I'm super psyched to be able to play Halo 1 MP on XBL for the first time ever. I had been planning on waiting until either Halo 5 came out or until the XBO was dropped to the sub-$399 range before I got the system, but I'll actually be getting one now just to do something I've wanted to do for years. LANs, which are nearly impossible to assemble these days within my circle of friends, are no longer necessary. However, I have to wonder: Why are they only able to do this just now? What was keeping them from doing it three years ago? In the June 6, 2011 Bulletin, Frankie said:

And multiplayer! Well that was the challenge. We ached over this one. Do we build peer-to-peer netcode for Halo 1 and simply update the graphics? Do we disrupt the Halo: Reach player base and community ecology? Or do we invest in the loyalty of those players, and the amazing new features Reach has brought to the table? It was a super hard decision, but ultimately the thing that tipped the balance in Reach’s favor was this simple fact: If we added netcode to Halo CE’s console gameplay, it would change it irrevocably. It would NOT be the same game you remembered – it would be a compromised vision of it, with the pros and cons that lag, latency and more can bring. Oh, and everyone would whore the pistol 24/7.

You may recall how irate I got about HCEA lacking the original H1 MP because I felt those excuses were rather flimsy (many older pre-XBL games were re-released with online MP but otherwise unchanged gameplay-wise; new COD games come out every year with no obviously crippling splitting of player bases). Now here we are three years later and we're getting H1's MP online this time, and all those excuses we got in 2011 are now non-issues. So, what's the deal? Were there really any practical obstacles preventing them from including it last time, and those problems were able to be solved now? Is it that the MCC is one single interface on a new platform that makes them feel comfortable about "splitting the player base" concerns?

I just don't get how having H1 MP on XBL was such a huge obstacle only three years ago, and now we're actually getting it totally unchanged, in the original engine. I'd like to know exactly why this was the case. Were the excuses we got in 2011 just PR spin to get people to stop asking, and rather there were just other insurmountable technical issues with the 360 and/or with XBL as it existed on that system (or the issues were surmountable, but not in the time needed for HCEA to release when it did)? It just seems weird that something that just three years ago seemed like it would never ever happen For Reasons™ is now happening like it's no big deal from a development standpoint.