343 should’ve been taking a good look at much of the recent mediocre or straight-up bad open/semi-open world games if they hope for Infinite to even stand out well. But so far we have marine rescue missions, assassination missions (implied by crosshair symbol waypoints on the map), and just “destroy these objectives” missions packed with the run-of-the-mill undiscovered location markers and ambient wildlife.
Actually doing more with established Zeta lore beyond name drops, terminals or god forbid codexes
What scares many of us, justifiably, is that 343 has been misinterpreting our criticisms of Halo 4 and 5 and is going to reduce any of the greater implications of Zeta Halo to readable/watchable terminals, random name drops by characters, or confining everything into an easy-to-access codex that only works in games where the narrative isn’t given a strong priority. But Halo Infinite has to be a “simple story” like Halo Wars 2, right? No, that would be the easy and lazy way out and a massive slap in the face to Infinite’s narrative potential that’s more then “Human good Monke Alien Bad”
Properly introduce and let players encounter Mendicant Bias in-person and let Chief interact with it, provided that he is still around. The same goes for every location and character on Zeta Halo from the Palace of Pain to the significance of Ancient Humans and Precursors. Find a good way (and there is!) to make them relevant to the plot instead of treating Zeta Halo like a virtual museum.
Memorable encounters that add to the wider universe instead of being pop-culture easter egg or “lol random” moments
Okay, I have to admit that much of Halo’s easter eggs were incredibly well-done and got a laugh out of me at points Neither 343 and Bungie have really taken advantage of encounters like them to adding effective means of rewarding investement into the wider universe. How about a deserted Marine who’s an insurrectionist sympathizer and is angered at the UNSC letting Cortana get out of hand, complete with the symbol painted onto his warthog? Or a couple of Kig-Yar merchants setting up shop near an important location and offers you stuff in exchange for “bringing over” a specific member of a certain SPARTAN fireteam that he/she “wants to talk to”?
Have more distinct marines and characters that dynamically react to the environment and enemies in combat, instead of being stereotypical NPCs.
The Halo series is known for their Marine NPCs that are used as cannon fodder and don’t do much outside of being programmed to fire at the enemy until they’re dead and say the occasional voice line. On another hand has the Covenant species do have unique enemy behaviors that make each unit stand out - Grunts will flee if a Brute or Elite dies, Elites will go beserk if you take down their shields, and Jackals piss us off with their sniping accuracy. That’s not enough now and Halo Infinite is already showing potential of good AI improvements for their enemies, so treat the marines and allied characters the same way.
For example, have a couple of Marines be more biased against grunts and charge a lonely pair in amusement, and quickly fall back if they see a jackal, elite, or brute. And then others that try to pull sneak attacks. And others that aren’t as strong as other marines and tend to swap heavier weapons with marines holding lighter ones when given the opportunity. And those that are genuinely afraid of Elites, Brute, Hunters, and keep their distance as much as possible. AND those that don’t immediatly give up their weapons to Chief in the heat of combat (“Chief, I can’t waste this last rocket! Let me take down the Wraith!”).
It would take up this entire post if I were to go into detail for specific characters, but apply the same logic to them and create unique combat behaviors for them.
N****ot stretching the map for the sake of “OMG BIG MAP” and everything being empty as a result.
Self-explanitory for those who’ve been caught in the open-world boom of the mid-2010s. We like well-detailed worlds but if there’s nothing but forest for the next couple of miles between objectives, there’s going to be a problem.