Infinite Tech Preview – Social Arena

Games Halo Infinite
1042

I played in the flight both weekends on Xbox One, and I want to make sure my feedback is recorded somewhere. Here’s what I thought of the Arena:

Multiplayer is completely unfair on Xbox One. Xbox One players like myself stand no chance at beating PC players who have a much higher framerate and are already killing me before I can even react. There needs to be an option to only match with Xbox One players, because we will never be equal with those on better hardware. If this isn’t an option, I will only ever play against bots. Either that, or find a way to balance the teams better so that there is an equal amount of Xbox One and PC players on the same team, or cap the framerate across the board. You guys have made crossplay balanced and it works great for MCC, why can’t it be the same for Infinite?

The team balancing was completely off this flight. Nearly every slayer match I played, my team would lose 50-20 on average. Somehow I was always playing against players who are a way higher skill level than me. It was nothing but sweat. There needs to be a way to properly separate these sweaty players from those of us who are just there to play the game and have fun without having their confidence destroyed. There needs to be full segregation of these players from people like me who don’t aspire to be professional Halo players. Maybe have a K/D ratio cap to be allowed to enter social games, so if you’re K/D is above a certain number you have to play competitive and aren’t allowed in the social playlist.

The game felt quite laggy at times, both PvP and against bots, but I’m sure that will get improved with time.

I’ll mention this in my BTB post, but there are too many voices talking during the matches. I really only want to hear Jeff Steitzer, not the other Spartans yelling and your AI telling you things that don’t need to be said (like “battle rifle acquired,” I know I acquired it you don’t need to tell me). There’s just too many voices going on, and I really just want to hear “double kill,” “killing spree,” etc.

Get rid of the outlines. Either have them only for your teammates, or bring back forced red vs blue teams. There’s a lot of clutter on the screen as it currently stands.

I must say, playing against bots I had a lot fun. This feels like proper Halo once you get into the zone. You guys at 343 are so close to making a classic Halo experience, but there still is a lot of work to make this truly great.

1043

players should have slightly more momentum, strafing is way too fast and unpredictable which makes it quite hard to shoot with precision and turns it in a lot of just shooting and trying to hit some of your shots. Getting a perfect kill with the br(or dmr in reach) doesn’t happen every time but its also not super difficult…in infinite I have gotten maybe 3 perfect kills total over 6-7hours of playing just to show my point. adding slightly more momentum so that players can’t change direction so instantly and without warning I think would go a long way towards making this a lot better. It would also make the game smoother and a lot less sweaty. I feel like a lot of issues people are having with weapons being too punishing for bad accuracy can be traced back to this. I’m not saying everyone should be ice skating but just taking a little bit longer for players to switch directions would go a long way.

I like this version of the radar more than the last one, I like the indicator when someone is on equal elevation with you, however the radar range needs to be extended slightly. I’ve hardly ever been able to react to something I see on radar, by the time they are on radar I already know they are there or its too late.

1044

Alright, my 2 cents on the game.

There are a lot of pieces that feel like a throwback to the older Halo games but to me it still does not have that classic Halo sandbox feel. This is for a number of reasons, here are the ones that I’ve identified:

  • The time-to-kill is just too low. In Halo 3 it seemed more possible to make aggressive plays and escape around a corner or get shot in the back and turn around and kill the person with a well placed grenade + 1 burst from a BR before they could kill you. To me this is a huge part of the Halo “feel” because it made it so it always felt like you had a chance to make a play. Give me a chance to react when someone shows up unexpectedly! In this game it feels much more rare to get a turnaround kill and makes the “outplay potential” much lower. Once I’m getting shot in the back I’m usually dead before I even fully turn around. - Weapons are too accurate. This plays into point 1 also but a lot of weapons are very accurate from long distances. In Halo 3 the natural spread of the bullets made it pretty much impossible to 4-shot someone with the BR from a long distance away. This allowed you to move around the map more freely and made it difficult to control an entire map. In Infinite I feel like 1 guy can post up in a tower with a BR and control everything within visibility. It also feels like projectile speed is very high, making distance shooting much easier. - The “goofing off” style of Halo 3 does not seem to exist in this game. In Halo 3 we could queue up for a game of BTB and roam around in a mongoose with a brute-shot and just launch ourselves off of cliffs looking for a cool splatter kill. In Infinite vehicles seem to barely respond to outside forces like explosions or gun shots and it takes about 2 seconds for one guy with a BR to mow us down off the mongoose from half-way across the map. The time-to-kill issue mentioned in point 1 is really detrimental to people wanting to mess around in social games. After the flight ended last night my friends and I queued up for a game of Halo 3 BTB and we were immediately having memorable moments that made us all laugh. Moments that were not happening in Infinite because we were dead before we could ever pull off anything funny or goofy.I really want to like this game and it feels close to being something I really want to play. I think it is closer than any Halo has been since Halo 3. The sound design is great, the game looks good, and moving around the map feels good but for the reasons mentioned above it just does not give me that classic “Halo” feel. To me it feels more like COD in that it seems like the only way to have fun is to try hard and even then I find myself often frustrated by the impossibility of making improbable plays.

A couple smaller points:

  • Radar range feels too small, I rarely feel like I see people on the radar with enough time to react. - Vehicles should respond to outside forces more. In Halo 3 you could tip over a warthog with AR fire, or at least tip it up on 2-wheels and make the moment more exciting. - The heatwave feels like shooting a nerf gun. It tickles people.
1045

I have played every flight and always have had a great time! The art style, weapons, combat, music - ie everything that makes up the sandbox as well as the general “feel” of the game is great and overall I think it’s a great game and can’t wait to see campaign on Dec 8!

I’m certainly no pro or sweaty player but one thing that is making some games, particularly BTB almost unplayable is the stuttering, lag and desyncing which seems to be at it’s worst this weekend, I am in Australia and have heard from a few other aussies they are getting the same. Perhaps the aussie servers, or the low ping when we move off to other non Oceania servers. I’m playing on PC and my setup is stable for other games (Ryzen 5600x, GeForce 3070 Ti, game on an NVME SSD and a standard stable aussie internet connection- 35-45 Mbps).

I also feel like match balancing is a little off, I have been loaded onto teams where there are players with accuracy +45% and kills +20 against a team of 20% accurate and under 5 kills per person. Some i’m playing and it feels like a good amount of challenge, some a complete wash with ease and some which are near impossible. It feels like it’s random most of the time.

If this can be sorted then it’s a game I can see myself playing for the next few years as the Halo infinite seasons progress :smiley:

1046

Issues I experienced while playing social were that I found the weapons to be unbalanced. A lot of the normal guns are too weak except for the pistol which is too overpowered and has too much range, the shotgun is too weak but the power weapons were pretty balanced as long as the shots hit. The aiming is difficult compared to other halos and I tried other settings but the aiming system is just not as good as previous halos.

I feel that the radar should be in the top left corner instead or have a setting where you can choose where to have it. Also the radar detection distance is too small, should read out a bit further.

Vehicles especially the ghost has way too much health, you can shoot it all day and it’s still indestructible.

Health regenerates just a little too slow.

1047

Firstly, I love how the game is turning out. From the sandbox focus, vehicle physics, and map esthetics to the Grappleshot, Battle Rifle, and Training Mode, so many things are useful, interesting, new, and fun in Halo Infinite.

That said, there are a number of things I would suggest changing/improving, which I will post in the relevant forums.

Friendly fire and player collision: The lack of friendly fire and player collision is a bit of a disappointment. No friendly fire means players don’t need to be as aware of teammates when throwing grenades, shooting rockets, etc. Also, the inconsistency of being able to damage oneself and not teammates can create confusion during gameplay, as it’s easy to forget about self-damage. I would like to see friendly fire return at least for ranked, ideally for all playlists, as it adds a dimension to gameplay that is currently lacking, and would create a more consistent experience. Similarly, I would like to see player collision return in some capacity because it also adds more dimension to gameplay, both in having to be more aware of teammates and allowing more interaction between players.

Plasma Pistol: The Plasma Pistol in its current state is not very useful, to the point I don’t even want to pick it up. The charged-shot tracking is too low, the lack of vehicle EMP goes against its precedent role, and the uncharged-shot does practically nothing to shields even compared to UNSC projectile weapons. All together these issues make it a mere shell of its prior utility and desirability. I would prefer if it had slightly increased charged tracking, vehicle EMP, and increased uncharged damage to shields.

Gravity Hammer: The Gravity Hammer physics feel somewhat lacking and inconsistent. I would prefer the Hammer have more physical impact on players than it does currently, especially enemies. This would bring it more in line with legacy versions like Halo 3 and make it more impactful and enjoyable.

Sniper Rifle: The Sniper Rifle seems inconsistent and difficult to use especially while no-scoping making it hard to hit shots and feel skillful while using it.

Sidekick: The Sidekick feels ever so slightly overpowered. In Arena it feels like it shreds shields a bit to quickly and is hard to counter.

Heatwave: The Heatwave is kind hard to figure out how to utilize. It seems a bit imbalanced or weak somehow, getting overwhelmed by most other weapons. Maybe the spread is a little to wide. It’s just kind of a mystery.

Pulse Carbine: The Pulse Carbine is somewhat confusing in that it seems best at mid range and yet it’s Smart-Link implies it’s a close range weapon. I would like it’s role to be more clearly defined to the player and suggest giving it a Smart-Link that is either of a higher zoom power or is unique in some other way.

Grappleshot: Only one small suggestion for the Grappleshot. The Grapplejack is a little overpowered and can be annoying at times. I would like to see the range to Grapplejack reduced slightly, which would hopefully make it less annoying to get Grapplejacked.

Dropwall: The Dropwall needs a bit of tuning because it’s not practical to stand behind for cover and yet it allows the player to shoot it through from that side. I think it should be either a barrier on both sides or buffed to take more damage.

Of course I understand the game is still in development, and I’m sure it will be better tuned at launch and beyond. These are just a few concerns/suggestions. Overall, really looking forward to the full release; I’m sure it will be just as fun and better.

1048

> 2533274829729146;1041:
> I would like to see map objects like Fusion Coils and Mounted Machine Guns to respawn during the matches.

So would I, they do in every other Halo game.

1049

> 2535456388527614;1047:
> Firstly, I love how the game is turning out. From the sandbox focus, vehicle physics, and map esthetics to the Grappleshot, Battle Rifle, and Training Mode, so many things are useful, interesting, new, and fun in Halo Infinite.
>
> That said, there are a number of things I would suggest changing/improving, which I will post in the appropriate forums.
>
> Friendly fire and player collision: The lack of friendly fire and player collision is a bit of a disappointment. No friendly fire means players don’t need to be as aware of teammates when throwing grenades, shooting rockets, etc. Also, the inconsistency of being able to damage oneself and not teammates can create confusion during gameplay, as it’s easy to forget about self-damage. I would like to see friendly fire return at least for ranked, ideally for all playlists, as it adds a dimension to gameplay that is currently lacking, and would create a more consistent experience. Similarly, I would like to see player collision return in some capacity because it also adds more dimension to gameplay, both in having to be more aware of teammates and allowing more interaction between players.
>
> Plasma Pistol: The Plasma Pistol in its current state is not very useful, to the point I don’t even want to pick it up. The charged-shot tracking is too low, the lack of vehicle EMP goes against its precedent role, and the uncharged-shot does practically nothing to shields even compared to UNSC projectile weapons. All together these issues make it a mere shell of its prior utility and desirability. I would prefer if it had slightly increased charged tracking, vehicle EMP, and increased uncharged damage to shields.
>
> Gravity Hammer: The Gravity Hammer physics feel somewhat lacking and inconsistent. I would prefer the Hammer have more physical impact on players than it does currently, especially enemies. This would bring it more in line with legacy versions like Halo 3 and make it more impactful and enjoyable.
>
> Sniper Rifle: The Sniper Rifle seems inconsistent and difficult to use especially while no-scoping making it hard to hit shots and feel skillful while using it.
>
> Sidekick: The Sidekick feels ever so slightly overpowered. In Arena it feels like it shreds shields a bit to quickly and is hard to counter.
>
> Heatwave: The Heatwave is kind hard to figure out how to utilize. It seems a bit imbalanced or weak somehow, getting overwhelmed by most other weapons. Maybe the spread is a little to wide. It’s just kind of a mystery.
>
> Pulse Carbine: The Pulse Carbine is somewhat confusing in that it seems best at mid range and yet it’s Smart-Link implies it’s a close range weapon. I would like it’s role to be more clearly defined to the player and suggest giving it a Smart-Link that is either of a higher zoom power or is unique in some other way.
>
> Grappleshot: Only one small suggestion for the Grappleshot. The Grapplejack is a little overpowered and can be annoying at times. I would like to see the range to Grapplejack reduced slightly, which would hopefully make it less annoying to get Grapplejacked.
>
> Dropwall: The Dropwall needs a bit of tuning because it’s not practical to stand behind for cover and yet it allows the player to shoot it through from that side. I think it should be either a barrier on both sides or buffed to take more damage.
>
> Of course I understand the game is still in development, and I’m sure it will be better tuned at launch and beyond. These are just a few concerns/suggestions. Overall, really looking forward to the full release; I’m sure it will be just as fun and better.

I have to disagree with you about the Sidekick, I think it needs more power because it shouldn’t take a whole clip to kill an enemy plus about the Grapple Shot you’re going to need the distance in Campaign and the Pulse Carbine really is kind of a waste of a good weapon that really does need some big help though.

1050

Still completely unable to finish a single match. The same crash at the same place. Every time.

I guess I’ll wait for full release and hope it actually works on my hardware.

1051

Here are some of my suggestions for tweaks after about 40 hours in the three weekends of flights.

AIMING

  • The aiming just feels off. I can adjust settings to where it feels “ok,” but I am never fully happy with it. I never had aiming issues in Halo CE-Halo 4, then in Halo 5 I felt like the aiming was wonky, which was a huge turnoff for me. And now it’s the same in Infinite. It just feels simultaneously both sluggish and too fast compared to the classic games, even with all the adjustment options available. Having some presets in the menu that are based on old games would be amazing! But I know that’s a big ask. - A small bump to aim assist would be nice. Someone else pointed out how rarely they get Perfect medals in this game compared to other Halos and I agree - I think I’ve only got 2-3 Perfects ever in Infinite, compared to the usual 2-3 per game in the past. - I think there needs to be a little more momentum when changing directions when strafing. Strafing is a little too good right now, especially when combined with the low aim assist.WEAPONS AND EQUIPMENT

  • The AR needs a nerf to damage range. It’s fine up close, but it’s too way good at medium-long distances. - I feel like my Sidekick bullets don’t always go where my crosshairs are pointing. There seems to be more bloom than what’s being indicated on the crosshairs. I’m fine with high bloom when spamming, but make the crosshair reflect that, like in Reach, so I know to slow down. - The S7 Sniper is just unwieldy. I don’t know what’s up with its aiming, but I just can’t hit anything with it. And I have only been sniped maybe 3-4 times ever, so I assume that it’s not just me. - The Plasma Pistol needs to EMP vehicles. But surely this is a bug and not a design choice, right? - The Pulse Carbine is practically worthless in its current state. No one even picks it up. - The Dropwall isn’t very useful. It takes a long time to place and the squares pop easily. I would either slightly buff the drop time or the shield strength to make it a bit more effective. - The Heatwave and Ravager are both underpowered and could use some damage buffs. - I think the Gravity Hammer takes too long to swing. It’s already risky to use, so I think a super long swing time is unnecessary. - The Rocket Launcher having 4 shots is a lot for a small map like Bazaar, especially given how often it respawns. I would drop it to 2. - Frag Grenades have a little too much explosive radius, in my opinion. It makes grenade spamming too effective in small maps like Live Fire. - Spike Grenades take too long to detonate. They’re relatively underpowered already, but having a long fuse time makes them even worse.OTHER

  • I wish the fireteam color outline worked in Arena as well. I’d like my party members to be a different color than my matchmade teammates. - The motion sensor radius is too short. Please make it farther. - If you change scoreboard to HOLD button in the UI settings, it takes like a full second for the scoreboard to go away when you let go of the button. It’s pretty annoying. - Please, please, please have an objectives-only 4v4 playlist in the final game. In Halo 5 the only playlist with objectives was Team Arena (which contained Slayer too), so it was impossible to just play objective modes. Please give us Team Objective like in the H3 and Reach days. Halo 5 is the only AAA shooter I’ve played where you can’t play only objective modes, which is absurd to me.I’m happy with everything else. The game is fantastic and has the potential to be the best Halo yet. I’m pumped for release!

1052

The delay between clambering and being able to fire your weapon is much too long. Firing instantly after sprinting feels great, so being able to fire immediately after clambering would also feel great.

1053
  • Behemoth definitely needs BR starts to give spawners a chance of living. Had multiple people quit because they were getting spawn camped on this map. - Behemoth needs more anti-vehicle options. Plasma pistol would be good, if it EMP’d. Skewer should be where shock rifle/ravager spawns instead. Keep sniper or shock rifles on tower. - On Bazaar, rockets are way too OP as power weapon, sniper rifle or skewer seems more balanced for this map. - Recharge needs a power weapon to fight for (besides hammer), sniper would be good. - Live Fire should have rockets instead of snipe/skewer, plenty of space here to escape.
1054

The flight was fun but the bugs I noticed was some of my grenades just disappears sometimes and im not sure it’s because of lag or something, as also one time I gotten a strange visual glitch on the BTB map where light purple textures just started to appear after i dismount the Turret. Also a friend told me during the flight that sometimes the plasma pistol Emp blast sometime working.

as for stuff for other stuff i feel like the Turrets and fusion cores should respond as the Cores mostly just get used instantly when the match starts. Also i feel like the some Vehicles health should get buffet slightly as it sometimes feel too easy to destroy Like the warthog and my friends opinion, the ghost.

either way I enjoyed playing the flight and cant wait for the next one.

1055

PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF CORTANA SPEED UP THE SCORPION AND MAKE IT EASIER TO CONTROL. It’s the year 2500 in halo not 1901… And THE HAMMER HAS WAY TOO BIG OF A KILL RADIUS TOO. … ALSO THE ANIMATION FOR THE JUMP PORTAL ON THE TOWER IN FRAGMENTATION KEPT GLITCHING ON AND OFF

1056

4v4 looked and felt phenomenal but sadly gets unraveled really quick by grenade spam where it feels like you get punished for focusing on design-intended gun-play and movement. Whilst spawning with two grenades gelled with previous Halo games, it feels like a strong clash against the current direction of things, especially given how the maps were designed. Tweaking it to 0 to 1 grenades on spawn with the potential to pick up more for 4v4 will go a long way towards gameplay where grenades are used as a tactical option to finish fights or move players from positions rather than mindlessly throwing all grenades before firing a shot for kills or throwing everything at your feet to force a draw

1057

Please change it so the winning team is on top of the scoreboard. I’m not sure what the point of changing that was for and it only added confusion on my end because a lot of times I just glanced at the colors and thought we were winning when in reality we were the losing team. It also looks odd seeing the losing team on top.

1058

  1. The end of game UI would be much cleaner, and allow the user to see what information they want much more clearly, if it was a giant table with multiple columns for categories such as Kills, assists, deaths, headshots, grenade kills, objectives, etc, and more options, for the entire team (player names) as rows. The current implementation forces you to select only one person to view their stats, and makes it much harder to compare and see how you did in the scope of a match. For big team battle there would be a lot of names, so it might be easier to split it up into two giant tables, one for each team. Something like a CSGO or Valorant type of end of match scoreboard would make information much more accessible.

  2. let there be a button to immediately redo the weapon drill without having to go into the main menu and select it again. I found myself wanting to redo certain drills and only wanting to go back into the menu if I wanted to change which drill I was doing. It would make the most sense in the “More Drills” page

1059

LOVED IT. Loved it. Greatest halo ever played. None other fps right was attracted to me as much.

1060

Please increase the Radar Range back to 25m like the previous Halo games and reduce the Respawn Time in Slayer back to 5 seconds.

1061

The flights were awesome! Really entertaining and the visuals were so good. Can’t wait for launch and I’m really excited for the campaign. I just feel like the motion sensor range should be extended a little more. There were too many times when I was guarding a zone and enemies would almost come out of nowhere and I couldn’t react because they didn’t pop up on my radar until it was too late. Also, a scoreboard on academy would be nice as well, being able to customize the length of games against bots and see how many kills/deaths I have would be cool.