No Starfield Direct Announcement so L for Jez, Rand, Andy, Nate, etc.

It was never a question to dump forge, the question is priority.  My point is that if I have a certain amount of resources, would I spend it all trying to get Forge running on Unreal or spend it on crafting the best Singleplayer game for Halo.  In my opinion it would be the SinglePlayer.  Yes forge is fun but its not bringing any new gamers to Halo.  Its not expanding the customer base nor does it get any gamer who isn't currently engaged with Halo excited.  Forge makes the current old heads happy but its not staving off the decline of Halo as the Big 3 in MS arsenal.  There needs to be a priority to what you can do in the short term and what you can do in the long term.  I feel the short term is a full commitment to the SP for Halo that get games excited to come back and want to engage in the game, not Forge which is just an extension of the MP but doesn't really change the scope of where Halo is now.

When do the Xbox Free Play days weekend games start? I was going to play Diablo 3 but when I click on the Free Trial button on the Diablo 3 store page it just says check back later.

Edit: WTF, the free trials are supposed to go live on Thursday, it is now Friday and I still can't access it. Xbox L.

Bit hard to create a Campaign on Unreal Engine when they don't even have a Campaign team right now though, Lol.

On the topic of priority, Multiplayer would come before Campaign even there because firstly Multiplayer is a lot more of a bigger deal for Halo and has been since Halo 3, it's Multiplayer that keeps the players around and brings in the money. Secondly because they first need to nail the gameplay/gunplay/movement systems and they need to make sure they work for Multiplayer before Campaign because it's far more important to nail that stuff down precisely and make sure it works in Multiplayer before then moving onto implementing it into Campaign.

They've reportedly already got a build running of Forge on Unreal Engine as of last year which is when they made the decision to switch to Unreal Engine, they've likely focused on Forge first because it's going to be difficult to get up and running on Forge and because they know how important Forge is in itself and how it links to multiple other aspects of Halo's Multiplayer so they want to make sure Forge is possible on Unreal Engine before everything else because everything else should be fairly easy to get up on Unreal Engine.

I don't know how you can claim that Forge won't ever bring new gamers to Halo or expand the customer base but also claim that Campaign would do that after Halo Infinite...Halo Infinite was the PERFECT opportunity to do exactly what you believe, it was a soft reboot in the story, it dumped a lot of previous threads, it was a reboot in terms of gameplay (open world instead of linear) and it was widely considered to be great both in story, world and gameplay and yet by all evidence we have, it seems to have barely brought in any new gamers to Halo but also likely underperformed, which would also explain partly why the Campaign team was gutted. Halo Infinite was primed for exactly what you believe Campaign could do and yet it didn't.

343i shouldn't be chasing trends, it is what got us Halo 4's hated Multiplayer and a desire for extreme change got us Halo 5's hated story. Halo has a large enough fanbase on its own as Halo Infinite's launch proved, as the sales of Halo proved, and we shouldn't piss them off by putting well loved things in the background.

Infinite would have been in an infinitely better position right now and we wouldn't even be having this conversation if it simply had content after launch on a regular schedule, it could have sustained a large player base if it simply had content, it wouldn't need to shove anything in the background or try to make any major changes to survive,.

What Forge did/does is stem the bleeding and provide a ton of content which sets itself apart from the Competitive Multiplayer, it keeps the current and large Halo fanbase happy. Post-Forge launch, Infinite has by far had the most positive reception amongst the community since launch, Lol. Alongside the multiple other benefits I've mentioned which Forge provides (more/quicker/easier flow of content, the popular Custom Games Browser/Custom Games, a distinct fun side of Halo's Multiplayer, etc).

Campaign, Multiplayer, Forge - These are Halo now. Staples of Halo, they all deserve significant effort put into each when the time comes.

So basically they'd focus on Forge first because it's important but also because it is likely the most difficult to get up and running on Unreal Engine. Then they'd likely move onto Multiplayer (or Tatanka will do that) because GAMEPLAY has to be nailed first for Halo and they nail that firstly on Multiplayer where precision is important as Infinite/Campaign don't have many gameplay differences at all, then they will start building the Campaign.

They don't build the Campaign first because they may get the gunplay/equipment, etc. Wrong for Multiplayer, I.E. Find out that all this cool shit they've just put into Campaign doesn't even work well in Multiplayer, find out the Sprint breaks the flow of Multiplayer, or that the Equipment doesn't work, etc. If Grapple Hook didn't work in Multiplayer, I doubt we would have seen it in Campaign as that is just how 343i usually designs, Campaign/Multiplayer basically share everything and there are few gameplay differences.

My point way back at the start was that Forge not being able to work in Unreal Engine would make switching engines a major mistake, which if it didn't work, it likely would be dumped, I stand by that, if Forge doesn't translate well to Unreal Engine then they'd have made a major mistake in switching engines.

Ugh, Xbox Support sucks. Why is there no way to chat with an actual Xbox Support agent via the chat window, your only options if the chat bot support tips fail are to call them, chat with a gamer who is not affiliated with Xbox, or ask a question on the Support Forums. The later two won't fix an issue that is on Xbox's end (from what I'm reading on TA many people can't access the Diablo 3 trial right now so it's definitely on their end as the other 2 free trial games work), and I dislike talking on the phone with support agents.

Contact - Microsoft Support

Type in Agent on the search, Contact Support (blue box) at the bottom, under Products and Services dropdown menu, select Xbox and hit Confirm. 

You'll get a link to take you to Xbox support. Select "Contact Us" for chat or call make sure you're logged in on your Microsoft account that you use for Xbox.

Just had a chat last week. I think I had to type "chat" into the bot chatbox to get a real person to chat with. But not 100% sure if it was "chat" or something else^^

Yeah, I tried that. The options it gives me are "Get Help With Download Issues-Let Our Virtual Agent walk you through a solution" (tried all of these tips and nothing worked), "Message a Gamer in the community-Through an External Partner 24/7" (which isn't useful because it's an external partner and the problem is on Xbox's servers, it seems like they have Diablo 3's free trial disabled on Xbox Series and only enabled on Xbox One for some reason from what we have been able to gather), "Ask the Community" (which just takes you to the support forums) and "Request a Call".

Damn, that's a bummer. It looks like they're selective over what issues you can and cannot have a live chat with an agent. It's worked for me before when it came to an account issue I had a while back, but I chose options for what you're experiencing just now, and it straight up says "Phone calls and chats aren't available for this issue."

I'm talking to the unaffiliated external partner now, but I'm doubtful it will help much.