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Halo Infinite - Campaign Overview (October 25th - 6am PT / 9am ET / 3pm CET)

Haggard

Banned
Wait your telling me to "grow up" in the same message as talking about out "jacking off"? Pretty hard to take anything you say seriously while your typing out messages similar to that of a 12 year old playing Fortnite.
Since when are we supposed to take anything seriously here especially when it comes from proven clowns like you?
I voiced my opinion and being the insecure worm that you are you couldn't just live with it.
Internet business as usual i'd say.
...
On second thought before I waste any more time on you=> ignored.
 
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Leyasu

Banned
If this is true then this game wasn't designed for co-op which does make sense give what we have seen.

What I think will happen is they never "planned to have coop" so they are saying "its delayed" to avoid the blow back for now and then drop the news of no co-op months after launch or they plan to create a new mode that has co-op and drop that instead.
Looking at the part where he called in a vehicle made me think the same. Halo without coop is fucked up
 

GiJoint

Member
I’ll admit I don’t like the way 343 have handled the series when Bungie left but this looks like a bunch of fun and I’m a sucker for that Ubisoft style open world environment. The landscape brings me right back to those Halo 1 days. I’m looking forward to playing this.

Also, they’ve done some great work knuckling down over the past year and improving the how the game looks. Kudos.
 
Definitely a big step up from the previous showing in terms of visuals, but it's far from the home run I think it needed to be, at least for me.

Before I explain why I think that, I really just have to say: the folks here posting down-sampled, low quality, bit-rate-fucked compressed-to-hell-and-back YouTube screen grabs to make their "points" about visuals are just... sad. Desperately trying to keep the console war fires burning by finding the next Craig meme to spam out of context in every thread the word 'Halo' appears in. A lot of my complaints about the visuals from the original showing are basically all addressed. Check my post history if you need to: I haven't been kind to 343i, and I don't give them the benefit of the doubt - they're incompetent until they prove otherwise. But, they've worked hard to fix their stupidity and it shows. Credit where it's due: if Infinite had of been shown off originally looking like it does in this video, it wouldn't have been delayed, and no one would complain.

Anyway. The things that I'm seeing that are holding me back from being fully excited are:
  • We've still only seen a single biome for the campaign. Sorry, but we're close enough to launch, and this concern has been echoed enough. I needed an assurance that Halo Infinite was not an entire game built around variations of one environment.
  • Halo Infinite seems to have adopted the least interesting part of Ubisoft's design: repetitive busy work. And 343i clearly aren't as good as Ubisoft's best, so I doubt they're the ones to finally make it interesting.
  • Destiny-style health bars doesn't bode well for a game billing itself as a "ten year platform". See above note about repetitive busy work.
  • The pilot feels like an annoying "I want to go home, I don't to continue this adventure! Stop having fun!" character that grates on my nerves. The Weapon feels like an annoying "Gee wizz, Mr Chief, you must've blown up their favourite tank - the bad guys sure are angry! ^_^" character that I can stomach for about negative five seconds. If these are our primary secondary characters, 343i are close to the crimes against humanity that was vanilla Destiny 2's dialogue and character writing. And this is supposed to be the longest Halo... :messenger_fearful:
For me, given 343i's track record, they do not get the benefit of the doubt on any of my concerns, and I'll need player reviews and hands on to tell me otherwise. OG Halo worked so darn well because of its incredible pacing; sandbox moments, that moved into scripted moments, that moved into story moments. And every piece of it was industry leading. Always moving forward, always on mission, always amazing. If Halo Infinite has decided that "Clear 3 Banished Outposts", "Kill 5 Brute Chieftans" and "Active the Relay Tower" are the next big evolution for Halo... then Halo is now just a lesser quality Far Cry with a bigger brand name.

Multiplayer is pitch perfect, no argument there. But, campaign feels off note. I really do hope I'm wrong, and 343i have delivered the Halo they desperately needed to.

I'm in the same boat, graphically and mechanics wise. The user driven gameplay shown basically usurps a ton of my gripes/concerns, this is sandbox Halo and back to that magic of CE where you can tackle things any number of ways. Go on foot, bring in a flier, blow it all up, speed through it etc. I'm liking what is there. I agree they have come a long way but it's not a Forza blow you away.

There are some fundamental differences in Halo such as physics systems, player choice, not scripted, coop etc. It's a different beast to 30fps on the rails super high quality character/environment games. The replayability of Halo and unique nature is on show here, looking like a real treat on that front. I also liked the real time RPG-lite player choice driven screens they showed e.g. tacmap vs loadout for what you're planning to head into. Very cool.

Now to the concerns, similar to yours -
  • There is still this washed out look, it's present in the long vista shots and even within a single brute enemy in that it's just very "dull" in the contrast and lighting/texture interplay.
  • The designs aren't alien enough, the covies of CE brought life and colour to the world. The overall Banished look to everything from their armour to their vehicles is very "human and military" looking. Take the banshee for example, it's very lego human looking now, previously that covenant purple multi-layer hexagonal detail gave it that extra polish and alien feel. Much of that is lost now, hope it comes through in later missions or future content updates.
  • Organics of the flood, they brought a gruesome element to Halo and balanced the super clean look into a very natural and horror-esque feel. Again this has for the most part been lost under 343 in most titles, they had some awesome flood modes in multi but campaign has dropped this contrast in story, gameplay and design.
  • Futuristic? What happened to that awestruck feeling of unknown tech? Everything feels firmly within today's technology and not like you're going up against far superior higher tier tech.
  • Environments. Why aren't we seeing a small glimpse of snow capped mountains or deep underground mines or on board an alien ship etc? It's very pacific northwest biome, which is quintessential Halo but CE thrived on differing environments and conditions. Heading down to discover the flood, sliding a hog across ice during battle, flying a canyon, crossing immense tech bridges between nature, the vista of that second mission hiding from banshees to progress etc.
  • Playstyle. Where is the variation? CE has stealth whack-a-grunt sleeping, out and out battle on a tiny bridge while dodging fire from the other bridge, inside a UNSC ship fighting off boarding parties, fighting tanks and ghosts on foot, clearing an LZ etc. They just showed the same gameplay as the reveal. If this was an overview why show only one thing? Again?

I have a feeling that much of this is in the player's hands on how to tackle things, go in guns/vehicle blazing or snipe from afar before heading in but this overview was very "samey" to the reveal and they really should have put a highlight reel together more. Show off environment diversity, show off different playstyles and get rid of this idea that the game has to be bombastic in the trailer every second. So much of what made Halo campaigns brilliant is the downtimes where you're stealth approaching or getting a look around to work out your approach to a section/engagement or just taking in the scenery while being immersed in the audio and visual delights.
 
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Gediminas

Banned
I don't recall you expressing any concern that Ratchet And Clank: A Rift Apart would be a hard sell? My understanding is it didn't have any multiplayer, free or otherwise, no co-op ever, was only about 8hrs long and cost $70, so why are you concerned about Halo Infinite?
by comparing halo to Ratchet you just rose Ratchet price to 150$. congratulations, you are real PS PR person!
 
Yeah I think that’s the biggest downer. The 2018 E3 trailer gave the impression that the world would be much more lively and diverse. So far all we’ve seen is the bog standard Ubisoft open world template. Looks very basic.

Amazed such conclusions are being drawn, and even then just about every environment from the 2018 trailer has either been shown in the campaign or confirmed present in the campaign via the official blog. We had the inside of a cave confirmed, we had the same fields of open space with the same trees shown in this footage, same forerunner architecture and landmarks, we had a forest (lots of trees, chances are high there will be somethin akin to the deer scene at night - we have even had more dense areas than that already shown in the campaign) we have wild life, will we see the inside of a pelican? Shouldn't be a serious question. Will there be a body of water or lake? Clearly yes, the footage is all telling us and showing signs of it. Inside of a tent with UNSC gear? There's UNSC equipment scattered all over the world map. Chances are we will run into some things left behind. They are likely apart of collectibles too.

There's a full court press to make wild claims about this game when even this footage alone demonstrates a variety of quite different looks to locations based on battletorn damage, where on the ring you are, whether you're on the inside of a forerunner facility or not.

But I'll just go back to ignoring the nonsense. It's extremely easy to tell who has no intention of playing the game in this thread, and is here for one purpose only. Did Halo 3 or Halo 2 showcase all its possible variety of locations before release? Halo 3 sure as shit didn't. Halo Reach didn't either. Why Halo Infinite is being held to a dumb standard that so far no other videogame is held to is funny to me. The complaints amount to "why is the game taking place on a Halo ring, so boring, no diversity."
 

Kacho

Member
Amazed such conclusions are being drawn, and even then just about every environment from the 2018 trailer has either been shown in the campaign or confirmed present in the campaign via the official blog. We had the inside of a cave confirmed, we had the same fields of open space with the same trees shown in this footage, same forerunner architecture and landmarks, we had a forest (lots of trees, chances are high there will be somethin akin to the deer scene at night - we have even had more dense areas than that already shown in the campaign) we have wild life, will we see the inside of a pelican? Shouldn't be a serious question. Will there be a body of water or lake? Clearly yes, the footage is all telling us and showing signs of it. Inside of a tent with UNSC gear? There's UNSC equipment scattered all over the world map. Chances are we will run into some things left behind. They are likely apart of collectibles too.

There's a full court press to make wild claims about this game when even this footage alone demonstrates a variety of quite different looks to locations based on battletorn damage, where on the ring you are, whether you're on the inside of a forerunner facility or not.

But I'll just go back to ignoring the nonsense. It's extremely easy to tell who has no intention of playing the game in this thread, and is here for one purpose only. Did Halo 3 or Halo 2 showcase all its possible variety of locations before release? Halo 3 sure as shit didn't. Halo Reach didn't either. Why Halo Infinite is being held to a dumb standard that so far no other videogame is held to is funny to me. The complaints amount to "why is the game taking place on a Halo ring, so boring, no diversity."
No one reads the Halo blog, man.

Halo 2, 3, ODST and Reach weren’t under the same scrutiny because that was Bungie in their prime when Halo was the hottest it’s ever been. The franchise has cooled off tremendously since then, in large part thanks to 343’s mismanagement.

Honestly, 343 has fumbled their marketing campaign if what you say is true. And it’s on them to show us all this awesome stuff, in a video on YouTube preferably, not buried in some blog. All they keep doing is showing the same stuff over and over again. Today would have been a great time to showcase some of that location/environment diversity.
 
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MrFunSocks

Banned
Who could have guessed that all that concern and predictions that the game was going to be delayed again would turn out to be wrong?

Really liked the look of it, even though I'll play it once at most and not for a while since MP is my go to. Started off just looking like more of the same "classic" halo, but as the trailer went on it really showed some of the amazing looking changes. The massive open world, the new movement and attack options that things like the thrusters and grappling hook give you, and the graphics look fantastic especially when taking scale into account.

I'll probably play MP on Series X on the OLED and the campaign on my PC with 3070 on the VRR Ultrawide.
 

THE DUCK

voted poster of the decade by bots
Since when are we supposed to take anything seriously here especially when it comes from proven clowns like you?
I voiced my opinion and being the insecure worm that you are you couldn't just live with it.
Internet business as usual i'd say.
...
On second thought before I waste any more time on you=> ignored.

Lol more childish name-calling 🤣
I second the ignore idea, its not like you have anything constructive to ever say about anything.
 
Watched the 4k version tonight and call shenanigans on anyone saying this looks bad. I question all of your motives :messenger_tears_of_joy:

I’m not the world’s biggest Halo fan - I never played any until MCC came out (which I loved) and have never and will never play multiplayer - but this looks great, and it’s on Gamepass so even if it’s not I don’t have to waste money to find out.

I have a feeling this will be right up there in amongst the best games released this year though, if not the best, and some people are just going to be so mad about that… The next couple of months are going to be salty as fuck with this and FH5 - I hope the modding stays strong because things have definitely been more enjoyable around here since the policy change.
 
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I'll probably play MP on Series X on the OLED and the campaign on my PC with 3070 on the VRR Ultrawide.
I'm considering trading in my dual monitors for this beast, Halo might just give me the excuse to claim it on business -

au-odyssey-neo-g9-g95na-ls49ag950nexxy-458255181
 

Corndog

Banned
I wonder when we will see a platform like Xbox or Sony take advantage of access to all the studios they own. Imagine a game developed just as you say, Forza team on the environment and 343 team on the action.

I'd go one further and imagine a game were 10 levels are built around 10 different engines/studios. One game world but a greatest hits from each studio, sort of a continuous game theme/characters/story through a Love, Death+ Robots deal. Contra did this really well back in the day, I struggle to think of a modern game crossing multiple genres per mission/chapter.
Maybe just more collaboration between first party studios to utilize their talents.
 

NahaNago

Member
Amazed such conclusions are being drawn, and even then just about every environment from the 2018 trailer has either been shown in the campaign or confirmed present in the campaign via the official blog. We had the inside of a cave confirmed, we had the same fields of open space with the same trees shown in this footage, same forerunner architecture and landmarks, we had a forest (lots of trees, chances are high there will be somethin akin to the deer scene at night - we have even had more dense areas than that already shown in the campaign) we have wild life, will we see the inside of a pelican? Shouldn't be a serious question. Will there be a body of water or lake? Clearly yes, the footage is all telling us and showing signs of it. Inside of a tent with UNSC gear? There's UNSC equipment scattered all over the world map. Chances are we will run into some things left behind. They are likely apart of collectibles too.

There's a full court press to make wild claims about this game when even this footage alone demonstrates a variety of quite different looks to locations based on battletorn damage, where on the ring you are, whether you're on the inside of a forerunner facility or not.

But I'll just go back to ignoring the nonsense. It's extremely easy to tell who has no intention of playing the game in this thread, and is here for one purpose only. Did Halo 3 or Halo 2 showcase all its possible variety of locations before release? Halo 3 sure as shit didn't. Halo Reach didn't either. Why Halo Infinite is being held to a dumb standard that so far no other videogame is held to is funny to me. The complaints amount to "why is the game taking place on a Halo ring, so boring, no diversity."
Just got through watching that 2018 trailer and this current trailer feels or seems to look nothing like that game. The only thing that seems to be similar is that master chief is in it and you have one type of tree. Are you trolling? All you said was their is a cave, body of water, gear, and equipment in the world map. I mean I would hope those things would be in an open world halo game. That trailer was simply an in engine cut scene to hype folks up for halo and should be for the most part be ignored since it would just create disappointment.
 
I wonder if we'll ever get clarification or an explanation on why 343 decided to announce the campaign overview on a Sunday evening and show it the very next morning at 6am. I'm very curious. That kind of thing doesn't just happen.
 
I'm in the same boat, graphically and mechanics wise. The user driven gameplay shown basically usurps a ton of my gripes/concerns, this is sandbox Halo and back to that magic of CE where you can tackle things any number of ways. Go on foot, bring in a flier, blow it all up, speed through it etc. I'm liking what is there. I agree they have come a long way but it's not a Forza blow you away.

There are some fundamental differences in Halo such as physics systems, player choice, not scripted, coop etc. It's a different beast to 30fps on the rails super high quality character/environment games. The replayability of Halo and unique nature is on show here, looking like a real treat on that front. I also liked the real time RPG-lite player choice driven screens they showed e.g. tacmap vs loadout for what you're planning to head into. Very cool.

Now to the concerns, similar to yours -
  • There is still this washed out look, it's present in the long vista shots and even within a single brute enemy in that it's just very "dull" in the contrast and lighting/texture interplay.
  • The designs aren't alien enough, the covies of CE brought life and colour to the world. The overall Banished look to everything from their armour to their vehicles is very "human and military" looking. Take the banshee for example, it's very lego human looking now, previously that covenant purple multi-layer hexagonal detail gave it that extra polish and alien feel. Much of that is lost now, hope it comes through in later missions or future content updates.
  • Organics of the flood, they brought a gruesome element to Halo and balanced the super clean look into a very natural and horror-esque feel. Again this has for the most part been lost under 343 in most titles, they had some awesome flood modes in multi but campaign has dropped this contrast in story, gameplay and design.
  • Futuristic? What happened to that awestruck feeling of unknown tech? Everything feels firmly within today's technology and not like you're going up against far superior higher tier tech.
  • Environments. Why aren't we seeing a small glimpse of snow capped mountains or deep underground mines or on board an alien ship etc? It's very pacific northwest biome, which is quintessential Halo but CE thrived on differing environments and conditions. Heading down to discover the flood, sliding a hog across ice during battle, flying a canyon, crossing immense tech bridges between nature, the vista of that second mission hiding from banshees to progress etc.
  • Playstyle. Where is the variation? CE has stealth whack-a-grunt sleeping, out and out battle on a tiny bridge while dodging fire from the other bridge, inside a UNSC ship fighting off boarding parties, fighting tanks and ghosts on foot, clearing an LZ etc. They just showed the same gameplay as the reveal. If this was an overview why show only one thing? Again?

I have a feeling that much of this is in the player's hands on how to tackle things, go in guns/vehicle blazing or snipe from afar before heading in but this overview was very "samey" to the reveal and they really should have put a highlight reel together more. Show off environment diversity, show off different playstyles and get rid of this idea that the game has to be bombastic in the trailer every second. So much of what made Halo campaigns brilliant is the downtimes where you're stealth approaching or getting a look around to work out your approach to a section/engagement or just taking in the scenery while being immersed in the audio and visual delights.
  • I agree with your first note, there's a harshness to the graphics that's a little off putting. Blacks are too deep.
  • The Brutes are scavengers that use both alien an human tech and slap it together.
  • The flood will most likely make it to this game.
  • But Halo's humans have always had a grounded human look to them going all the way back to CE.
  • Save it for the rest of the game, we don't need to see it all right now.
  • See previous. I'd rather experience it for the first time as I play and not see it all in the trailer. Halo has always been like this.
I wouldn’t jump to conclusions at this point, we’ve only seen a small sliver of this game.
 
I can't recall a AAA single player title that has had this little footage from the campaign before release, but here's hoping The Legend of Cortana: Halo of the Wild holds up. My hope is it'll be a reverse Cyberpunk where they're actually trying to preserve more of the game because its great and worthy of being experienced. I dunno though, I look forward to reviews.

I wonder if we'll ever get clarification or an explanation on why 343 decided to announce the campaign overview on a Sunday evening and show it the very next morning at 6am. I'm very curious. That kind of thing doesn't just happen.

Someone probably missed their previous midweek deadline, and by making it only ~6min long they wanted it to trend throughout the day on breaks so they dumped it in the early morning.
 
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twilo99

Member
Looks very enticing. Looking forward to that day 1 on gamepass deal.

Another great example to why gamepass is a stellar service for people like me.. as good as this looks, there is no way I would shed $70 to play it on PC, but give it to me on gamepass and I am 100% going to give it a try.
 

supernova8

Banned
It looks far, far better than when they first showed it off (Craig, etc). Doesn't mean it looks good. I'd say it looks OK/fine considering it's meant to be their tentpole game.

I know it sounds like complaining for the sake of complaining but seriously imagine if Uncharted 4 or TLOU2 or Ratchet & Clank looked mediocre. People (including me) would be all over them saying "wtf are you guys doing?!".

So yeah nowhere near what I would've expected for the next Halo instalment but a massive improvement from where they were before. Plus, if I was already paying for Game Pass I would of course play it (no reason not to).
 

HeisenbergFX4

Gold Member
It looks far, far better than when they first showed it off (Craig, etc). Doesn't mean it looks good. I'd say it looks OK/fine considering it's meant to be their tentpole game.

I know it sounds like complaining for the sake of complaining but seriously imagine if Uncharted 4 or TLOU2 or Ratchet & Clank looked mediocre. People (including me) would be all over them saying "wtf are you guys doing?!".

So yeah nowhere near what I would've expected for the next Halo instalment but a massive improvement from where they were before. Plus, if I was already paying for Game Pass I would of course play it (no reason not to).
I look forward to playing it especially via Gamepass.

That said to me it’s not even comparing it to any Sony games I more compare it to what I most recently saw with Forza Horizon 5 as that game looks phenomenal

Still looks way better then it did a year ago
 
For some reason Sony fans enjoy calling anyone who likes an Xbox game or product advertisers for that product. It's pretty odd but they keep doing it. Oh well I agree the game looks fun and appealing to people who were never Halo fans but keep the long standing fans would be the ultimate recipe for success. I'm really looking forward to the reviews.
I don’t get it, but learned not to get sucked in. A shame they are still allowed to ruin discussion with their pointless low effort nonsense, but it’s an overwhelming task to control for the mods.

Back OT. /advertising mode: Halo looks fucking great - available for a terrific low price this December, or included with your Gamepass subscription, ONLY on Xbox :messenger_beaming:
 

Codes 208

Member
I don't remember 343 hiring him back or even defending him. Isn't 343 made up on Bungie people who were afraid to leave MS?
Only a portion of it is, most of the staff is made up of new people, they discussed that in a vidoc ages ago with halo 4’s release. Most bungie people stayed with bungie.

343 doesnt have any beef with marty, marty went off to do his own thing after leaving bungie.
 
Not really impressive but it does look better than it did when they first showed it, I never play MP in Halo but I will play this campaign because I've played all of the other ones and really enjoyed 1-3 and Reach, 343 has shit the bed with this franchise though and there needs to be some changes made at that studio.
 
Looks pretty good. 343i had a pretty difficult task. They needed to change up the formula of the campaign while at the same time sticking to its roots and working within the constraints of cross gen.

Is it OMG 2021 next gen amazing, no. I guess it doesn't need to be. The days of ever being blown away a la Halo CE in 2001 are over.

The reception is pretty interesting though. Kids who grew up with Halo 15 years ago are spazzing out due to nostalgia while other people who don't have affinity for the franchise or younger people gaming post 2010 are pretty much "Yup, that's Halo." The media reviews will be critical if the franchise will grow beyond the hard core base.
 
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