A three-year gap between each major Halo debut just isn’t cutting it for Microsoft Game Studios, it seems, as division VP Phil Spencer has admitted to IGN that the current release pace  is “probably not frequent enough.”

That’s not to say Microsoft intends to churn out Halo on an annual basis — a strategy Activision has employed with its mega-popular Call of Duty series. While Spencer admits that Activision’s take has worked well for them, he concedes that it’s not an approach that can be directly applied to Halo, due in part to its structured story-driven nature.  There’s also the fact that Acti has multiple teams working on Call of Duty, while Microsoft only has one — previously Bungie, now 343 Industries.

Will we still Halo annualized anytime soon? Judging by Spencer’s comment, probably not, but we could very well see the next Halo — and not an “expansion” type release like ODST —  in less than 3 years.

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Read more: O’Connor: Halo Story to be Finished,  Source: Halo Remake Inbound for Fall,  Microsoft Seeks Talent For Next Halo,  Halo MMO Was In Development At Ensemble,  First Glimpse at Halo 4 from Developers