Infinite Tech Preview – Social Arena

Games Halo Infinite
662

Pros

  • Gameplay and maps feel amazing, it feels like a combination of Halo 3 and Halo Reach playstyles to me with modern touches and refinements which is amazing! - I personally like the way the guns feel, I’m not the most competitive / e-sport player so I don’t have much to say about ‘TTK being too long’ or rng bloom but I’ve been really enjoying the gunplay and was just starting to get the hang of the new Sniper after tweaking my mouse sensitivity - Optimization work done on PC since the last flight is just awesome, I was personally worried about my rig being able to play it and being able to run it at 60FPS with Mostly High / Ultra settings just felt great - Vehicles felt great to try out aside from the Ghost feeling a little too overpowered in my opinion, given how many times I got splattered by a Ghost that was strafing to the side because of how fast it goes
    Cons

  • Grenades dropped by players have an orange glow on them, every time I saw this I thought it was a live grenade and would often try to avoid it only to run into enemies to then realize it was just a grenade on the floor. - ‘BXB’ combo really needs to be removed from matchmaking, being able to exploit melee / reload / melee animation cutoffs makes it a nightmare in close quarters maps, BUT I did enjoy doing it with my buddy to mess around so maybe enabling it in Custom Matches could actually be a plus? - Radar at 18m is a bit too short range for a lot of situations, increasing it back to the regular 25m would go a long way - Ghost moves a little too fast and splatters too easily, fun when you’re driving, not fun when you get run over by a strafing Ghost that doesn’t even realize you’re there

663

plz make the power slide on the warthog more like halo’s reach, 4 and 5 because in those games i could switch from driving forwards to driving backwards seamlessly without stopping like if it was strait from an action movie. Oh and i almost forgot if you die while clambering you’re corpse will be frozen mid air and the frag throwing animation while in the warthog is weird and is not in sink.

664
  1. Weapon balance. This is pretty good but the AR feels a bit too powerful, maybe 0,05 secs longer to kill would be fine, it is pretty much an upgrade from the sidekick, which can feel kinda weird to use sometimes, the plasma pistol on the other hand feels quite useless, no EMP, hard to use… the skewer is still quite hard to use but I guess that’s intentional to use it on vehicles, the Gravity hammer needs gravitational effects, the flag should be a 1 hit kill. I don’t think there should be many other changes to the weapons by themselves.

2.Friend or foe. This needs some revision, the shields are quite confusing to look at and it just feels kinda weird, maybe remove the outline from the enemy players. On the other hand, please PLEASE, friendly player collision, without it it just feels weird to see an ally walk through you.

3.Communication. I often felt that I wasn’t given enough information about what I just picked up, mainly with the equipment I couldn’t know what I had in the middle of a fight once i just picked it up, this could be a UI problem though. Controll on your kill cam is something we’d appreciate as well, it was in Halo 5 so why not Halo Infinite.

4.Equipment. Equipment is pretty cool but the drop wall and the threat sensor still feel quite underwhelming, maybe some slight buffs to the shield strength and the radious and time of the sensor could help. Also, minor pick up, add broken pieces when the shield deployer is broken, right now it just dissapears.

5.Granades. They are cool, the dynamo granade is weird but definately pretty good. The granade launching is quite minor though, pumping it up a little bit could make stuff more consistent.

6.Maps. Overall fantastic, BUT there’s something missing, and that’s props, the maps need more interactible props like boxes on the map, traffic cones, etc. There’s loads of potential with those and the grapplehook!

665

Music is depressing, cut that halfway sound right out of arena. I usually love halo music but i lose out on it cause that half way sound drives me crazy, so i turn it off which also then cuts out menu music unfortunately. Ability to just have specific halo soundtrack would be perfect.

Pistol sidekick reminds me of when halo 2 got rid of the sweet magnum from halo 1. It doesnt have to be that overpowered. But i mean your playing as a freak of nature in a tank suit and your giving them what looks like a toy pistol…

Default control settings should have dead zones to zero, felt much better after this switch.

Toggle ui/hud. I want the hudless mode so bad, but not having a reticle is pretty challenging, mainly when zooming in, with a scope… get rid of the scoreboard /timer option would be nice.

The needler, what did they do to you. Looks like something outta the mcc and is slow to shoot slow to explode and feels like it does nothing in terms of damage.

The red ghost turns like a train…

The mongoose feels like it has adhd and can we just make them all gungooses?

Please for the love of halo, have an option to turn that awful player outline off on players. If my players have clan tags above them its obvious they are on my team. The opposing players dont need an outline, regardless.

Despise the battlepass and lack of an exp system. Really noted how boring it got when the battlepass was completed and you couldnt even level up, makes for pointless exp bonus as well.

I assume i am the only one on this boat, but forge maps are awful, specifically the aesthetic look to them, layouts can be great. But please keep them out of regular playlists, money goes to 343 to make the maps not the community. 343 take the community map and make it look like it belongs.

Believe it or not i really enjoyed the betas so far. Just voicing my gripes/growing pains with the game.

666

Xbox series X seemed to have a lot of screen tearing. And the vehicle damage is way too high. Can’t kill a ghost with all the ammo you spawn with. That seems to be over kill.

667

I love the weapon timers being visible, although the weapon lockers don’t exactly catch my eye so I don’t always realize they’re there.

I’m no tech expert but aiming is really hard, I’m guessing due to aim assist. I don’t even attempt shooting at range with the pistol anymore and I even struggle at times with the AR up close. This hurts to say as I feel I am very competent when I go back to MCC.

Also, the AR seems a bit too viable in all situations. I almost never saw any benefit using a weapon pick-up over the AR, aside from shotgun in close range or the rocket launcher. I would argue that most weapon pickups hurt my chances to win fights in most situations when I could have used the AR instead.

668

First off I just want to say that I was so incredibly excited to play this game, I’ve been a halo die hard since my grandma bought me Halo CE for Xmas all those years ago. That said I want this game to be amazing and tried not to look at it though rose tinted glasses
things I love are the overall feel and pace. I’m almost 30 so the days of sitting down to play video games for 10 hours are gone but this game kept me wanting more. When the MP times were over I couldn’t wait until they came back on again. My buddies and I had an absolute blast.

the only downsides I found were some random lag spikes (mostly on Bazzar) which would happen every time I played the map
some menu issues where it would say “can’t connect to server” but the cancel search button was just frozen and the only way to play was to reset the app
and random freezes after a game. Basically we’d finish a game and the “XP” display would freeze and I would have to restart again
I know it’s a flight so those are probably just flight problems since I saw a few of the streamers I follow have the same issues

669

If you press the “change weapon” and “punch” buttons at the same time you seems to move a bit faster and can almost infinitely punch. Had someone do it to me, and I immediately tried it. Super weird, but can probably can be fixed. Watching someone charge at you doing it is rather odd! haha

670

RADAR

  • Change radar from 18m back to its classic 25m - I found the 18m very frustrating and almost pointless - Time and time again I would look at my radar and then back up, only to be beaten down by a sprinting player - Many times I was like “Where did they come from?? I literally JUST looked at my radar!?” - Perhaps 18m would have worked in a sandbox without sprint
    DIALOGUE

  • Would very much like the option to individually turn on/off specific narrators (AI, announcer, commander, Spartan chatter, etc.) - Would also enjoy having the option to select what type of events these narrators call out (example: an option to turn off corny jokes but keep on weapon spawns)
    BR SLAYER

  • Please have an option for BR slayer! - AR and sidekick are cool and all, but come on, it’s the BR. I need this. Please…
    SLIDE

  • More control over slide! - Would love the ability to cancel the slide - Destiny does this PERFECTLY fyi
    BLOOM

  • Bloom seems a little much on the Sidekick and Commando - Perhaps lower bloom but reduce their damage to compensate for the buff (lower rate of fire?; less aim assist?)
    GERNADES

  • Radius of grenades was a bit high for my taste - With the radius that high it can feel “unclear” and “frustration” as to high you died
    FLAG RECOVERY

  • Way too fast holy moly
    MUSIC

  • Please add classic Halo scores alongside the new stuff - The music of the classic Halos is one of the core parts of what made them great - Please please please don’t leave those songs behind <3
    PLAYER COLLISION / PHYSICS

  • Please bring back player collision for the entire game - Have an option for a player to turn player collision off if they are getting grieved - Double jumping and grenade jumping are one of those beautiful legacy things about the Halo games - It would be a real loss if they don’t come back :'o
    PLASMA PISTOL EMP

  • Disabling a vehicle with a perfect plasma bolt is bliss… so if that could return that would be just great
    VEHICLES

  • They seemed too weak and would die way too fast - Halo 3 had a great balance for these
    GRAVITY HAMMER

  • Needs way more physics - Bring it back to the classic version the new one is over powered and frustrating to play against
    ROCKETS

  • Velocity is WAY too fast
    UI

  • Its a bit cluttered - Kind of hard to navigate - Canceling games was weird - Not being able to customize your spartan when you are the leader and searching is not optimal

671

Really loved the game and I’m someone who hasn’t enjoyed Halo since 3/odst.

But I didn’t really enjoy the new Grav Hammer having no physics, also didn’t like the grab hammer sound it’s a very plain boom and not identifable like the original, no player collision was a shame but I could see the worry that the maps were designed around that.

My BIGGEST gripe ending up being the vehicle physics and controls.

  • I didn’t like that you could not turn the vehicle with the left stick like all previous games. - The vehicles feel like they’re all being held to the ground and lack their original bounciness. - Vehicles barely slide or slip anymore, feel very wooden and boring to drive.
672

Suggestions/Things to be Tweaked:

  • A problem I had was with the “hitboxes” for getting into vehicles and hijacking them, they were a little wonky. There were several times when I was trying to get into a warthog driven by one of my teammates and I would hold X and the icon to get in would go away if the vehicle moved very slightly and I had to be in like the perfect spot to get in. I feel like they should adjust this and make the hitbox for getting into vehicles bigger because it was quite annoying.

  • Not being able to 1 hit melee with the flag should be changed in my opinion.

  • Add per match XP that you earn based on how well you perform

  • Had some problems with melees not registering, an enemy Spartan and I would both have no shields and melee each other at the same time but the result would be either me dying and the other player not dying or vice versa. Noticed this happened many times and I never see this happen in Halo 3 and Reach when playing Master Chief Collection, always have consistent melee hit registration/detection.

  • Maybe have an option for Modern Aiming and Classic Aiming inputs just like how Master Chief Collection has it.

  • Would be cool to have another pistol that maybe is better for long range than the sidekick

  • Pressing button to see score is a toggle instead of only appearing when held down like old Halos were. Maybe give us an option to have it be either toggle or hold down (this may have been in the settings to do and I’m just dumb and didn’t see it though)

  • Couldn’t find a way to bind a push to talk input to my controller, should be added. (Also may have been there but I just am dumb and couldn’t find it)

  • Couldn’t find easy way to see what my XP challenges were when I was already inside a match. This would be very helpful

  • BR buff!

673

I’m used to H4 radar which feels perfect. I think the radar in this game is too close quarters. By the time I see a dot I’m already getting shot at without much time to react for a fair fight.

The cadence on the BR feels a bit slow. I love the gun but it feels slower than any other Halo BR I’ve played with.

Damage level on the ghost feels a bit high.

674

> 2533274914463283;673:
> I’m used to H4 radar which feels perfect. I think the radar in this game is too close quarters. By the time I see a dot I’m already getting shot at without much time to react for a fair fight.
>
> The cadence on the BR feels a bit slow. I love the gun but it feels slower than any other Halo BR I’ve played with.
>
> Damage level on the ghost feels a bit high.

Good shout about the ghost. I loved using it, but did feel a little too tanky

675

Solo puedo decir que esto es un Halo 3 con Sprint :v no puedo sentir algo nuevo como cuando experimente Halo reach y mucho menos a la experiencia del multijugador de Halo 5 que sin duda a sido el mejor de todos

676

> 2535467175559025;661:
> > 2533274833311664;621:
> > - Strongholds isn’t as good as koth. - You guys know you’re allowed to be your own game and not just follow the market right?
>
> Really good points that I didn’t really address in my original post.
>
> Strongholds on its own really needs adjusting, I just felt like I was riding a carousel the whole time. Make it take longer to capture to drive player engagements around the objective. Make the zones smaller. King of the Hill is just such a good gametype, I really hope they don’t replace it outright with Strongholds aka Domination. There is room for both. King of the Hill is a more Halo gametype as well while Strongholds is just a 1 for 1 rip-off of Domination.
>
> On the other point, I also agree with you. A lot of choices feel safe, in line with other shooters, and to be honest there’s not a lot that they stuck their neck out there to drive a unique Halo: Infinite game mechanic. Playing strongholds with AR starts is as close to Call of Duty Halo has been since H:4.

Strong disagree on Strongholds.

Strongholds has a few very important but subtle tweaks which make it quite different from the likes of Domination - most importantly the fact that you can only score if you have 2 or more control points.

It’s also one of the best modes Halo has ever had.

677

I would much prefer a Red Vs Blue type match than the outlines, so that the shield flickering can be yellow and visible instead of the same color and indistinguishable. I can tell when a shield is almost broken, not if it’s down or fully up.

678

Social Arena can be difficult at times depending how unsafe and aggressive I play during matches, but it was a fun and smooth experience!

The maps feel fun to traverse and are unique from one another, the sandbox is fantastic where almost every weapon and equipment feels useful that leads to gameplay variety and the modes like Slayer, CTF and Strongholds are fun as well!

The Grappleshot is easily the greatest thing 343 have implemented in all of their own Halo games and there’s so much fun things players can do and have done with it.

Behemoth is also good with its vast and open layout while having an aesthetic that’s overloading my nostalgia for Halo.

679

It has potential to be great with the H5 movement and the H3/Reach gunplay. H2 TTK H3 equipment pick ups and H3/H2 art style and maps like behemoth. Problem is the wonky aim is having the same problem H5 had which is very far from great which also probably akin to the weapon balancing issues across the board and respected weapon roles with in the sandbox …considering this was a technical test I’m hoping things can get ironed out to have that buttery smooth aim of H3/H2 again and then we can all say it’s great cuz right now it ain’t… also if this was intentionally done so PC players could have an advantage not sure if it was… but just implying that if it’s not a mistake but rather intentional. Which I also don’t understand because the inputs/crossplay seem quite even to me on MCC or maybe I could be wrong idk but anyway I’ll be jumping ship and playing MCC for eternity because I will not be going through another halo 5 type of aiming system ever again period…. Because the aim in that game is not the best and one of the worst in the series and that’s a fact…. And I am someone who almost mastered the pistol in that game and it’s still has mediocre aim mechanics and always will have… and I am very passionate about halo and don’t want to see infinite go down the same path please 343 make a good aim system for the game before launch for all inputs because currently it’s not very good. Thank you !

680

I dislike the new HUD in game. Could you test the old HUD for a flight to see how people think it is? The new HUD is all close together and I can’t quick glance to see on average how many bullets I have left, or what grenades I have.

681
  • AR seemed too viable in all situations. Either lower the damage over range or increase the spread - Pistol has too much bloom and or could do with an extra shot or two in the mag. (why is there even bloom, did we learn nothing from Reach.? Thought it was universally hated?) Pretty useless in its current state.
  • Where’s all the symmetrical maps gone from halo over the last few games? Being a arena shoot I feel this is a huge part of the game. Still, these beta maps are not a total disaster. - Ghost was straight up OP, especially with the state of the new plasma pistol. - Can we go back to traditional Red v Blue in multiplayer? I get that you want us to be able to show off our amour pallets but all its done is create more problems. - Can we get a toggle for unified sensitivities across the magnifications ? Trying to align both sensitivities of unscoped v scoped was a nightmare on M&K. - Options to mute all the dialog during games. All I wanna hear is the traditional Halo announcer for multi-kills ect. Not some destiny sounding guy chatting rubbish all game. - An option to cancel the slide animation. Sometimes I just dont wanna slide that far - Great job on the optimization for PC from the previous flight. Theres still some issues I hope get ironed out before release though. The game doesnt feel like it has true Raw mouse input, aiming can feel a bit odd at times. No native full screen mode is another huge issue. - Essential that theres input based match making options in the final game. Dont really wanna be forced to use a controller just to be competitive once I hit 40 in ranked - Still prefer the previous radar where only sprint and shooting exposed you.
    All in all, was impressed with the improvements made from the last flight in regards to performance. Looking forward to playing again this weekend.