even after Bungie have stopped making Halo's, the main place for halo fans is Bungie.net...

Bungie stopped making Halo? I doubt it. Maybe they're done with the Master Chief story arc for now, but there's no way they're giving up on that big of a cash cow.

 

[SelectivelyEvil13]

WTF is halo wars? oh, wait, that crappy RTS game based off that crappy FPS series that everyone who isn't a halo fanboy, or has reasonable knowledge of just how crappy console controls are for an RTS, hates? Oh well, I don't see that big of a problem.

You missed the key point: It was also the last game by Ensemble, the makers of Age of Empires. So killing Halo Wars effectively? That's karma for killing everyone else's RTS hopes and dreams.

I have no idea what they were thinking making a console exclusive RTS when the obvious thing to do would make a PC version as well[footnote]Unless they knew that PC users would not give a damn...[/footnote]. On a side note, does Halo Wars even have user-made maps or a map editor of sorts? It would be rather humorous if thee Halo RTS had a worse map editor than than Halo 3 or Reach.

 

[Anti-Robot Man]

I thought Halo Wars was actually very good for a console RTS, the control scheme was quick and easy, the graphics were good and they used the licence very well (obviously no console RTS comes close to PC equivelents but still). I can't believe that they've never reduced the price of the two dlcs, 800 points each. If they had done that at any time (particularly close to Reach launching) they would have made quite a lot of sales and regenerated the community a little, now it's on it's death bed.

 

[DazBurger]

People still play Halo Wars? Good lord, that game was terrible, even for a console RTS.

Wait.. They want to concentrate all Halo related chatter on Waypoint?

Thats not gonna happen any time soon.. Even after Bungie have stopped making Halo's, the main place for halo fans is Bungie.net...

Bungie stopped making Halo? I doubt it. Maybe they're done with the Master Chief story arc for now, but there's no way they're giving up on that big of a cash cow.

They have signed a 10 year deal with Activision, and since Microsoft owns all rights to Halo Bungie HAS to quit making Halo's.

But it has been hinted that they would pick up on the saga after they are done with Acti.

 

[Grey_Focks]

WTF is halo wars? oh, wait, that crappy RTS game based off that crappy FPS series that everyone who isn't a halo fanboy, or has reasonable knowledge of just how crappy console controls are for an RTS, hates? Oh well, I don't see that big of a problem.

psst, your troll is showing....

OT: eh....no strong feelings one way or the other. For a console-rts it handled pretty nicely, and the community for it (atleast the few people I played with who had mics on) actually seemed pretty...mature. Shocking, but true.