Because I seemingly didn’t get a survey, I’m going to leave my overall feedback from the last 2 weekends. Just for clarifications sake, I was not able to play in the first flight a couple months back, so this is my first impressions on Infinite as well.
OVERALL:
Overall, I am very positive on what I played. It feels like a perfect mix of Halo 2, Halo 3 and Halo 5. Sprint feels useful but not overpowered. Most of the new weapons feel right. Equipment being a mix of Halo 3’s and the Armor/Spartan abilities from Reach-5 feels like a good compromise in that regard, and the Grapplehook and Repulser give this game’s movement its own character without changing the core of what makes Halo, Halo. There are obviously some issues that I had, and I know that a lot of people had a lot of the same issues, so it’s not just me, but I have a feeling that the rest of this post is going to come off pretty negative, so I just want to preface now that I like what I played for the most part, I just think that there are a handful of little things that are splintering through the entire game that cause it to just feel… off. So, let’s jump into it!
MOVEMENT
Like I said before, I think that sprint is in the best place that it has ever been. It feels useful, but not to the point that people are running away from fights. It feels like maps have been scaled back size wise as well. Not sprinting to get around is actually viable for the first time in a couple of games. I also liked that they went back on the sprinting-stops-shields approach of Halo 5. (It made it feel like you needed to stand still to get your shields back and slowed the game down a lot.) Sliding feels good, which is something that a lot of games screw-up. I do not like the reliance on clamber. All the smaller maps (Bazaar comes to mind first, though) require you to use it when doing any sort of vertical movement, and it doesn’t feel good. It slows everything down and starting a fight while clambering doesn’t feel good. I wish that they were somehow able to get crouch jumping back in, as that would allow a skill gap that just doesn’t exist right now. I’m guessing that this was done to allow the other methods of movement like the Grapple or Repulser to shine in that role but there’s only one or two of them on the smaller maps, so most of time you are going to be forced to clamber, which seems like it should be the fallback whenever possible. Grenade jumping could also be reintroduced to add some depth as well.
I also think that the strafe speed it probably a little bit too quick. It makes fights feel inconsistent with all the micro-adjustments required and the reduction of auto-aim on most weapons, but I’ll get into that later. Last thoughts on this are with some minor tweaks this could basically feel perfect. Add some acceleration to strafing so that gunfights feel better and figure out a way to scale clamber back into the game to allow for that movement skill-gap. The act of running around feels good otherwise.
WEAPONS
I’m going to only be talking about guns here. Grandes will be later. Let’s get the massive elephant in the room out of the way, I think that the AR is too much. It needs either a damage nerf, range nerf or some kind of combination, because right now it just doesn’t feel right. Too many AR vs. AR fights, and the random spread + headshot modifier makes these feel bad most of the time. I like the accuracy of bursting, and personally think that the best way to balance this is to remove the headshot modifier and add some faster bloom so that spraying isn’t as reliable. The body-shot ttk feels appropriate. Burst-fire range feels appropriate. I just think that the combo of spread and a headshot modifier is a bad idea, and I think that it comes off as inconsistent. That leads ne right into bloom on the Commando and Sidekick. I have no idea why they thought that bringing bloom on precision weapons back was a good idea. It has all of the same problems that it did in Reach, but with the faster overall ttk it is not nearly as forgiving and feels bad. This was really brought to light in the BTB tests this weekend, where so many more fights between two people using Commandos were happening. It got to the point that I just straight up stopped using the gun full auto, which seems against the point of the feature in the first place. I think that that an easy solution here it to remove bloom and decrease fire rate slightly on both weapons.
The rest of the weapon sandbox feels pretty good IMO. The three-way combo of slightly nerfing/fixing the AR, Sidekick and Commando feels like it would slow the average ttk down a little bit, which would help the game breathe, but also make those guns feel more consistent, which is the big issue to me. BR seems like it might be a little bit too easy to use, but for where they want it in the sandbox, that’s not a bad thing. Storm Rifle and Skewer feel a lot better than the Spartan Laser, which was such a hard counter on vehicles that it wasn’t fair/fun. Sniper is hard to use. I like that. Rockets feel powerful but also a little bit buggy. I don’t get the Pulse Carbine, but people were shredding me with it so clearly that’s a me thing. The Plasma Pistol does feel completely useless outside of its charged shot, which is maybe the point, but the Sidekick should never shred shields faster than it, so they should fix that. Nothing else really stands out to me. Overall I like the faster ttk across the board, but think that the inconsistencies of the AR, Commando and Sidekick stand out as the only real problems here. It’s close.
GRENADES
This section will be short. I think that there is too much Grenade spam but think that the power of frag grenades it pretty spot on. Maybe spawn us in with only 1? Plasmas feel great, and sticking feels maybe the best that it ever has. I would like it if they brought the pseudo-flash grenade qualities that it had in Halo 5 back though, because right now it feels like it’s just a worse version of the spike grenade. Speaking of the spike, I think that when it’s thrown onto a wall, that the “spread” out the back is a little bit inconsistent and that I’ve got some kills that I probably shouldn’t have and didn’t get some that I probably should have. I think that the best comparison of how I’d, personally, like this to work is like the lightning grenade from Destiny, where it can be a powerful tool for getting people out of cover, but one that requires skill and aim when using it. Dynamo grenades need some work. They do too many things too well and they need to be tuned down. I think they they probably shouldn’t do health damage, and instead just hurt shields. A grenade with that kind of utility has never really been a thing in Halo before and would allow basically everything else that they do stay in place. Getting two of them thrown at you feels really bad. I like the idea of a utility grenade that EMPs vehicles and attacks shields.