Okay, so this is a lengthy one which I’ll start with a brief backround.
I was a toddler when CE came out and played the campaign on CO-OP endlessly with my step dad and this was THE MOST IMPORTANT stage of gaming in childhood. I love Halo, all of them. Sure, Halo 4 and 5 missed the mark but each had their own Pros aswell as multiple Cons. So for the sake of argument, I will be talking about PURELY “HALO” and draw as little comparisons to modern games as possible.
Pros: For a long time I’ve searched for the Halo 2 vibe in the franchise and I’m happy to say “Infinite” comes close enough to please players with the same pleasures from the earlier iteration of the Arena Shooter style gameplay.
Gunplay - minor tweaks aside - is almost perfect. There’s plenty of weapons that cater to different playstyle and offer their own uniqueness and style.
Graphics - Are actually pretty impressive for the most part, there are MINOR visual glitches but you HAVE TO be looking for them to see them (I’m on OG XBOX)
Cons: Well, there are many.
Cosmetics - Meaning armour, skins, coatings, attachments to armour and vehicles are all great on paper. But the way you earn them is MILES and MILES from what HALO is known for. It’s as if they realised they can’t do REQ packs anymore and found the next way to make extra money from it. Never has the term “Freedom of Player Expression” felt so limited and catered to those who would spend money on it.
Co-oP: Not to be seen at launch, after 6 years in development (C19 aside) theres no excuse that they cant implement one of HALOs staple modes into day one.
Forge: Also not available at launch, again, being one of the saving Grace’s of the franchise since HALO3. So for now, we’re stuck with very few maps and have to wait till 2022 to see any real passion put into map design.
Microtransactions: Must be a joke, $10 might seem like nothing to a gaming company, but that $10 quickly turns to $50+ once the game has ran its (10 Year Cycle)
“Free 2 Play”: Is nonsense and is just how they are able to slip these microtrandactions under the rug for us to find. Find me a game that split its core game from its multiplayer game and charged full price for one and LITTERED the rest with microtrandactions.
Battlepass: The limit set for “Free Players” is abysmal. For every 10 tiers, you MAY be lucky and unlock something slick for your armour but that’s about it aside from challenge swaps and 2X xp. But challenge swaps and doublexp is useless when they dont help you towards anything except from 10+ tiers down the line.
Progression: There is none. None at all. Unless your a ranked player your going to be VERY disappointed when you realise noone has a “Level” and it can only be measured on how far in the battlepass you are.
Challenges: Are the exact opposite of what they should be let alone what they do for the player. You can go games without receiving a map that had the gun/vehicle REQUIRED to complete a challenge, thus putting your challenge completion and “Progression” right down to 0.
Rewards: Again, there are none. Dont be surprised when you get a perfect medal and a killionaire only you realise you get the same XP as someone who dominated control points or the objective, you will get the same XP as someone who is AFK the entire match.
In summary, the gameplay is fine, but that’s it, it’s fine.
I completed the first weekly challenges and now only get 50xp (No more or less) for completing a game. Considering it takes 1000xp to tier up, this means I now have to play 20 games or wait for the new challenges (meaning between weekly challenges I’m not playing for anything other than nostalgia).
The way the systems are set up is going to kill Halo Infinites fan base in a couple of months unless fixed / tweaked. HALO isnt just a highly respected IP that a company should come and milk for money. The franchise and its fanbase should be catered to and respected, not the big board room with people who more than likely wont play the game or can easily afford to pay for the pass.
I dont respect someone in full armour now because I know they didnt earn it.
In Halo: Reach, if I saw someone with the Haunted Helmet, I knew they worked their -Yoink!- off for it and respected the grind. Now I see children who pay FAR TOO MUCH money for cosmetics.
We were told Coatings would pay off, but they haven’t.
Sure, they look cool, but what’s the point if they can onot go on certain armour cores. If they implement each coat design into it’s own colour and then made your coating “wheel” customizable then the creativity would multiply 10fold.
If you charge 5$ less for the pass, maybe more people would be more inclined to buy it. But whilst you charge 10$ for bundles with bare minimum, it helps us see right through what 343 are trying to do.
You’ve split the fanbase into the Halo diehards that would defent the game to the death (until now) and the F2P players who dont know any different and assume that this predatory scheme is acceptable.
Truly, I hope 343 makes some MAJOR changes before release and afterwards. But for now, i would of much rather paid $60 for Campaign AND multiplayer (Just like ANY game has and should be doing). Instead, i find myself hoping 343 being overwhelmed with criticism for the micro transactions to the point of crumbling and either lowering prices or being boycotted. And I used to be a die hard Halo fan.
Now, the game sits for days at a time waiting for challenges to reset so I can get back into grinding (Even though I distinctly remember them saying you wouldnt run out of challenges).
Bring back the CR system from Reach
Give us more playlists at launch
And for the love of god, stop treating your fans as a cash cow. This is HALO. It isnt fortnight, or Apex or any other game fresh out the oven that NEEDS to make these microtrandactions to fund the game.
Its HALO, for 20+ Years you’ve survived on initial sales and the very seldom map pack. So why cant you now?
As a loyal fan, I’m overly disappointed in the outcome of HALO: Infinite and can already tell I’ll play 2/3 times a week at most based purely on progression and microtransactions. And going by Facebook groups and these forums, I’m thankful I’m not the only one thinking this.
Something seriously has to be done, not a battle royale. But anything that pushes us closer to how the older HALOs functioned. When I felt I could run it for days on end and constantly be working towards something.
But after 6 years if development, it seems they spent a large timeframe working out how to monetise the game and armour, its shameful.
Maybe Infinite 2 will nail it 10 years down the line. But you ALMOST had it perfect this time. It just so happens the things that you seriously messed up, makes HALO what it was. Too many companies are trying the F2P with battlepass but HALO. DOES. NOT. NEED. IT. Nor should it have ever even went across the board and agreed with.
Make the game for the players, not the money.
It might be “Free 2 Play” but it comes hand in hand with “Pay to Enjoy”