Update: 343 Industries has clarified that Halo 5 players will require an Xbox Live Gold account to play online co-op.
Executive producer Josh Holmes commented on Halo Waypoint that "I misspoke during the interview when stating that online co-op campaign would be supported with an Xbox Live Silver account. Co-op campaign will require Xbox Live Gold to play. I want to extend my sincere apologies to our fans, and to Game Informer, for this error and any confusion it has caused."
"That said, it is important to us that fans have the opportunity to play the full co-op campaign experience and we are doing this by providing a 14-day Xbox Live Gold trial with Halo 5: Guardians," he added.
Original Story: The featured title in the latest issue of Game Informer is Halo 5: Guardians and developer 343 Industries has divulged plenty of new details about the game, including co-op details and free DLC maps.
Guardians will be the first core Halo game since 2001's Halo: Combat Evolved not to feature split-screen co-op. Co-op has been a continually successful staple of the series since Halo 2 and while Guardians' campaign does feature four player co-op support, it is online only. Surprisingly, players won't need an Xbox Live Gold account to participate in online co-op.
Master Chief will be joined by Blue Team in both single-player and four-player co-op. The Blue Team's members will feature in cutscenes and follow Chief's commands in single-player, while in co-op, each player takes on the role of a specific member with a different loadout.
Blue Team, a sub-unit of the UNSC's Spartan-2 division which was led by Chief during the Human-Covenant War, has been a popular part of the Halo universe for some time now, but has never before appeared in a major game. Its members, Linda, Kelly, and Fred, were all abducted from their families by the UNSC when they were six years old, just like Chief.
For reasons which aren't clear just yet, Chief and Blue Team are eventually declared AWOL by the UNSC and hunted by Spartan Jameson Locke, who previously appeared in the Halo: Nightfall TV series. Locke will be accompanied in his mission by Fireteam Osiris. Unlike Blue Team, Fireteam Osiris is made up Spartan-4 soldiers, who were adults who volunteered to join the Spartan program.
On the competitive multiplayer front, 343 Industries says Halo 5 will launch with 20 maps, while an additional 15 maps will be released by June 2016 and every single one of those maps will be free. 343 Industries says they decided to do this because they didn't want to divide the player base by selling maps.
Halo 3: ODST's Gunnery Sergeant Edward Buck, played by Firefly actor Nathan Fillion, will also feature in Guardians, Game Informer's preview confirms.
Halo 5: Guardians launches on October 27th.
