Did you watch the video? It was basically complete before Microsoft bought it. They then ported it to Xbox.
It may have been an RTS initially, but when Microsoft bought Bungie, it was already "Combat Evolved" and near release.
It may have been an RTS initially, but when Microsoft bought Bungie, it was already "Combat Evolved" and near release.
A lot of development happened right before Combat Evolved got released due to Microsoft injecting a lot of money. It wasn't just an Xbox port of an already finished game. Look at the E3 2000 trailer which is pretty much what has been shown at Macworld the year before. Combat Evolved looked quite different when it came out a year later. Note that Microsoft acquired Bungie in 2000.
I loved Myth and Myth II. A space-based one would have been great.
I don't understand the timeline, though, as the videos shown at MacWorld in 1999 (before Microsoft), show Halo as a first-person shooter. The video is linked above. I think it was a FPS long before Microsoft was interested. I think Microsoft bought it specifically because of the FPS game.
But according to https://www.vice.com/en/article/xwqjg3/the-complete-untold-h...
It was already an FPS by 1998, 2 years before Microsoft was involved, and a year before the video shown above.
They started as an RTS, then decided it was way too much fun to actually drive the vehicles, and the rest is history.
Microsoft definitely helped with the development, but Microsoft bought a FPS game, not an RTS one.