Shhhhhh...The Spartans Are Sleeping!

As we roll right up to the end of 2005 and the beginning of 2006, I can't help but notice that things are extremely quiet on the Halo2 front these days. Clan participation across the board seems to be down and MM games seem to be taking longer to start because it is taking longer to put together a room full of players. Why is that? Several reasons all help to contribute to the Great Halo Slowdown Of '05...let's take a look at it.

• It's the holiday season. Activity seemed to by spiking again back on November 9th of this year. The one year anniversary brought people back to Halo goodness who hadn't played for a while. But after that, as Thanksgiving rolled around and we are now smack in the middle of the Christmas rush, people just have less time available to play. I myself have gone from a minimum of 4 to 5 nights a week down to about 2. Christmas parties, family functions, the EOY work crunch, school activities for our kids...it quickly adds up to far less leisure time than we'd like to have.
• The Xbox 360 launch. As with any new console, the launch of the 360 has definitely torn some of Halo's slightly less hardcore players away. If you are lucky enough to have gotten the new system (see Q's posts on that subject), you have no doubt been experiencing all kinds of new goodness that has further dwindled your amount of time for Halo.
• It's an old game now. Let's face facts. For a game to continue to be the most popular and often played game out there for over a year is something special. It just doesn't happen that often. Halo2 has been going strong since launch. There are simply going to be a section of players who...*gasp*...just get bored with it.

All of these things have contributed to the slowdown, I don't think there is any disputing it. So the thing to ponder...the question that can only be answered by Father Time is this:

"Is Halo2's dominance really coming to an end or is the slowdown merely a temporary setback due to the circumstances outlined above?"

I don't believe that it's ever going to be as popular as it was. I don't see how it can be. People get bored. They want something new. They turn their attentions elsewhere. That said, I anticipate that the turn of the new year will bring a resurgence in playtime. The holidays will pass, those same people who got bored with Halo and are right now playing Call of Duty or PGR3 will get bored with those and pick the Master Chief back up for another spin. Then, as soon as Bungie lets the worst kept secret EVER out of the bag and announces Halo3, even more people will pick the game back up and get interested again. We may never see the record number of games played that Bungie has reported in the past, but I don't think any of us hardcore folks are going to have trouble finding a room to join anytime soon.