: Pete skipped one of my favorite parts:
: "It's during that time you're questioning yourself: 'How is this
: going to work, will it be as I envision it in my head?" says Holmes.
: For Halo 4, he says there were a few epiphany moments that helped boost
: the morale of the team. One of the earlier ones that Holmes recalls was
: when the team completed a small piece of the Halo experience that he
: described as a "very traditional" Halo. User research showed
: that people thought it was a lot of fun, and it showed that the team was
: capable of making a Halo game that was true to what the series was about.

: 343 scrapped it, Holmes says, as it was too traditional. But that first build
: showed the new team that this amalgamation of different studio cultures
: could work together and achieve a common goal.

: It all makes sense now. For real. All the arguing and bickering. Restaurant
: analogies. Schooly was right. I was right. It's brilliant. That quote
: really sums it all up.

It sounds bad but it really doesn't sum anything up. We don't know what he said, the "too traditional" part isn't quoted. He might have mentioned other reasons. We don't know what he might have forgotten to mention. We don't know what or how much was wrong with or missing from that first build.