About 6 months ago, I got fed up with Infinite. Each match felt like a chore, each engagement with an enemy player was tense and frustrating, but even when I won it didn’t feel good. I wondered if maybe it was just that I was growing out of gaming. So I decided to test the theory and hopped on MCC.
And it is fun. Even after being out for 10+ years, every game is entertaining. Sure there are still tense engagements and frustrating losses, but they are broken up by satisfying kills, funny deaths that actually make me laugh, and casual rides in vehicles that I know won’t turn out well but are still enjoyable.
I can’t put my finger on why it is, but Infinite just has no joy in it. The spartans look cool, the weapons sound great, but it just doesn’t have the fun that I associate with Halo. What are your thoughts?
Could be unconscious bias for a particular experience. Could be that Halo Infinite lacks fun-factor in a lot of its design. But my own thoughts? It’s because those games play in a manner that is meant to be enjoyed.
Halo Infinite goes to great lengths to ensure that you are sweating at all times and only rewards you for either completing your challenges or sweating your nuts off. Asking me, I don’t consider that very fun.
Well for one there is no traditional progression system.
The only way for you to level up is through the battle pass.
Second the only way for you to get rewarded is through the awful challenge system. There is no match xp, if you go on a killing spree or get an overkill there is no reward for that. Everyone is just focused on trying to complete their challenge because of this.
Lets compare it to say Apex. With Apex you get match xp and can rank up to level 500 (its actually more now) but you can also complete challenges that help you progress through the battlepass faster. Its just a way more entertaining experience
For me these are some of the biggest factors. Lack of maps, weapons, and game types are another big reason
To me Halo Infinite felt way too “sterile” if that makes sense, probably due to 343 trying to push Halo to be a competitive shooter. There’s less whacky sandbox moments in Halo Infinite compared to previous Halo games. For example how likely are you to be killed by random debris in Halo Infinite?
The absolutely ridiculous challenge system that’s tied to the only progression systems (the seasonal battle pass & rotational events) and how it limits what players can play if they want to make any form of progression or unlocking of items in multiplayer.
More specifically, no match performance-based XP earnings. There’s just a Daily Challenge (Play a Match) that dwindles down to 50 XP after about 6 or 7 matches. Thankfully they’ve realized their mistake (late), but are looking to implement some form of match XP system.
No character XP progression system that’s independent of the battlepass.
Lacking a match composer that allows players/fireteams to search a variety of modes/playlists simultaneously.
Generally speaking, a severe lack of content; though, there’s been notable improvement on the mode-side for the multiplayer since release. I’m still hoping to see a Squad Battle (6v6) playlist.
A pretty limited amount of maps; though, it’s hoped that the eventual release of Forge should help solve this issue in due time.
No Forge (at release).
The annoyance of having to manually begin a new search after a match ends (particularly when searching in social) and how trying to do anything else during the search period will kick you out of the search.
The inability to bookmark or save a past game for re-viewing in theater.
The fact that the social arena environment would greatly benefit from a more robust point-based scoring system (like featured in Halo 4) to reward player contributions more broadly and to help further distinguish the social experience from the ranked environment.
As hinted to earlier, extremely limited player customization options/progression if you’re not paying for overpriced items sold in the shop; though, cross-core sharing should somewhat help.
No playlist/mode XP or Win tally progression system to complement CSRs as an alternate ranking system that’s focused on being a progressive investment grind instead of a reflection of a player’s TrueSkill.
No registered Fireteams/Spartan Companies in order to allow for group recruitments and to introduce Team CSRs (absent the individual team member performance adjustments).
Custom games/options are buggy and limited.
No customs browser, but it’s suppose to arrive sometime in the future.
No assassinations (with an optional on/off toggle).
Vehicle play feels underwhelming — other than in the Ghost & Wasp IMO. The Warthog still lacks an appropriate weighty feeling.
Lackluster weapon sandbox (this is more of an opinion). The only weapons that feel truly okay/good to use in the hands of a casual player are: BR, AR, Rocket Launcher, and the Sword.
A skill curve emphasis put onto the game’s aiming, so many of the weapons feature historically low reticle and bullet magnetisms. It may be in-part due to the developers seeking a balance between two input devices (Controller & M&KB) with cross-platform crossplay in place, but at the same time the skill-curve emphasis on aiming feels excessive and fairly unwelcoming to casual players.
Game voice chat is disabled by default which is an anti-social move by the developers.
Extremely minimal in-game career stats and accolades visibility.
The short answer is that Halo Infinite is a game made by and for eSports wannabes.
A while ago I did a word count on the 343i’s March 2022 “CLOSER LOOK: HALO INFINITE’S RANKED EXPERIENCE” post and the word skill or skills was mentioned 72 times. The word fun only 5 times…
There are a few main reasons but I dont think it has anything to do with the actual gameplay. I think the main reasons are:
Desync
This one is pretty obvious but desync and other network/server related problems are currently massively ruining the gameplay.
Matchmaking
The tight skill based matchmaking needs to be relaxed in social. The ideal scenario would be giving you the choice like previous Halos did (Halo 5 for example) that allowed you to choose if matchmaking prioritized skill based or connection based matchmaking. That way everyone is happy. But a short term solution would be to loosen up on the skill based matchmaking in a similar way to how Halo 3 did back in the day. Some games were matched more tightly by skill than others to give a nice variety in social gameplay.
Social doesn’t feel social enough
Social playlists need more fun, non competitive modes. Social Team Doubles needs modes like Team Snipers (S7s Only), Ninja Slayer, Rocket Repulsors, Fiesta, etc. BTB would be more fun with some of those same modes and more non traditional fun modes (maybe in a separate action sack BTB playlist). Speaking of which, Infinite needs an Action Sack 4v4 playlist, with modes including Shottys and Snipers, Fiesta, Ninja Slayer, Rocket Repulsors, Skewers, Power Slayer, Grifball, Dodgeball, Sumo, etc. We also need Infection ASAP.
I think the fact that weekly challenges are a chore and forces us to play crap we dont want to play makes it crap.
because we want the weekly but it drains the life out of us our pleasure for playing instead its a chore a job then you just want to stop playing after
and the fact we have weekly challenges in general makes it crap we cant just casually play for fun especially people who like collecting stuff. We can no longer just pick up put down the game as we please without fear of missing out
But that’s it, I don’t think they want casual players. It seems everything is geared to people paying for that dopamine-drip-reward to filter out the players needed to support their eSoprt leagues.
I still have fun in Infinite, but I have to really not play it regularly to be able to do so. If I try for a weekly ultimate or play daily that kills it for me. I am biased though, I think the basic gunplay is not that fun compared to Splitgate. It feels a bit sterile and lacking fluidity, like they can’t make up their mind if spartans are agile or heavy. Physics also seems a bit tame. If I get hit by a RL whilst sprint-sliding I want to see my spartan fly in a funny way.
When you add desync it makes every engagement a bit of a coin toss. This is also why I find it unrewarding when I tryhard. I have to luck out on networking and matchmaker.
And let’s not forgot the absence of player collisions which results in melee kills for and against that I have no idea how they happen… halo 5 in this context was way more predictable… lots of the time I literally have no idea how I killed a person or how they killed me with a melee…
Halo Infinite needs something that keeps the players more invested in actually playing the game. Right now, the only investments a player can make is found inside the in-game store. Even trying to go for an Onyx rank gains a player practically nothing besides bragging rights, unless you just enjoy pretending to play(sweat) like a pro gamer for free.
343 made another huge mistake (as usual) by removing career progression from Halo multiplayer which only proves that they are still too inept to understand something that helped make Halo MP famous and popular in the first place. The Career Progression gave players milestones to reach in both Ranked and Social playlists, it also meant that players who invested more time and effort into their Spartan Careers in general would be rewarded more (and in turn keep the game populated and relevant). This will undoubtedly extend the amount of time players keep playing Infinite. Toss in some more TRUE Social playlists and maybe even Custom Games progression of some kind, and the fun will become even better.
Right now, players only have Challenges, Battle Pass and Events… and Challenges are literally the only way to progress in ANY of those things lol It’s monotonous, tedious work doing Blue Challenges for the Battle Pass and Weekly BS reward, then having to do more of the same Challenges except now they are Orange for the Event… HOW IN THE WORLD COULD ANYONE THINK THIS IS A CREATIVE SYSTEM?! This is the most lazy, ignorant way to do your multiplayer system. Even Fall Guys has a better Career Progression than Halo Infinite! That’s pretty pathetic of 343.
Then to top it off, we have a severe lack of features, game modes, maps, and playlists which only toss more fuel right on to the fire… It seems all of the most beloved weapons, playlists and game modes from previous Halos are going to get dripfed into the game throughout this 10 year lifespan and we’ll be told that the “new” content they added is “brand spanking new” all because they made some very slight adjustments to them like changing the names or something before they finally put it in the game.
Ya, I actually started actively ignoring the challenges in Infinite after Season 1, because it was a slog that didn’t actually reward me with anything I was interested in. But even ignoring the rewards the actual gameplay just turns me off, it doesn’t make me feel good to play.
That’s a good point about the physics though. Starting with H2’s ragdoll physics and H3 flying debris, it was just fun to see what the sandbox would result in when you threw in explosions and gravity hammers.
I usually play H3 or Reach social, here and there I’ll play H2. Sometimes I’ll spend a couple hours in Reach custom games, because it’s just mindless fun.
Hm that’s a good point. It cares too much about “balance” and doesn’t really embrace the environment or the physical sandbox. So there’s little variety in experience.
And that fits with why the vehicles have so little health, bc they care more about competitive play than making the vehicles fun to use. I basically avoid vehicles bc they feel like they were only designed to be used strategically
Thebcore philosophy of the the team is essentially the reverse of what made the halo franchise so popular is my inpression.
But im not an expert on anyone elses enjoyment of halo so i can only speak for myself.
My comments in the threads titled
343 doesnt understand halo
And
Halo is a competitive shooter
Provide context and my reasoning should anyone wish for futher insight as to why I feel as such.
for me is the mix of maps, iffy controller aiming, horrible horrible matchmaking, and push for competitive in every playlist. The lack of a traditional progression system, and more social modes on top. it’s just straight up not fun.