Halo 5: Guardians will not include Big Team Battle at launch, according to studio head of the title, however similar gamemodes with high player counts will be offered when the game releases October 27.
Josh Holmes, of 343 Industries took to Twitter, to explain that the removal of the gamemode will affect few, as the large scale battles can still be experienced with the debut of Warzone. According to Holmes, Warzone is “the evolution of BTB, on steroids.”. It was mentioned however, that a traditional BTB style gamemode will be introduced later into the game’s lifecycle.
Warzone is a twelve versus twelve multiplayer gamemode coming to Halo 5: Guardians this fall, and after its announcement for E3, has grown massively. Warzone is designed alongside the biggest maps in the franchise’s history, and will blend AI combat with a PvP arena experience, into a single mashup of the Halo sandbox. This is a hectic gamemode, which leaves the intensity of Big Team Battle looking rather reduced.
Big Team Battle made its first appearance on Halo 2, via a matchmaking playlist implemented into the game. The gamemode allowed teams of eight players to be pitted against one another, on large, open maps. Often, games in the playlist were focused on vehicle combat and mayhem, and objective based play. Until now, Big Team Battle was the largest gamemode that shipped with the vanilla edition of Halo games, allowing sixteen players to fight in the largest maps. Now, Halo 5: Guardians will offer battles with twenty-four players per game, never attempted before in the series.
Big Team Battle has often been implemented into Halo games as an unranked playlist, aimed at a more casual audience. With the release of the most recent Halo titles, as the playerbase reduced, Big Team Battle usually held a large portion of playlist numbers, having games constantly being started. With Warzone, upgradable equipment and the REQ pack requisition system may introduce features which are less competitive, however with its roots being sourced at a casual gamemode, the reasoning becomes clear.
While many may be disappointed that the gamemode will be left behind at launch, it is likely fans will find Warzone to be an adequate replacement. Warzone’s roots can be easily traced back to Big Team Battle, and Halo: Reach’s Invasion, which both revolutionised the series at launch. It is expected that Halo 5: Guardians will do the same.
Matt was a regular ICXM contributor in 2015, publishing 110 articles across game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news. Their work focused on hands-on reviews, platform commentary, and breaking-news reporting during the Xbox One’s first full year of post-launch coverage, including the early days of Backwards Compatibility and Windows 10 gaming. They post on X as @RTEnvi.