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Halo Wars 2 Launches Worldwide on Xbox One and Windows 10 PC

“28 years, professor…”

Though it may not have really been 28 years since Halo Wars, eight years is certainly a long time to wait and it feels surreal to say this: Halo Wars 2 is launching worldwide today on Xbox One and Windows 10 PC!

On behalf of the Strategy Games team inside 343 Industries, we’re incredibly grateful for the opportunity to work on Halo Wars 2 and for the patience of fans who waited so long to get their “ALL UNITS” on again. We want to thank our partners at Creative Assembly for their deep respect to the Halo universe and for challenging us to expand on that universe. We also couldn’t have done this without Blur Studios and their ability to see Halo even more clearly than we did at times. And we have to pay respects to the foundation laid by everyone from Ensemble Studios when they made that great first transition of both Halo and consoles to real-time strategy gaming.

Catching up with team members on launch week is challenging, but we did collect some thoughts:

  • “I’m really looking forward to taking fans on an epic new journey in our universe. That and watching players turn Grunts into cheerfully exploding confetti while rainbow colored Locust beams turn bases into rubble – it never gets old.” – Mike Ellis, Campaign Design Director
  • “I want to thank everyone who participated in our betas. We got invaluable information from them that made a direct impact on the game. On a more technical note, I’m really looking forward to seeing what fans do with the public stats APIs. Halo fans and RTS players are very dedicated communities so when they come together the results are going to be interesting.” – Isaac Bender, Technical Director
  • “I’m hopeful that people who don’t normally play RTS games will give it a try as I think Halo Wars 2 has something fun for everyone! And I’m excited that we created a game with strong characters (including one awesome new female face for Halo) that hopefully everyone who plays can get excited about.” – Torey Allen, Associate Producer
  • “My greatest hope is that the Halo Wars fans who have hung in there with us, and been so passionate for all of these years, and who never thought that this day would come, will launch the game for the first time and realize that they made this possible – it’s their game as much as it is ours. And to the players who have never played before, or who may be jumping into an RTS game for the first time, I wish that I could be you right now. You’re in for an amazing ride.” – Clay Jensen, Multiplayer Design Director

We’re excited to start playing the game with you all and we can’t wait to show you what’s yet to come for Halo Wars 2. Just in the last few days of early access, we’ve already learned so much from you about how we can make the game better and we’re going to keep watching your feedback and improving everything we can for a good long while.

But right now, it’s time for us to join you for some games.

Happy ALL UNITS everybody. We’ll see you soon.

Dan