Halo Studios cinematic director Josh Daniels has confirmed that he was promoted and laid off inside the identical week amid information that Activision has now taken over growth of the subsequent Halo recreation.
Xbox’s huge restructuring continues this week, with Chief Content material Officer Matt Booty asserting 268 layoffs “throughout Halo Studios, different first-party studios, and the XGS administration and central features layer.”
One of many workers impacted by these layoffs was Josh Daniels, the now-former cinematic director of Halo Studios. He confirmed the information in a publish on LinkedIn, the place he revealed that he’d simply gotten promoted that very same week in a brutal flip of occasions.
“Promoted and laid off in the identical week is fairly wild. I am one of many many hit by the Halo Studios layoffs,” he wrote. “I will be taking some offline time at the moment, however very a lot would love to speak to anybody searching for Cinematic Path or Manufacturing roles. Be happy to get in contact if something appears to be like like I is likely to be a match.”
Daniels had been concerned with Xbox for simply over a decade, having beforehand lent his abilities to the Forza Motorsport video games. He was anointed cinematic director at Halo Studios in 2024 and labored on Halo: Marketing campaign Developed, a title that was met with a lukewarm reception from gamers upon its launch earlier this 12 months.
A cinematic director for a online game oversees a title’s artistic imaginative and prescient, narrative course, and in-game cutscenes, amongst many different obligations. The removing of such an integral position means that the subsequent Halo recreation is taking a drastically totally different method than its predecessors, although this wouldn’t be out of left area; one of many extra stunning outcomes of Xbox’s shakeup was the information that Activision is now taking the helm of the Halo franchise.
Whereas Halo Studios nonetheless exists and can “proceed supporting the Halo group and video games in-market,” Activision is now main the cost on the sequence’ subsequent recreation. The minds behind Name of Responsibility making a Halo recreation is actually one thing that wasn’t on anybody’s bingo card, and whereas opinions are largely combined, many followers are cautiously optimistic and open for something to get the franchise out of its present state.
For now, we’ll have to attend and see what the long run holds for Halo. Within the meantime, different studios impacted by Xbox’s huge restructuring embrace Undead Labs, who revealed at the moment that its subsequent recreation, State of Decay 3, is nonetheless in energetic growth and is slated for a closed beta later this 12 months, with a launch date set for 2027.
