So, I guess the better question is: Do you actually believe 343i competent enough to not only learn the ins and outs of Unreal 5, but also write code for it, make everything they have compatible with it, and so on?
Like, do you actually think that’s a good investment of their time, money and resources, and that they can actually do it?
That’s the real question in my mind. Halo has been on the same engine (just an upgraded version each time) with every game. There is obviously a lot of efficiency with that, not the least of which is learning the system. Though, if the 18 month contractor stuff is as rampant as everyone seems to say, then maybe it would be better to use a more wide spread system that contractors would have more familiarity with.
The issue I see (having no knowledge of how games are really made) is that they would have to literally start from scratch with an engine switch. As it has been thus far, they can take the previous assets and systems and build upon them. There’s going to be a lot of trepidation with the long timers to make that switch.
Congratulations - for somebody who doesn’t know, you immediately grasp more than the average Halo fan seems to.
Not my problem, you obviously had proven several times you don’t have really much clue about game development. 
Btw, I answered your latest question as well in my previous post.
Have you actually worked witha game engine before? What gives you the expertise to say people don’t understand things?
They’re both good questions.
I think to answer the first one I’d actually say yes. I think 343 have got a lot wrong with Halo Infinite, I’d like to think that’s because the project has been badly managed rather than the actual developers not being competent. Regardless though Unreal Engine is very easy to use, a lot of developers from indy devs to big studios have experience with it, perhaps more importantly so many Microsoft studios have experience using it including support studios they’re using for Infinite.
For the second,more expanded question that’s harder to answer, I don’t think anyone can actually answer that question definitively. There is so much delayed or missing content for Infinite that 343 have either dropped or are playing catch up with and the work required to move to a new engine is considerable so I don’t know how they could manage their resources effectively to pull it off successfully. I think if they were to, which I still feel is incredibly unlikely at this stage (but I wouldn’t go so far as to say is impossible) then the sooner the better, the cost would be considerable to do it now.
Do I think the new game is being coded as we speak? Probably not. But a map of how the game will function probably is if not done. That’s why they’re hiring the team listed in the the most recent job postings.
Infinite has a finite life cycle like all products. As a business, you want you’re replacement product to be released just as the previous product is starting it’s life cycle decline.
So infinite was released in 21 (was supposed to be 20 to line with the new console release). Planning stages for endless probably started around '20. So with that logic, a new console should release 2026-2027~ ish, and with that a new halo game to launch with it.
And there’s definitely some pressure for that because this is two(?) launches now that halo has missed the console launch (MCC and Infinite).
So while the plan was for endless to be a dlc, the problems with slipspace probably negated any advantage of putting out a dlc for infinite and the decision was probably made to get back on track with the console launches with a new game on a new engine.
That’s how I see it anyway.
the only new thing we kinda know they are working on is the supposed BR mod which i guess will either be an addon to infinite or a standalone f2p game using the same engine.
I do believe so. I believe in 343i that they’ll eventually get us to where we want to be. If infinite had the same layout as MCC we as a community would be happy.
The UE5 rumours for one appear to be for certain affinity at least those coming from proven sources.
(As of my last exposure to them)
But this idea that MS wont use UE5 is misguided. At least in my reading of the situation.
They are one of epics leading engine partners.
Coalition likely being the first external studio to gain access to UE5.
The technical debt of slip space is a progressive debt, that will only grow over time making it poor business to maintain it.
Also sunk cost fallacy is not a model MS have adopted in the past.
They will gladly trim the fat, buy out a competitor or use a thirdparty solution.
over using resources to fix an underlying issue.
Even discord a sony invested company is actively supported on xbox and mixer, formerly beam, a conpany purchased by MS.
After opting to abandon planned expansion to their skype platform,
was canned.
It seems pretty much a given that 343i’s issue is engineers have no experience with the proprietary engine.
We saw a similar change happen with luminous. A technically deficient engine that needed multiple reworks to implement new engine feature.
While a fascinating engine with some impressive results it was replaced by unreal on future projects post FFvsXIII/XV.
When the staff is on such a high rotation using an industry standard engine is quite literally the fastest way to improve output issues.
We saw this very dice roll occur with a studio/publisher known for valuing their autonomy quite recently.
After having to draft in namco and despite funneling absurd amounts into RED engine CDPR have dropped it for UE5 because it lacks those technical debt and stability issues sure
But also because the studio saw shake ups post CP2077 and new hires are literate in Unreal. Not only for the in prepro witcher title but earlier on for the suspected to be live service 2077 mp spin off that saw multiple prototypes in red before switching dev to UE4 and latter 5
The sunk cost will only increase over time whereas using a licensed engine sees huge reductions in cost for building new engine features as they become standard.
Obviously the switch to UE will allow for a workflow that will see a more steady output for the studio and thus a far more profitable return on a live service or standard release models.
All audio recordings are going to be utile in UE.
As are their high value art assets or 3d models seeing as they would be using the standardised tools for those judging from how they have past advertised for hires.
Concept art and paper design remain the same.
Depending how they catalogue their texture assets the raw materials will likely also remain utile.
The UE switch would be at least 2 years away from showing dividend and the live team for infinite will still function on its low output in the interim.
Likely for 3.5 years at least. Unless a new project started earlier than believed.
Now there is the worry of feel but halo 5 and infinite has already lost much of that as is and 343i lacks Bungies long term experience with tiger.
So to continue using a blam based solution in reality serve no tangible benefit beyond legacy assets.
Ironically many here, even some who speak against UE5 as the new engine base for halo, are emphatically opposed to the most utile assets at 343is disposal.
Namely halo 4 and 5 assets.
It makes little sense to oppose a choice to make output rate greater but none to do so when vocally opposing the easiest avenues within slipspace to curtail these issues of content going gold.
Theres a reason most studios big or small opt to liscence.
The fees are negligible because of the vast gains it provides production.
We transitioned from a proprietary assembly based engine as soon as the liscence fee became affordable for us on small scale.
The fact is these large premiere multi year partnerships are more financially agreeable because cost is often offset by marketing agreements and information sharing.
Example being the amount of testing and actual in engine development that large AAA studios will perform when liscencing new cutting edge versions of the tech that build the platform for the liscence owner. In this case epic.
UE struggles with open world spaces and so the deal with enix or cdpr for example will, assumedly, see the engine recieve new solutions to it’s open world woes thus making it a more desirable product.
Obsidian also a notable name here given their avowed title being a UE5 developed project.
As well as TOWtwo and obviously experience from the prior installment.
Depending on the agreement with the liscencies the sharing of these proprietary elements may be made engine standard post release of the product in exchange for a cut cost or a return on liscence fee and royalty payments.
Or will showcase the utility in the least allowing for replication by other cusromers.
This is a long term solution for studio health.
Because once a product implements a novel solution it will invariably see rapid imitation at a vast reduction in R&D.
So the loss of sharing this technology is magnitudes smaller (in most cases) than retaining it in house.
The biggest benefit to making it is actually user experience.
The engineers behind it will invariably be the most well versed for some time but allowing it into the wild trains prospective new hires in the systems you use.
A huge saving in time and financial cost down the line.
Further, it will see applications that were unintentional to the developer of these features that can be brought back in house as other studios show their work fuelling the iterative process.
So to be blunt your reading of the situation as outlined here:
Reads as fairly uninformed from both a developmental and financial perspective.
That all said. I worry that something may be lost in translation as the oddities and nuances of blam is removed from halo.
But thats the emotional response of a fan.
If I were to think pragmatically and consider it from a studio heads perspective its a no brainer.
The obvious choice is to drop slip space as soon as feasible.
Engine literacy is bar none the greatest asset of any given studio.
Edit:
And id wager most on staff have some experience with UE.
And the greater xbox team has mountains of it.
Being able to share information with the coalition and ninja theory whose work already exemplifies some of the best work in Unreal is a huge boon.
As is the case for rare, who is using unreal and
who we already saw an example of technology sharing from in Halo 5, with sunaions sea and leveraging cross team literacy of azure water tech.
Edit: @RamboBambiBambo
Those were assured to be place holder.
Are you referring to 2018 engine proof of concept assets?
Or the unfinished in development models that showed that where still going through refinement?
It would be a needless hindrence to the production pipeline to try to use in work assets when placeholder legacy assets can serve as stand ins until the tail end of development.
Grey scales and old models will be standard until very late i to production.
except for halo 4 multiplayer.
Good question, but the better question is why I’m bothering with you. You can make up anything you want. I feel like you’re the kind of person who’d assert one of the first things done about a game are its visuals.
So why wouldn’t the next one be badly managed? What does the new engine change, honestly?
This much I know. But there’s still legacy code active from the original game working SOMEWHERE in Infinite, that much is for sure.
The former is hard to believe, but the latter - I genuinely did believe MCC was the template. It does bewilder me that they didn’t just, do that.
Alright, a bit barbed but, frankly, you’ve actually put considerable effort in stating why they MIGHT use UE5, and your read is the first where is sounds even remotely plausible to me.
I’m certain something would be lost.
But despite all this I am fairly certain they’re not switching any time soon.
Even still, thanks for an actually comprehensive reply.
Barbed? Respectfully I don’t see how.
I was nothing but respectful in my opinion.
If you are referring to:
Id say perhaps show a little more awareness haha.
I mean you outright make multiple appeals to authority and state others are lacking in knowledge so you shouldnt find it offensive if someone politely shows a gap in your knowledge.
To be frank your assertions that people who don’t share your opinions, based entirely on the fact UE has a liscence fee, would constitute barbed.
Honestly its insulting to suggest people must lack the most basic of consumer facing industry knowledge on that basis.
Regardless neither this or my prior comment intended to cause harm or insult.
Being corrected on the mechanics of the industry isnt barbed its merely meant as an informative observation in response to a thesis that struck me as lacking.
A new engine doesn’t change that in and of itself but it’s clear that a lot of resource went into creating Slipspace and then trying to find ways of making it do some actually really basic stuff. That’s ultimately a combination of two things, bad management and the developers biting off more than they could chew.
Creating a game engine and making a video game are two different things, yes there is a lot of crossover but they aren’t the same and 343 tried to do both and clearly it has not gone well for them and they are struggling.
I honestly would have more confidence in 343’s ability to manage Halo if they were just working on content for the game rather than being split between creating content and trying to make Slipspace jump through hoops.
Yes moving engines does create the work of having to port assets but Microsoft developers have a huge amount of experience with Unreal Engine, as I said previously they’ve made over 30 games using it and have more in production using it, they are actively hiring more developers specifically with Unreal Engine experience and they have a close working relationship with Epic, if you’re going to move something from one engine to another than outside of Epic doing it themselves they’re with the best people for the job.
Again though circling back to where I came in, I don’t think 343 are going to abandon Slipspace just yet and jump to Unreal Engine, but just because I don’t think they are going to do that doesn’t mean it’s impossible and there are so many benefits of working with a tried and tested, well supported engine like Unreal. With Unreal Engine 5 you can make a massive detailed city in a few days, with Slipspace they struggle to add menu items because of UI limitations that exist in an engine they themselves created. It’s night and day.
Its possible that they try to rewrite some source in ue and build a sort of replicant blam engine within UE with a better suite for workflow.
Theres arguements for either side. But honestly im leaning towards ue being the engine used going forward.
And your observations about the functional relationship between XGS and epic is something that should not be dismissed by any means.
XGS arguably have the best production standards in that engine to date.
At this point, I don’t care what engine Halo uses. Just fix the game and I’ll be happy.
Hey, I didn’t say it was disrespectful, lol. You can be respectful but barbed.
Yes, it is. Unfortunately I see that demonstrated way, way, way too often. People really do think you can just port engines - and right new we’ve got NVIDIA marketing that RTX can remaster entire games. (It cannot.)
For what it’s worth? The new forge video they released? They’re clearly very proud of what Slipspace can do.
It has been very difficult yes.
That is at least technical. Epic not being MS on the other hand…
BTW you actually can port engines.
Its been done.
It isnt functionally what many consider it mean but entirely within the realm of possible.
With it, llike most problems in development, having a myriad of plausible if not always practical routes to accomplish the outcome.
The issue is more so if its cost effective.
And on the topic of RTX.
The marketing ive seen simply shows the tools value as a time saving tool.
Guess i need to look into nividias rhetoric on the product.
AI solutions are gonna make a major impact on time thats much is certain.
In that regard it appears to be highly valuable.
But it could conceivably “remaster” an entire game depending on one’s definition with the functionality it has. And the game in question.
I’ve yet to use the tool but it looks like a huge win in terms of expediency.
Actually planning to look into what we can do with it for some older projects to get a sense of the applications and results it may have going forward.
Quite excited to play with RTX.
Cool, wasnt going for barbed but spose the tolerance of what is or isnt differs colloquially.
Having pride in something doesn’t automatically make it good though 
. Forge does look really cool but they are still years behind where they planned on being at this point.
There’s lots that hasn’t been released that’s expected items and new items that the community is looking forward to. It definitely does hurt that things continue to be pushed back.
If the rumors are true, and I hope they are, it wouldn’t be 4 games, it would be 2. 343i is not working on Tatanka, Certain Affinity is, and Infinite would go into maintenance mode at best. They would be left with MCC and Halo: The Endless.
I would think that the new game would completely replace Infinite because why would you create a competitor for you own game that is already on life support. Whether or not UE5 is going to to the engine behind it, I do not know, or really care just so long as whatever they decide on, they can support.