There’s plenty of room for sandbox redundancy in halo infinite right now. Lots of things that aren’t functionally all THAT different from weapons that currently exist, but are different enough to warrant a new weapon. Things like the Covenant Carbine, SMG, DMR, etc. However, what about the ones that aren’t? perhaps variations of weapons that existed in past halo games that some people prefer over the infinite counterpart?
Well, what if we had a new customization slot in the weapons bench, like “variant” or something for certain weapons that lets you swap out a weapon for a version more preferable to certain players. Maybe you’re gettin old and cant accurately land sidekick shots as quick as it lets you pull the trigger, so you swap it out for the old classic magnum, where it fires slower with more damage per shot so your (my) hands can keep up. Maybe you prefer the slower, punchier feel of the halo 4 assault rifle, or the roaring flood of bullets from the old MA5B.
If we wanna get REALLY bold, you could, perhaps, keep this new customization slot relegated to the performance changes only, and call it “internals”, while the visual designs associated with them become available as either weapon kits or model options, Use this for things that didn’t differ drastically in performance but went through major facelifts visually, like the sniper rifles, battle rifles, plasma pistols, etc.
To clarify, this should be strictly used only for variations that would not change the weapon’s role in the slightest, like, for example, even if you pick the MA5B internals, it would still take the assault rifle JUST as much time for the weapon bloom to go from 0 to max, just as much time to kill the target, and just as much time for the magazine to deplete, but it would do so by firing more weaker bullets downrange faster. You would never use the assault rifle differently, it would just feel different