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Areet folks,

So I'm a keen Halo player, although that absolutely wore off when 4 and 5 came out (utter dross in my opinion, 5 was a lot better but 4 was a crapshoot). I don't play much in the way of fps games these days but I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the few games I played last night with a few friends. I'm playing on xbox one and they talked a lot about designing from the ground up ways of making the game run well no matter what platform you use. I have to say they've delivered that excellently, I'm sure it looks better on PC and the new xbox console but as the One is all I have it was doing great.

I'm very interested in the more open world style campaign, it seems quite Farcry esque, which seems like it could be a lot of fun. They obviously tried hard to recreate and modernise Halo: Combat Evolved and I think they have succeeded.

The way I can best describe it is if they made Halo: CE right now from the ground up and make it a modern shooter. It still has a classic feel but the updated features make it feel like it should with general advances in the industry.

Has anyone else played any so far? What are people's thoughts going into the future and the campaign release?

I played a bit of the multi-player beta one evening. Of course, I'm horribly out of practice with FPS games, and tended to be near the bottom of my team's rankings.

On the other hand, my teams *did* tend to win. So that might count for something.

In any case, I had fun with it.

Been playing the hell out of it the past few days, runs real smooth on xbox series S performance mode. I'm feeling pretty positive about it. I like the cosmetics in the season 1 battle pass. But may next year is a long way to go with the current amount of maps/content the game has. I hope they plan on dripping at least 1 or 2 new maps in the coming months.

I keenly feel the loss of the old school plasma rifle and the smg though.

So far, I'm really enjoying it, largely sticking to the 4v4 modes as Big Team Battle is in an odd place for me; can't match Battlefield or Battlefront for epic scale and spectacle, but feels too big to be properly tactical like the 4v4 modes (aside from one game of Total Comtrol on the night map, which was really dynamic and close). Runs and looks great even on an original Xbox One, and the modernised quality of life stuff while keeping it Halo is really well done. At first I was greatly missing the loadouts/gear system from Reach and 4 and the enhanced mobility from 5, but the back to basics approach is growing on me.

Only thing I'm missing is the classic Halo weapons. Doesn't feel quite right without SMGs, pump action ahotguns, a Magnum that feels like it can punch a hole through a tank... All the new guns seem to have some gimmick or other, which is probably good for variety but definitely feels like something is missing. Likewise some classic modes, after playing a lot of Splitgate recently I was hoping for at least Shotty Snipers and Infected to be in there, so hopefully they get those in sooner or later.

The surprise launch and 'beta-but-not-really' has certainly done it's job in the marketing department at least, definitely going to grab a month of Game Pass for the campaign when it launches. I really enjoyed 4 but didn't get on with 5's campaign at all, though I am sad to see Infinite seems to kind of be glossing over the Evil Cortana AI Revolt reveal at the end of 5 for yet another Halo ring/Covenant plot, but I guess that is what the series does best so I'm sure it'll land.

 Paradigm wrote:
I really enjoyed 4 but didn't get on with 5's campaign at all, though I am sad to see Infinite seems to kind of be glossing over the Evil Cortana AI Revolt reveal at the end of 5 for yet another Halo ring/Covenant plot, but I guess that is what the series does best so I'm sure it'll land.

From what I understand, 343 is trying to do both with Infinite. There is the big plot about John Halo murdering all the Banished, but Cortana is so far implied to be a key player, and Master Chief's relationship with his new AI is definitely tied into the events of the past two games. I fully expect a big twist in the campaign in which it is revealed that Cortana has more involvement with the plot as we know it than it seems.

 Flipsiders wrote:

From what I understand, 343 is trying to do both with Infinite. There is the big plot about John Halo murdering all the Banished, but Cortana is so far implied to be a key player, and Master Chief's relationship with his new AI is definitely tied into the events of the past two games. I fully expect a big twist in the campaign in which it is revealed that Cortana has more involvement with the plot as we know it than it seems.

The trailer has MC's new AI wondering about Cortana. It'd be odd if she came up in dialogue, but never actually showed up.

Fair enough! I do like the fact that Chief is getting some actual character work in this by the sounds of it, via the new AI (who does seem cool). I'm not expecting God of War 4 Sad Dad Kratos levels of reinvention or anything, but it's about time he got a little bit of introspection.

If there is a big twist in the middle, please let it not be The Flood!

I think story wise it carries on after Halo Wars 2, which I never actually played but I feel I really should. I really enjoyed the first halo wars, the last great hurrah from Ensemble Studios and man did they deliver.

I think there must be some flood somewhere, especially what with the Gravemind on the ark at the end of Halo 3. Maybe something wriggling into to place halfway through?

So I finally decided to give Infinite a go last night, overall it's pretty meh.

Pros
- Some of the visuals are nice, and it looks like they're going back to a Chief-orientated plot.

Cons
- Micro-bloody-transactions. They've gone beyond this person's opinion of acceptable DLC and have just moved straight into pure greed. For 20 years you've been able to change your Spartan's colours, now you need a freaking £20 season pass? This overall crap they've fallen into of "design a game, cut it in half and sell half to them again, and fill out the gaps with absolutely pointless crap such as poses and weapon charms."
- Removing more and more Halo-esque aspects. Suddenly we have all samurai and roman armour types. Loads of the Covenant weapons have either just gone (Beam Rifle, Carbine), or changed so much they're nothing like the originals (Plasma Rifle). Look at this image; remove the Rocket Launcher and AR and you have a generic sci-fi shooter with nothing that screams "Halo".
- The possibility that there'll be such a huge skip between the plots that it'd only make sense if we read all the novels, short films and comics. Again, more greed.
- Game balance; I despised Warzone as it just meant once one side slips ahead then they've won in 9/10 cases, as the other side will find themselves up against multiple Banshees, Scorpions and Gauss Hogs with nothing but an AR and Magnum to fight back. Tried a couple of BTB games last night and they turned into this.

The microtransactions thing is an absolute joke, but frankly nobody is surprised by that. Which says a lot about what people have come to expect about modern gaming.

I don't mind the new guns really, the Banished are a different faction of the Covenant and have been away from them for some time. There's enough diversity in the guns, which I like. This is coupled with the starting weapons of the pistol and AR. Means people actually go and pick up different weapons.

I tell you what the brute chopper really sucks, used to be great in Halo 3 but now every time I get in it people kill me with zero difficulty.

Also there isn't much of a plot skip, it's just if you have played Halo Wars 2.

Hopefully some more of your games go better though, because that sucks.

I had some fun splattering people in a warthog last night.