Developer 343 Industries was forced to cancel one of it’s official Halo tournaments after the Xbox One shooter, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, ran into connectivity problems.
The HCS is the official Halo eSports league, which has been running for several months in partnership with with the ESL.
The first regular season online cup for Season 2 of the Halo Championship series was supposed to take place this weekend. It was planned to have the cup span two days with two seperate brackets. While matches did take place on April 25th as planned, Halo: The Master Chief Collection ran into connectivity issues that prevented the tounaments conclusion taking place yesterday.
During the tournament HCS Live Tweets announced some issues:
Yep, a lot of protests going on in this Open cup. Either connection issues to blame, or something else.
— HCS Live Tweets (@HCSLiveTweets) April 25, 2024
After the situation got worse, Halo dev 343 Industries and ESL decided to cancel the tournament. A tweet issued from the official Halo account last night detailed how there were party joinability issues and, therefore, 343 Industries had to cancel Cup#1 of Season 2 of the Halo Championship Series.
We're aware of and investigating party joinability issues. As a result, we'll be canceling HCS Cup #1, and apologize for the inconvenience.
— Halo (@Halo) April 26, 2024
The cancellation of this tournament is the latest in a long line of Halo-related embarrassments for 343 and Microsoft, who’ve had to continue to release necessary patches for Halo: The Master Chief Collection. Earlier this year, 343 actually had to cancel a planned Beta for one of The Master Chief Collections updates. Before that they offered a free month of Xbox Live, and the Halo 3: ODST campaign is due to be added to the game as a free download as an apology for the issues with the game at launch next month.
Last week 343 released a patch which focused on ranking, matchmaking penalties, game specific improvements for each title and overall stability for the game, as well as laying down the foundations for next month’s release of the ODST campaign as a free update. Halo: The Master Chief Collection has certainly improved since its disastrous - and potentially brand-damaging - launch last year, but incidents like this are a reminder that the game still has some way to go before living up to its pre-release hype.
I (like many Halo fans I’m sure) am hoping that these issues with The Master Chief Collection aren’t a herald of things to come with the release of Halo 5: Guardians later this year on October 27th. The commitment of 343 to improve the game is laudable, but for some it’s already a case of too little, too late.
Chris Corbett
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