Bonnie Ross to Step Down

[Warbrand2]

By the looks of things they where planning on having Them resign when S3 launched, but a family issue sped it up.

[Emblyne]

@LysanderxX

She said family issues, so family issues

@Griff1821

The timing, if nothing else, is extremely coincidental with what’s happening with Infinite

Context implies that this move is so she can be spending more time with loved one(s) who are is(are) ill.

The time sensitive nature of that kind of planning means she can’t really wait on good timing for her departure.

My guess is the situation worsened and that’s why she had to advance the decision to leave.

Edit: Nobody wants to go out on a low note. Leaving after the winter update would’ve been better for her, so I’m inclined to believe that the situation required her to immediately depart.

[XxPWNAGExX3]

@WhoLikesChicken

She was the lead for a studio that actively kept a 20 year old franchise in global relevance.

She had nothing to do with keeping it in relevance. The legacy games were so good they became classics. Nobody forgets about the Wizard of Oz and so on.

[Fuelled_Oats]

Microsoft’s statement

“After more than 28 years in gaming at Microsoft, including 15 years leading 343 Industries and Halo through its most ambitious steps forward, Bonnie Ross will be leaving Microsoft and spending more time with her family. We are thankful for her leadership of 343 during which the team launched Halo 4, Halo 5, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, the Halo television series, and Halo Infinite. We wish her all the best. Head of Production Pierre Hintze will become Studio Head effective immediately. The 343 team is hard at work shipping the Winter Update, the biggest Halo Infinite update since launch.”

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2022/09/12/bonnie-ross-leaves-halo-infinites-343-leadership-restructured/?sh=1a2c96c8c72b

Spotlight on Pierre Hintze from 2018

https://www.343industries.com/news/articles/employee-spotlight-pierre-hintze

[Thee_Bluejay]

@Griff1821

Are you really that naive? Quite often when someone is forced out of a high position like that they’ll be offered the chance to resign themselves to save face. Usually they’re not going to say “Hey everybody, I was forced to resign!”

This is generally true yes, however in certain circumstances it is absolutely necessary for the company to come out and fire their CEO or whoever is in charge, but normally that only happens in the event of a scandal or some kind of crazy charges being put against them.

Bonnie Ross if you just look at Halo purely from a business POV isn’t horrendous, but make no mistake there is no chance that the recent splitscreen debacle is not the reason for her being asked to step down. What’s even more embarrassing was that its clear that splitscreen works, yet for 343i to come out and say they moved on from something that was already in the game just hidden from us so we can’t use it is insane.

Bonnie Ross is basically Todd Howard but without as much success lol

[KCD0DGER]

It was Frank O’Connor’s idea to blow up Requiem because the writing team literally ran out of ideas in Spartan Ops.

Take that as you will.

[Emblyne]

I was just talking in terms of overall franchise impact vs game-to-game development decisions.

I agree that nobody should ever argue that the narrative nosedive that is Spartan Ops was justified in any capacity, managerial or otherwise.

[UrbaneRocket495]

@KCD0DGER

It was Frank O’Connor’s idea to blow up Requiem because the writing team literally ran out of ideas in Spartan Ops.

Yeah I have 0 faith in the writing or the halo tv series to improve, sadly.

The games overall might however.

@Emblyne

In spite of the state of the games they’ve released, 343 have done a lot of expanding the universe and engaging with books / other published media that never would have occurred in the Bungie era. There are a lot of people that love that part of the cannon just as much as the games themselves.

(Bungie was never thrilled about the novels that were released under their tenure at Microsoft. I doubt they would have wanted to expand their world in the way that 343 has, for better and for worse.)

We had great (arguably still the best) novels under Bungie’s reign however. There’s been some good books since, but 343 also gave us some pretty terrible comics and that show that claims it was halo.

[LITTLEFATMONKEY]

The timing seems suspicious, but I really do wish her the best. Curious to see how things might change in the coming years, but I imagine it will take us a while to see any results from this change.

[Emblyne]

@UrbaneRocket495

We had great (arguably still the best) novels under Bungie’s reign however.

I would disagree here. Those OG novels are excellent (except The Flood), but it would be tough to say they were definitively better some of the stories 343 has given us (Forerunner Trilogy, Rion Forge, etc.)

@UrbaneRocket495

There’s been some good books since, but 343 also gave us some pretty terrible comics and that show that claims it was halo.

No questions, you’re dead on here. The treatment of the didact in the comics alone almost offsets any good narrative threads from that era, and the show’s silver cannon is arguably the most baffling move from an engagement perspective since Fractures. They could’ve just kept it cannon and earned a lot more goodwill, even if the show still wasn’t a huge win.

[XxPWNAGExX3]

I think Requiem overall was mishandled right from the outset. At the end of Halo 3 we see this really bizarre illuminated metal world, and Halo 4 just turns it into a generic rocky planet with a sparse few Forerunner structures scattered about, but with a giant metal shell above. While the shield world concept is really cool and unique it looked like it was shielding very little besides a barely developed world. It should have been protecting a massive Forerunner city/ critical facility that sprawled across the entire surface of the planet or at least most of it reminiscent of Coruscant from Star Wars.

For such a generic world beneath the shield I think that the explosive out come at the end was very much a necessary pay off. I love Halo 4 but it was not flawless.

[Dead_End_24]

I definitely wish her well and hope everything is okay. I have no doubt that she cared about Halo but unfortunately things just did not go the way she planned and I think it was time for a change regardless.

I can’t help but think that even if there wasn’t any type of family medical issue that she would have been stepping down anyways as Halo Infinite has not gone well.

Good luck Bonnie.

[TheSonicSpartan]

Only time will tell.

[Trand0]

@Majin_Eclair

This Honestly i give her props that she stook around for so long only to drop it for her family

~S~T~Ö~Ö~K~

Edit

Stook:

-Noun

1. a group of sheaves of grain stood on end in a field.

-Verb

1. arrange in stooks.

2. to (apparently) unintentionally trigger bystanders/adversaries who believe this is anything but an intentionally harmless goofy joke.

[WD_Hawkeye]

Fancy seeing you here.

[l_HyperLethal_l]

Oh wow. The lock unlocks on time and not 65 hours later.

Edit: It was just a joke about the locks. Settle down.

[the_dark_dwarf]

Can’t lie, it’s odd to me how, just as Halo is surrounded by a big controversy that has fans and news outlets calling for new management, Bonnie suddenly has a family emergency that requires her to leave. A part of me can’t help but feel like it’s just a PR statement and that she was forced out.

But then, it’s entirely possible it’s just a big coincidence and her family really are going through a bad time right now. If so, I hope they get better soon.

As for the future Halo, well… surely it can’t get any worse.

[ADM_S_Osman]

She is a leader and role model in the industry, I wish her nothing but the best and am excited to see what roles she might pick in lieu of how she has changed 343 Industries in the 15 years of Halo.