Topic: Halo Infinite

So Halo Infinite is launching alongside the Xbox Series X this holiday season. Here's your one-stop topic to discuss everything related to 343's next epic entry in the Halo Universe!

I just hope the story is more engaging than Halo 5

Fun game to play but dull narrative in my opinion

Only the second time an Xbox console will have launched with a Halo game. It will be epic.

I have only played 1 (Master Chief Collection) and halfway through 2. It's funny that I bought 5 physically and will play the digital version (Game Pass) with all kind of enhancements on Xbox One X... or Series X even at this rate.

I'm really looking forward to the new game and new console. Halo is my favourite series and it's waht got me into Xbox in the first place.

Not sure if this is the best place but GAME in the UK has Halo edition Series X consoles available again right now!

Downloaded the game last night and I was having a blast with it. Brought back alot of memories playing splitscreen co-op with friends. The progression seems a little on the slow side compared to games like CoD or Overwatch but it's something they can fix I am sure. I will.say one thing this "beta" is alot better shape then Call of Duty Vanguard right now and that is a full fledged release.

I can see myself putting some time into this game for awhile.

I'm not normally into large multiplayer shooters at all buy played quite a few of the big map games now and I'm eating this up! Something about the time to kill being so high and how you use grappling hooks etc is awesome

Played a bit last night and was having alot of fun. Not sure what the mode is called in Halo but it reminded me of domination in Call of Duty. Basically we had to take 3 points and hold them. My biggest thing I need to learn coming from CoD is that there's weapons scattered around lol. Still not use to that.

@Tasuki total control? It's pretty good! Have you tried the fiesta slayer 4v4 mode event that kicked off today? Only had the chance to play a couple of games but slayer with the random weapons from spawn is pretty fun.

@R1spam I have not. Might look into it today if I get some time. Been bouncing between Halo Infinite and Forza Horizon 3 the past few days.

So I am wondering does the Halo Infinite Campaign have co-op and is it splitscreen?

@Tasuki not yet, it will be added later but not sure if it is online only or couch co op

@Tasuki I believe Co-op was delayed to ensure they could release the Campaign this year as 'promised' and that 343 have said that Co-op will be coming sometime next year - with May 2022 slated as the 'earliest' its likely to arrive as they said it will arrive after Season 1 which runs until May.

Halo has a tradition of Couch Co-op and 343 know the Fans expect this so I would be surprised if its 'online' only co-op so its just a question of when more than if...

I'm enjoying playing Solo and managing so far to play on Legendary and complete all the extra activities too and never played Halo co-operatively so I am not that disappointed in the delay to the co-op. I always like to complete the game, collect everything etc on my own first. That way, I can play at my pace, do what I want and understand the Story without distraction.

@BAMozzy I can understand playing it at your own pace alone so you can enjoy the story. I tried a few games in the past with people online where they just want to rush through ***** and skip the story. One of the main reasons back when I played World of Warcraft I would never do raids with strangers and only with guildmates.

Lucky for me my son and I have similar play styles when it comes to story based games, Together on co-op we finished all the Borderland games except for 3 (one reason we have yet to play 3 is because they didn't include vertical splitscreen at launch) and both enjoyed the story at our pace. Which is one reason I was wondering if the co-op campaign was splitscreen for Halo Infinite. Which if that's the case that it's coming I will wait to play it with him so we can enjoy it together.

I got plenty of games in my backlog to play in the mean time.

My spoiler-free critical review of Halo Infinite’s campaign

Finished last night it is a really solid and fun sandbox game, but in going open world I feel it’s lost so much.

It’s lost the tempo and cadence of previous halo games, there’s too much lull between the fun fights and action. It’s also lost some of the best scripted set pieces that made Halo. Worst of all there are so few ‘Fu*k yeah!” moments, nothing like Chief taking on a war of the worlds style scarab tank… or three.

That said the moment to moment gameplay in a fight is staggeringly good and should be praised. It’s a great start, but not capitalised on in other areas either.

I didn’t enjoy many of the boss battles. Being locked In a tiny room with a guy who is a bullet sponge with a gravity hammer with no where to go wasn’t fun especially with unfavourable checkpointing leading to death, over and over.

Same with jackal snipers killing you from half a km away when you don’t have a rifle. It’s frustrating.

The last room in particular was absolutely unbalanced: Sniper drones being able to kill you from afar and a guy with a gravity hammer hunting you down. I got there in the end but it took 20 tries and cheese. That’s objectively bad game design.

These difficulty spikes were harsh at times and often it came down to figuring out how to subvert or cheese patterns, again that’s not fun or good design.

I played on Heroic as usual first time on Halo. I’ve always finished Legendary too, but honestly don’t think I will this time. The way the game design and bosses are set up I think it will just be unfair and tedious.

The verticality of the world is great, but there feels like little need to explore. Not least mapmarkers but also lack of diversity and interest. There were no different areas, it all looked the same. If you were to show me a photo it could be virtually anywhere, the ring had little to no personality. So why go open world?

I had maxed out the Spartan cores after about 5-6 hours so why were there another 15 pointless ones to collect? Dropped features? Something for later? It was odd but again gave no incentive.

The grapple is simply brilliant and is the best new thing in Halo Infinite. It’s momentum based control gives so much versatility. Unfortunately, on console at least, it doesn’t have a dedicated button. I often found I was on the scanner or shield and had to take my finger off the stick, or crab like reach across, and have to press the dpad twice to change. In the heat of battle this felt clumsy at best and took me out of the moment constantly leading to many deaths. It felt like trying to type accurately on a phone sceeen in the middle of a train wreck. I didn’t even use the dash for this reason. I don’t know if you can remap the back triggers to these 4 powers on elite controller but in my head that would help immensely.

On the subject of vehicles. Firstly they flip too easily. Second the vertical and rough terrain made it difficult to drive fluidly. Both of these made it often frustrating like I was fighting the controls and vehicle and took me out of the moment and enjoyment.

I feel the story was overly simple. It could be written in the back of a matchbook but it is drip fed out so slowly, which is frustrating that isn’t good narrative. It did have a few interesting threads but these were either A) unresolved or B) resolved unsatisfactorily. I had so many unanswered questions at the end. Yes you can leave plot points unresolved but you have to do so in a satisfying way.

Characters… mixed bag but generally not a fan. Pilot was annoying, though he did have an arc at least as did the Weapon. Wasn’t a huge fan of where they took chief either but that’s mostly spoilers so I’ll skip it. Escharum was that one dimensional guy that writes in ALL CAPS and constantly brags about his legend… yet we never see it. Show don’t tell 343. Terrible B movie villain.

The sound design was excellent guns felt meaty and visceral, the world more alive audibly than it was visually. But sadly I wasn’t a fan of the music, one of my favourite things in Halo. I was looking forward to this as Gareth Coker of Ori fame was on board, as well as two other composers. It’s never bad but it’s never really that memorable either especially the new tracks. The only bit I remember was the ride up to the Final base (I was in a Scorpion) when the main Halo battle theme kicked off and it felt bad ass. Yet even then is was a poor version of the theme with what sounded like a guy on a triangle playing over the top. It reminded me of non-musicians playing on top of a band… at least in made me lol.

Lastly I did have a few technical issues. It crashed twice, once right at the beginning and once near the end, the second time I had a saving bug where instead of saying “checkpoint saved” it said “saving failed” or something similar. This was when I got my second crash and when I booted back up In had lost 4 hours play. As this was at the very end of the story, after two tough back to back boss fights it was very disheartening.

Despite all that I had fun, GAMEPLAY is king and when this is good it’s excellent. Hence I want to go back and play some more. I’ve been critical here but in fact most of these issues are less important than that core gameplay which holds it all up magnificently.

Ultimately it’s a good game but also a missed opportunity. A bit disappointing as it could have been so much more.

8/10

What are the best MP maps for 2-4 players?

@Royalblues Yes, you can continue exploring the map just like before.

@Royalblues If you click on your username in the top-right corner of the page and then click on your username again it will bring you to your profile. From there, you should see two buttons to the left of your username in the top-right corner: one for social media and the other to edit your profile (shaped as a pencil in a square). If you press the second one, you should be able to access your account settings and change your avatar. For some reason, that button doesn't show up normally in the menu bar.

@Royalblues yes you can do side content but annoyingly you can’t go back and replay missions and so there are lots of missable collectibles, skulls etc.

@LtSarge I enjoyed reading your review on the other thread. Very different experience to mine above, but plenty of room for different views.