Thursday marked the first birthday of Halo 5: Guardians. A thank you message was posted to halowaypoint.com from 343 industries giving gratitude to players who have engaged with the title since its release.
Since launch, the game has been a success of community driven achievements. The powerful level editor Forge has been provided for free on Windows 10 PCs, giving users the ability to customize their own Halo experience. The games manufacturer has clearly been impressed by the fans efforts. According to the thank you post, they have included more than 60 community created maps in match-making. Halo 5 has also received nine updates, fifteen multi-player maps and six new game modes in the twelve months since its launch.
Halo eSports is also a big business. The prize pool for the fifty Halo 5 tournaments held so far stands at over $3 million. The developers confess their excitement at watching the worlds best players come together in competition, and will clearly still play a big part in their plans.
343 Industries have plenty to come for the game in its second year. They profess to be working on new maps, better spectator experience, improvements to match-making and servers, among other things.
If you managed to log in on the day, players were also given a prize of the Greatest Hits Customization REQ Pack for free. This offer was unfortunately only valid on Thursday, so if you missed it you best put next years birthday (27th October) in your diary, for the possibility of getting your hands on some free stuff.