Microsoft Explains Why Halo 4 Didn't Debut on Xbox One

Phil Spencer, vice president of Microsoft has finally revealed the reasons behind the firm pushing back it's much popular franchise game, Halo 4 to Xbox 360 rather than making a grand debut on Xbox One.

"A couple of years ago we had the discussion of: 'Should we do Halo at launch and not do Halo 4 last year?" Spencer told Kotaku. "But I was committed to getting Halo 4 done last year, and there was no way we were going to turn around with 343 a full Halo game in a year. So that was the plan we set on. I feel good about that."

"A discussion around having a Halo game at launch-a true Halo at launch, meaning like a Halo 4 or 5-size game-would have been something we'd have had to start two or three years ago. We had the discussion, and we thought having Halo 4 come out when it came out from 343 and having them really land their first full version of Halo that they developed internally would be great for the 360 customers, great for 343 in shipping something," he added.

Phil also mentioned that since Xbox One is not backward compatible with Xbox 360, it would not be hard to port a title from 360 to One. Microsoft is also said to have been developing some cross-platform title such as Zoo Tycoon and Max and the Cursed Brotherhood for both Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

"Whether that's a port or just dual development, you get a sense of what it means to move games between the two platforms," he stated. "It's not just 'recompile,' but obviously our controller is very similar, we know our codebase, we're on a certain number of engines that we're porting in different directions, so it's definitely possible to do things like that."

Additionally is has been also revealed that Halo: Spartan Assault, the action-game which released  for Windows 8 and Surface tablets earlier this year, will soon get a port for Xbox One console.