• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

343i update on Halo Infinite Season 2: Lone Wolves

Lone Wolf

Member
Having finished the campaign a few days ago, what I want to know is, where next for Master Chief and Cortana Mk2, on top of the fact that Atriox is the banished equivalent of the Master Chief...
343 probably has no idea either. Joe Staten put this game together in a little over a year from whatever 343 had already built. He’s probably had to restructure everything. It’s gonna take time, and more time is damaging this game. 2 maps and no forge for season 2 is going to get major backlash.
 

Batiman

Banned
That new map looks like it’s gonna be dope. Would be better if they at least had 4 new ones ready but whatever. I’m always gonna be on and off halo all gen.
 

Lognor

Banned
Season 2 still two months away? Oof. Got enough to play, but I was really enjoying the multiplayer until I maxed out the battle pass. I guess I do need that carrot after all
 

OverHeat

« generous god »
I’m a big fan of the game….getting content out here is the key…this is been a disaster so far.
 

STARSBarry

Gold Member
People are a bit harsh on this game considering its one of the few games lately specially on pc that launched without any major issues.

Is that not the lesson here? Not them take their time to make sure this shit works first.

wait what?!

I mean sure, compared to the other disasters such as Fallout 76, Cyberpunk and more recently BF 2042 ok yeah, in comparison. But I had to reinstall it twice on steam and then gave up and used Windows store for it to actually launch. I then had to uninstall the HD texture pack to have it not crash every 30 minutes. This is all fixed now but it did have some fairly frustrating launch issues for PC Gamers.

Not unique to the PC version but an entire game mode BTB was essentially broken from 2 weeks after launch until 3 weeks ago... I mean I know us PC players expectations are low these days but seriously?

I will be honest though I can't remember the last time a big budget game did go off without a hitch, but Halo was definitely not it.
 
Last edited:

Naked Lunch

Member
Only 2 new maps is just embarrassing.
It sounds like they are rushing to finish Forge and have the community make the rest of the maps.
The problem is, Forge maps are ugly as shit - and they usually play like garbage too.
I can honestly say there hasn't been a single Forge map I liked in the 15 years its been a part of the series.

I would have thought going free to play would result in at least one new officially made map a month. Nope.
Get ready to enjoy heaps of ugly ass Forge maps made by the community.
 
Last edited:

BryceNobody

Member
I kinda don’t get how they will do co op with the way the map works. Will players be limited to sticking together in a radius? Will other missions disable if you’re “live” on one?

I like what I see here though I’m not interested in competitive co-op. Cool designs though.

I’ve kinda wondered the same thing since beating the campaign. The world map is just so functionally different compared to previous Halo games that it almost seems like Co-op would make things too easy. Most of the camps/units are really built for 1-versus-many battles; adding a second player seems like it would make things a total breeze even on higher difficulties. But maybe that’s just me.
 
Last edited:

BryceNobody

Member
343 probably has no idea either. Joe Staten put this game together in a little over a year from whatever 343 had already built. He’s probably had to restructure everything. It’s gonna take time, and more time is damaging this game. 2 maps and no forge for season 2 is going to get major backlash.
I’m still happy with the overall game, it’s one of the tighter AAA releases without any major issues at launch that I can think of.

Good quality rewards patience imo.
 
It's currently at 5,812 players on Steam right now. By comparison, Elden Ring just hit a new peak of 952,523 players just recently. That's almost 164x the player numbers.

Of course Elden Ring is in a class of its own, but it does illustrate a stark difference in two games that were to revitalize and innovate their respective IPs, and break them into the mainstream. Elden Ring has absolutely accomplished that; Halo Infinite has miserably failed.

The only way they can salvage this game is to basically get enough new content and relaunch it like a new release, big marketing blitz and everything. Because at that point it's going to be competing against even more shooters and major releases, including ever better-entrenched live service games like Destiny 2 and Apex Legends. I know Halo isn't the juggernaut it used to be, but this is an embarrassing performance from an IP that used to lead the FPS genre.

Now it seems like it can barely keep up. I expected a much stronger showing.
 
Seems like they delayed co-op again.
How can they screw up so much about their biggest franchise ever is beyond me. Can't just be the management.

Hopefully we can at least get good, nextgen-only remakes of H3, Reach and ODST (from someone else of course).

They have so many good fps developers now, just give Halo to someone else (while keeping Staten and co.).
 
Last edited:

STARSBarry

Gold Member
It's currently at 5,812 players on Steam right now. By comparison, Elden Ring just hit a new peak of 952,523 players just recently. That's almost 164x the player numbers.

Of course Elden Ring is in a class of its own, but it does illustrate a stark difference in two games that were to revitalize and innovate their respective IPs, and break them into the mainstream. Elden Ring has absolutely accomplished that; Halo Infinite has miserably failed.

The only way they can salvage this game is to basically get enough new content and relaunch it like a new release, big marketing blitz and everything. Because at that point it's going to be competing against even more shooters and major releases, including ever better-entrenched live service games like Destiny 2 and Apex Legends. I know Halo isn't the juggernaut it used to be, but this is an embarrassing performance from an IP that used to lead the FPS genre.

Now it seems like it can barely keep up. I expected a much stronger showing.

I dont think thats a fair comparison because your looking at a new title vs something that has specific systems in place to try and retain players and have them spend money over the long term, and has been out for awhile.

you should compare them to games which have been out longer... like say fromsoft's Dark Souls III and another F2P shooter such as Apex.

YboCFyp.png


oh dear, perhaps they should concentrate on giving players something other than just a season pass.
 
Last edited:

RAIDEN1

Member
343 probably has no idea either. Joe Staten put this game together in a little over a year from whatever 343 had already built. He’s probably had to restructure everything. It’s gonna take time, and more time is damaging this game. 2 maps and no forge for season 2 is going to get major backlash.
Well yeah if they are looking at it as Halo Infinite being the base portal for further developments of the story, (ie you could pass through a jump gate and get taken to a DLC that takes the story further) then they better get their skates on...right now I am not that bothered about mopping up any remaining FOBs...the main threat has been taken care of, so the soldiers can rest easy..
 
Last edited:

Robb

Gold Member
I’ll probably play it and enjoy it, but seems like things are taking a long time to roll out for whatever reason..
 

SteadyEvo

Member
So, it sounds like you guys want more maps and online co-op? That’s understandable. MP has gotten stale to me cause maps are lacking. But thanks to that I finally finished the campaign.

Patience y’all. Patience.
 

Romulus

Member
Wait, so they needed to delay coop.... just to delay it again?

I miss the pre smartphone era developers that would do amazing shit without needing patches.
 
343i gotta stop making Halo games.. Let the people who make Doom or Wolfenstein make the next Halo. Even Treyarch would be better at this point. This game had a year delay already imagine if it didn’t get that…
 
Last edited:

Ozriel

M$FT
Do Apex seasons last six months, with a 500 person development team solely focused on getting it content complete?
Keep in mind, Respawn not only manage Apex, but also made a terrific Star Wars game at the same time.
343i has one job: make Halo Infinite. They’ve had six years. Their output is laughably bad by any and all metrics.

Halo infinite’s Seasons are three months. Season one is lasting 6 months because they’re bug fixing the base game and taking a much needed break after flat out crunch.

The 500 employees in 343i aren’t working on MP. You can expect work on campaign expansions to be well underway. Also work on campaign coop.

Respawn made a Star Wars campaign and Apex MP. 343 made Halo Campaign and Halo MP. Similar scope.



We will see if this is crying over spilled milk or trying to handwave issues away, the same way that was done for reports before the trailer, after the trailer, at launch, after launch to focus on hyping things out.

Lmao. As if all the talk before launch wasn't that the campaign would come in as a disaster. Go look at critic reviews for the campaign.

The MP mode is F2P. You didn't pay a dime for it. Play something else in the interim and come back when you feel the content is there.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Halo infinite’s Seasons are three months. Season one is lasting 6 months because they’re bug fixing the base game and taking a much needed break after flat out crunch.

The 500 employees in 343i aren’t working on MP. You can expect work on campaign expansions to be well underway. Also work on campaign coop.

Respawn made a Star Wars campaign and Apex MP. 343 made Halo Campaign and Halo MP. Similar scope.





Lmao. As if all the talk before launch wasn't that the campaign would come in as a disaster. Go look at critic reviews for the campaign.

The MP mode is F2P. You didn't pay a dime for it. Play something else in the interim and come back when you feel the content is there.
Revisionist history 101. Talk before the reveal was hype hype hype. A while after Craig gate and the delay the hopium started again (game is fine, just wait for lighting improvements), launch arrived, rinse and repeat.
 

Banjo64

cumsessed
I’ll be in absolute disbelief if we don’t get at least one remastered map for arena and one for big team. Guardian, The Pit, Sandtrap, Valhalla - they’ve already had a 12 month delay meaning a 6 year gap from Halo 5, and now they’ve had a 6 month long initial season. What the fuck do their employees actually do? Their post game support with MCC and this has been diabolical.
 

FireFly

Member
Halo infinite’s Seasons are three months. Season one is lasting 6 months because they’re bug fixing the base game and taking a much needed break after flat out crunch.

The 500 employees in 343i aren’t working on MP. You can expect work on campaign expansions to be well underway. Also work on campaign coop.

Respawn made a Star Wars campaign and Apex MP. 343 made Halo Campaign and Halo MP. Similar scope.
In the first 6 months after Halo 5's release, 343 added 8 new maps, 20+ weapons, 10+ vehicles, 5 new game types and a bunch of Forge maps. Then shortly after we had Warzone Firefight and a bunch more maps, weapons and vehicles.
 

mitch1971

Member
Here is the problem I see with Gaas. When a studio finishes up with a game they have slaved over for years - the pain of making systems work, early alpha problems, testing, late hours, playing the game over and over and over - you want to draw a line in the sand, recharge, strip you mind of all those up's and down, and go to work on something new. Apart from post fixes, the last thing you want to do is continue for years on the same project. Gaas works for the companies bottom line, I just don't think it works for workers minds.
 

Mr.ODST

Member
People are a bit harsh on this game considering its one of the few games lately specially on pc that launched without any major issues.

Is that not the lesson here? Not them take their time to make sure this shit works first.
Crashes every 10 minutes even now and to the point even in HCS they had to replace PC's with Dev consoles because the crashing was that bad
 

BigLee74

Member
Instead of whining and throwing toys out of the pram, just forget about it. Go away for a year and immerse yourself in some other games. Then, when you come back, everything you wanted will probably be there, and you have effectively a new game to enjoy again. That’s my plan anyway.

Given that i still play 10 year old games in MCC, it’s not as ridiculous as it sounds.

Good games are always good games.
 

Ozriel

M$FT
Revisionist history 101. Talk before the reveal was hype hype hype. A while after Craig gate and the delay the hopium started again (game is fine, just wait for lighting improvements), launch arrived, rinse and repeat.


Launch arrived and the campaign hit 87 on Metacritic and won 26 GOTY awards. Hard to dismiss what people felt as ‘hopium’, in light of that.

Anyway, getting mad because The devs of an F2P game decided to take things slow while they recuperate from a crazy long crunch is weird.
 

FireFly

Member
Here is the problem I see with Gaas. When a studio finishes up with a game they have slaved over for years - the pain of making systems work, early alpha problems, testing, late hours, playing the game over and over and over - you want to draw a line in the sand, recharge, strip you mind of all those up's and down, and go to work on something new. Apart from post fixes, the last thing you want to do is continue for years on the same project. Gaas works for the companies bottom line, I just don't think it works for workers minds.
We're not actually in the GaaS period yet though. It's normal for a multiplayer game to get updates for a year or so after launch. Even by the standard of "boxed games", Infinite's progress is unimpressive.
 

ZehDon

Member
Instead of whining and throwing toys out of the pram, just forget about it. Go away for a year and immerse yourself in some other games. Then, when you come back, everything you wanted will probably be there, and you have effectively a new game to enjoy again. That’s my plan anyway.

Given that i still play 10 year old games in MCC, it’s not as ridiculous as it sounds.

Good games are always good games.
Unfortunately, we’re talking about Halo Infinite’s multiplayer - a F2P live service game. If everyone walks away and waits three or four years for 343i to fix the game, there won’t be anyone left playing the game. 343i will have to stop working on it because it’s dead and move on. No one wants Halo Infinite to die - they want the game we were told 343i was making for the last six years.
 
This is so wacky. I absolutely loved the campaign, and they nailed the feel that I enjoy in multiplayer, but where are the maps? Halo 5 multiplayer was fucking humming 6 months after release..... I was happy with how they had salvaged MCC, I thought maybe they had turned the corner, but this is nuts. Multiplayer is still super barebones....ugghhh
 
Only two maps until May is embarrassing. There are so many great classic maps they could have thrown in with this update. This isn't looking good. I will continue to play, but this is sad.
 

ZehDon

Member
Halo infinite’s Seasons are three months. Season one is lasting 6 months because they’re bug fixing the base game and taking a much needed break after flat out crunch.

The 500 employees in 343i aren’t working on MP. You can expect work on campaign expansions to be well underway. Also work on campaign coop.

Respawn made a Star Wars campaign and Apex MP. 343 made Halo Campaign and Halo MP. Similar scope.
Season one is six months long, and in that time, they've fixed none of the major issues with the game and developed concept art for two maps. They did update the shop, though. My point stands.

No one will give a shit about campaign expansions if they abandon the multiplayer. Who wants to invest in a dying franchise with an incompetent developer? Right now, if this is their live service, then 343i has absolutely abandoned Halo Infinite, and its exposed as the hollow cash grab that the cynics decried it as. If 343i hasn't pulled every single content team together to brute force the necessary content to keep Halo Infinite's MP alive long enough to build a fanbase, then they're more incompetent than I'd ever imagined.

Respawn made of the most celebrated Star Wars titles in decades, and packed it with high quality content that looked, sounded, and played every bit the AAA game that is is. They also made a high quality F2P multiplayer title that has carved out a loyal fan base against the titan that is Fortnite. That's a huge effort. 343 Industries made the smallest campaign with the least about of content in Halo franchise history, that looks every bit the poorly made last-gen title that it is. They also made the smallest multiplayer mode with the least amount of content in the Halo franchise history, and it's currently being outpaced by Dark Souls III - a six year old single player title. They took six years to do this. Respawn is running laps around the clowns at 343 Industries.
 

BigLee74

Member
Unfortunately, we’re talking about Halo Infinite’s multiplayer - a F2P live service game. If everyone walks away and waits three or four years for 343i to fix the game, there won’t be anyone left playing the game. 343i will have to stop working on it because it’s dead and move on. No one wants Halo Infinite to die - they want the game we were told 343i was making for the last six years.
Well, I’m not encouraging everybody to abandon it in the meantime, just the whiny bastards 😂
 

Banjo64

cumsessed
Only two maps until May is embarrassing. There are so many great classic maps they could have thrown in with this update. This isn't looking good. I will continue to play, but this is sad.
It’ll be only 2 maps until season 3 starts in August/September.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Halo MCC illustrates my point perfectly. They completely bungled the technology underlying the game in a way that would require them to go back and rearchitect technology built across 12 different engines spanning over a decade. That's the classic situation where you cut your losses and move on. Yet 343 spent years behind the scenes fixing up the technology to the point where it could deliver on the original vision, and then they ported all the games to the PC *and* added ODST and Reach. And they were still updating it until Halo Infinite launch. So that's basically 6 years of support for a title that should have been dead in the water.
I am glad they did, but it feels like something of a change in direction coming above the studio and to fix the attitude towards the series in order to give Infinite and the IP a stronger chance. They took their sweet time turning it around. A lot of the effects they still had in a broken state (see Fog rendering and others) were fixed only last year. If people did not throw a stink around the Hall series very loudly it would have been done and dusted.

You need to "lower your risk" when you have a new IP or experimental game design. But Halo already comes with a huge audience, even if you're going to quibble as to whether it is really bigger than GoW or Forza.
Do you think only new IP’s and experimental games think about risk?

Not really, when AAAA budgets started to become a thing it is natural business people that were already looking to transition to episodic content (which makes sense for subscriptions oriented business models) tried to maximise what new kind of streams would bring them. If people accept and welcome the game getting regular updates / new content they may accept less content at launch and I can reduce the amount of content I develop without customer feedback. Call it agile, call it lowering your risk, etc…

It feels like the transition to digital distribution and trying to tell people that big businesses would be inclined to keep the extra margins they got from cutting out inventory handling, manufacturing, and retailers (Nintendo went a step above and said it was making players pay for the convenience, amazing 😂).

And Infinite has the most standard multiplayer modes ever, and even planned (or rumoured) additions like Forge and Warzone/ Warzone Firefight have already proved themselves. And when you have such a large audience on day 1, it makes sense to ship the most content possible, so your multiplayer base can keep growing. Not ship a small selection of content, and then update at a slower rate than any standard boxed release.

The fact that Infinite's strategy makes zero sense, makes me think the issues are really development related and nothing to do with some GaaS edict from above. When literally the head of the direction of the studio is saying publicly that development is too slow, you know there is a problem.


Games routinely ship unfinished, so if releasing a barebones product is necessary condition to be a GaaS title (and that's pretty debateable!), I don't think we can say it is a sufficient one. The idea behind GaaS is that with constant updates the player base can continue to grow over time, rather than shifting from one title to the next. If you just ship a barebones title and then do nothing for months, people will simply jump ship, which is what is happening to Infinite. So again, the launch strategy simply doesn't make sense. Unless – the real issues are development related.

Sure there are clear development issues in there coupled with a GaaS strategy. Worst of both worlds ;).
 
Last edited:

Clintizzle

Lord of Edge.
This puts into perspective how valuable devs are to GaaS and why Sony probably bought Bungie.

In saying that, Bungie have been criticized for Destiny a lot as well.
 
Top Bottom