About Halo Infinite
Halo Infinite is the latest sequel to Halo 5: Guardians and the third part of the Reclaimer Saga. It was developed by 343 Industries and released on both Xbox One and PC platforms on November 15, 2021.
First Impressions
When I first opened the game, the music was fantastic. Unlike 343’s previous installments, this game actually felt like a Halo game. The game was beautiful.
However, the User Interface was questionable and was a little difficult to navigate. It wasn’t as intuitive as I hoped, which had always been an issue 343 Industries suffered from.
The limited customizations 343 delivered to the Insiders (Beta Testers) were actually very diverse. Player customization was an upgrade from Halo: Reach’s but color customization was limited. They are likely to rename the original armor pieces too, a helmet that had a very uncanny resemblance to the classic Recon helmet was named Trailblazer.
Graphics and Framerate Demand
When I played the game, I ran it on a PC with a Ryzen 5 3600 and a GTX 1660 Super, allegedly a 1080p beast; however, because the game was so graphically demanding, I could only run minimal settings on low at 72–73 frames per second and medium at around 55.
This is likely to improve because the game isn’t optimized yet. But despite it being at its lowest, the visuals didn’t feel low at all. It looked as good as Destiny 2 on Max Settings. The design aesthetic resembled Halo: Reach a lot, and the game felt a lot like the successor Halo 4 should’ve been to Bungie’s games.
Movement, Aim, and Gameplay
The movement isn’t as advanced as Halo 5’s, but it was far more fluid and smooth, not to mention a lot more realistic. Halo 5’s movement can be exploited to launch yourself across maps, but Infinite’s fine-tuning of player jump and clamber was unlike any other FPS game.
Sprint is still in the game, but the movement boost isn’t substantial enough to force the game’s maps to enlarge to cater to such a disparity. There is no need to upscale anything.
However, sprinting does not impede aiming, as it is almost instantaneous. People loved this aspect and it is easy to run and gun; it is no longer a contest of who stops sprinting first by closing the timing between sprint and weapon fire.
The aiming, however, still needs to be tuned better. The input lag is substantially better than the previous games, but using certain weapons like the Skewer, Sniper, and Commando is pretty hard to aim with. No-scoping on Bungie’s installments was never a problem but Infinite’s aim isn’t as snappy and sharp as I wished; this was a problem I anticipated.
If 343 could draw a little closer to Destiny 2’s aim mechanics, the gameplay would be on an entirely different level from any other FPS game so far.
Bots in the Game
The bots aren’t much of a problem for human players so far as there is still a significant gap between the average human and computer within the technical preview.
However, they are not to be underestimated. Compared to some of my more casual friends, they are probably better and would make a non-seasoned player sweat. Some of the bots had actually tricked the insiders on occasion, even going as far as to “ninja” them, a feat only the seasoned and skillful Halo player knows how to do. This has happened a lot more than a few times.
Unfortunately, there are no “assassinations” added into gameplay, so it feels a lot like Halo 3 in a sense.
Have you been enjoying Halo Infinite? Leave a comment on your thoughts. I look forward to hearing them!