Halo Infinite Won't Include Co-Op Or Forge At Launch This Fall

Kinda a disaster, tbh. Co-op campaign is such a huge part of the Halo blueprint.

No co-op that's a pretty big exclusion

I never play with others, but this feels very weird…

This won’t affect me, but I have lost track of how many people talk about growing up playing the campaign co-op with their parents or siblings. I can see how many will feel this as bad as a full delay.

Edit to add:
I feel if the issue is split screen performance, just leave it out and launch with online only co-op!

@Zochmenos while I agree with that to a point, coming weeks or months later is not that big of a deal. Could this foreshadow a campaign delay or is it evidence that no delay will happen as here is where they would have announced it?

**My ignorant game design take**
I think this will be good because rendering two worlds for couch coop will result in more issues for the game and bad press. They have good momentum and this hopefully won't slow them down.

That’s really ***** tbh. Co-op in Halo is one of its main selling points imo. That’s a pretty big omission at launch. I don’t know what the hell has happened during the development of this game but it’s been a mess. They’ve had an extra year and it still isn’t ready. Not good.

@Tharsman me neither I didn’t even realise it had co-op!

@Bdbrady Nice take. Makes me think that this game being cross-gen has everything to do with the delay.

That's unfortunate for people who like to play the campaign in co op but at least it's coming in season 2.. I play the Halo campaigns solo so it doesn't bother me, Fingers crossed it releases this holiday..

Release MP this holiday and just wait the 3 months and release the campaign with co-op in my opinion. Really hope this one delivers for you guys!

This seems pretty concerning to me. Not many people will want to wait 3 months to play the campaign so by the time it comes out it may be useless.

Also, what kind of idiots at 343 had initially thought it was a good idea to release this last year??? They have to be one of the worst studios out there. Microsoft has basically unlimited funds and it’s been 6 years since the last Halo, truly unbelievable.

I really wanted this to be a home run but I’m skeptical now.

@elpardo1984 coop is a huge deal for many long running fans of the series.

Was hoping to play this coop at launch but I’ll still dive in solo through easy to get the story. Play through harder difficulties with buddies when it comes. Disappointed yes but it’s ok got lots to play and can wait.

@FatalBubbles I’ll be playing this on Gamepass, if I was considering buying this at RRP like others though I’d be pissed. Big misstep.

I remember how Halo 5 got such a kicking for not including split-screen co-op it made The Colation make sure to include it.

Halo co-op is a huge part of the franchise and its legacy. My first playthrough of every Halo game has been done in Co-op with my brother. This not having it at launch makes me not want to play it until it's ready. It's just too big of a part of my "halo journey" to ignore it.

It's deeply concerning that this game was meant to be out last year, saw a year delay and now Co-op isn't working? It's not even like Halo Co-op is particularly fancy, most of them we're both playing as the same character.

Co-op not ready for launch, forge not ready for launch, assassinations not ready for launch, let me guess firefight not at launch?

It’s not like they’ve had years and years…. Ha. At least they remembered a campaign I had at one point expected them to say it didn’t have a campaign.

Damn, this is a huge bummer. The first thing me and my friends do when a new Halo game is released is play online co op campaign. Even if the campaign releases, I won't be playing it for months. And they were seriously going to release this game last year????? WOW. I've defended the devs all the way up until this moment. No excuses anymore. This game should have been complete by November of this year.

My friends are not at all good with MP so I'll either be playing MP alone when they are not around or with bots until they learn how to game better. I guess that'll be it for 3 months.

They would have ruined Xbox's rep if they had launched this last year.

Am I the only one who is fine with this? Haha. Face it, if they delayed the whole game to include coop everyone would be slagging them off. This is a nice compromise

@FatalBubbles It's been 6 Years since last halo but I am willing to bet that they rebooted this game once or twice throughout its development. It changed several designers and lead designers and so on. This game that we are getting is probably result of more like 3 years of development IMO.And yes 343 is probably the worst Xbox first party studio. There is no point in sugar coating it.

I honestly don't get the big deal...
At launch, there'll be single player and multiplayer to keep you plenty busy... then you'll get co-op S2 and forge S3...

Patience people 🙂

I get that waiting a bit longer for a particular element you like IS a minor frustration, but it's no more than that.
There's a few entitled people on social media really throwing their toys out the pram and losing any sense of perspective!

@Bdbrady Whatever the problems in executing it, co-op should have been baked in from Day One. Not having it at launch either means they misunderstand the importance, or the release date teased all last year was a total lie. Very disappointing after a year of patiently waiting for gameplay details, release date, and basically anything else.

That's a huge omission. It's kind of ominous in way, the way it sounds, this game is launching in a sort of early access. Which kind of explains why we're in August and it really doesn't feel like a new Halo is near release.

Dont care about coop as long the multiplayer is good.

So on day one, you're essentially buying a $60 solo campaign. That must have a pretty big impact on initial sales.

Yeah, I'm out.

Co-op is the reason I even play Halo. My friend had Halo CE and I joined in one night with split screen. I didn't have any interest in the game until then. I have since played every Halo co-op. Even the Halo Wars games.

Halo 4 was missing features at launch. Halo 5 was missing features at launch.
Halo Infinite will be missing features at launch. And they had 6 years to get it all in. I do not trust them at all with an early purchase.

This is super disappointing. 😓

The OG Xbox One probably can’t handle the open world in split-screen.

I fail to see why people still have faith in 343.

Guess I'll be checking out the game after coop releases then.

Went through every Halo in coop with the girlfriend in anticipation of going through Infinite together. Huge disappointment.

A delay to around September 2022 would seem like the best option given the info obtained from this development update. Based on this current setup, Campaign co-op would release around March 2022 and Forge would release around June 2022 so a full game release in September 2022 would give an extra few months room.

Y'know, I was just sitting here thinking, what is this weird flat feeling I get whenever I see gaming news, articles or reviews. and it's the comments. The vocal minority. The fanboys. I remember the bliss of playing on the old xbox without knowing someone's else's opinion or critique of a game. I either enjoyed it or i didn't, there wasn't any expectation or self entitlement. Other people ruin gaming, their views and toxic thoughts and everything else that goes with online commentary. Ugh, videos on YouTube of some normal person acting like they're an icon, talking about why you should or shouldn't but a game. so called insiders analysing and criticising gaming developers. Articles on console sales and top ten reasons why this or that and then you lot, a game release on game pass which costs barely anything and you're just itching to see who can make the best whiny comment ever. I'm summary, so much negativity exists on websites dedicated to gaming. I'm going back to analog. Wish there were Xbox magazines again, that way I don't have to read some random joe bull. Blah

@The_New_Butler
Totally agree on game pass no big deal.
Glad they are focusing on campaign single player and multiplayer.
This game has had a bit of development hell, also during covid.
So let release the bits that are good and ready and the rest latter when it’s good and ready.

However and a bit controversial, they can realise the whole lot next year Christmas 2022 being honest. Also I think more time in development would make it even better.
We have farcry 6, Cod and Battlefield this 2021.
Do Halo infinite fall 2022 when the only other FPS will be COD 2022.
Also game companies have such bad release scheduling. 4 big FPS all within a few months all at Christmas 2021. Bad scheduling.

@Royalblues yep I feel the same way. Halo has been horribly managed by 343. Halo deserves better.

Release it all 2022 October. Totally polished and complete and fully loaded and full advantage of series x.

To many FPS this fall 2021.
Farcry 6
COD
Battlefield
Halo Infinite

What stupid developer release scheduling.

id software for Halo after this one.
Let’s start campaigning now.

@LordMonkfish The Cyberpunk 2077 disaster is still very fresh in everyone's mind, a delay that long wouldn't do damage because people will see it as making sure Halo Infinite isn't another Cyberpunk 2077.

Looking at when and how parts of Halo are realising now and the year delay.
They should have just gone series s/x now.
Maybe cross generation a year ago for original game with everything released but now time has passed. New generation series s/x only.
Would have made a better game of it overall as with zero last generation restrictions.

@Grumblevolcano @Dezzy70 right so we delay it so the MP crowd can scream because their side is done? Quite frankly they are already complaining that they don’t want it delayed, and I can see their point. Sorry, I just don’t buy the argument to delay and entire game when a ton of people only play MP and it is ready and we know it is. That group isn’t going to want to wait; and it be different if we didn’t have the flight.

@Grumblevolcano
Totally agree delay it all to 2022 October, when also 3 other big FPS will not be releasing.
Also use the extra year to make it series s/x only and true next generation.

And also, I’m not sure how many people who play it single non co op would want to wait either.

That’s a huge ask for a lot of people that won’t care.

The thing is co-op in Halo only got fun when Reach came out. 1-3 are great games but they do suffer from a lot of padding, CE especially. Co-op in that was great because at least you had someone to talk to whilst navigating the endless corridors between firefights!

Split-screen I get because of the increased processing required but I however don’t see why online co-op couldn’t have been integrated for launch. How much extra coding would that require beyond taking the template from Halo 5?

I'm filled with apathy over this news.

As with Halo 5, a delay in the Forge is a bad sign.

@Dezzy70 I think based on what they said they are pushing for making it gold and wrapping up. So the ship is sailing already. I also think it is the right decision. I personally only play the campaign and a little bit of MP. Both of which will be there.

@Dezzy70 they’ve had 6 years and a $200 million + budget and still can’t release a full game, a year after it was originally meant to be released. No matter how you look at this, questions need to be asked of 343’s incompetence and mismanagement. This is Xbox’s iconic franchise and under 343 it’s become a joke. They haven’t handled the release of any of their games well over 10 years. Change is needed.

@Tharsman totally, it’s just a game I’ve always played solo.

@Fenbops
Can’t really disagree, as most of your post is fact.
Not sure what has happened, but I guess they have been micro managed for a year now by maybe even Phil I guess to get things back on track.
The only thing I would say maybe they have stretched the studio to far. A new game engine, all the different consoles, last generation and this generation and pc. All the different modes.
Campaign, co op, multiplayer and forge.
Overall maybe to much or bad management.
Either way it sucks for Halo.

Not much of a wait left. Looking forward to it alot

@Xiovanni Absolutely, I think they’ve already set the MP as it’s own thing because it’s free to play. But some people get annoyed at that idea as well. I really don’t think they are going to please everyone no matter what they do at this at this point.

NO CAMPAIGN COOP! Then don't launch. Seriously the best memories of Halo 3 were playing the campaign on legendary with the boys. FML. That absolutely sucks especially with an extra year of development. Just wait, I want that game on a disc so I can play offline local couch coop. Might delay until a Special Edition comes in 2-3 years. Sucks

@Doctorwhoooourgh I’m totally fine with it. It’s going to have bangin’ multiplayer and can still play the campaign solo and then down the track it gets released and we can coop. This thread makes it feel like 90% of people waiting for Halo only want to play coop but I highly doubt that’s the case. Haven’t even thought about it until I read this.

My nephew & I have recently played through every Halo campaign co-op in anticipation to Infinite, man this is a bummer!

So is Halo Infinite going to have couch campaign co-op (splitscreen)? And just no online campaign co-op (different consoles or PC)? When I hear no campaign co-op it confuses me, always has. So please forgive my confusion.

@BundyDanger We saw how that panned out with no split screen in Halo 5. Halo is such a bug name because of that coop and splitscreen. It was so huge that online coop was one of the most requested features when Halo 2 released on Xbox live, that was then included from 3 on.

Coop is half the point of halo. Afaic this means halo is delayed to 2022.

Just how incompetent is 343? This game was supposed to launch on 2020. And now a year later core features "just aren't ready?". Guess I'm playing cyberpunk this fall, 😂

@senua I like reading your comments on xbox first party news, what's your take on this?

Quake is officially the best shooter of 2021 lol

Ot a good look all the way around. Xbox’s key franchise still can’t get a problem-free release. At this point it’s really a big bummer. More console war fodder to boot.

Was going to buy it physical but won't bother it's going to require a download for co op

@oconnoclast man I am with you I remember standing outside a gamestop at midnight with hundreds of people for Halo 2 I love the games. I like Phil Spencer he has rewarded my loyalty to Xbox through the the Xbox One days but I feel like he doesn't have his thumb on these guys there is no excuse for them not being able to deliver at this point. I am not a supporter of crunch and I want everyone to have a good equitable working experience but how much time do you need for a core feature and if they know now its not going to make it then they new months ago they didn't just wake up today and say well damn were out of time. The thing that really irritates me is the lack of urgency on their part well we will just deliver next year some time possibly maybe perhaps. this is an industry wide thing we can just patch it day one kind of attitude. 343 has done a terrible job with the IP and I think they need a major shake up at the top.

@mousieone for me its not about pleasing everyone there is always things that people are not going to like but they have had an extra year and this is not the first game in the series where they have seemed like the jv team is running the show on what was at one time Xbox's most important franchise.

@Cherip-the-Ripper I was never planning it to play on co-op mode. Played the last ones in single player. Given the poor Series X stock situation which has literally disappeared from Amazon, I think I will have to wait for it anyway. But it’s on gamepass so people can’t really complain about “wasting money on it”.

personally i will play it single player then when co op comes out play it gain co op

Apparently weapons wont be ready for launch, its going to be melee only for 3 months

@Fenbops i wouldn’t be pissed but I agree tha gamepass on day one does make the difference

@Doctorwhoooourgh +1 100%

@Xiovanni I would have done the same, TBH. It seems that this game's development is being a bit messy and maybe some decisions were not ok. This doesn't imply anything about the quality of the final product anyway. I still believe that it will be something special.

Doesn't really bother me. Looking forward to the multiplayer. I know campaign will suck. There's no way 343 will make a good campaign.

I'd be playing the campaign solo first time around to fully enjoy it anyway. Would have been nice to play co-op after that, but 3 months isn't a deal breaker.
Never bothered with Forge, so again, no deal breaker for me.

Does make you wonder what state this game was in to launch last year....

@Residentsteve01 Did you play (and enjoy) Halo ODST and Reach?

I feel like they are closer to gears as they have a more serious, grounded tone, and more of an ensemble cast rather than being more focused on MC and Cortana.

That's a shame, just finished playing through all the others in co-op with my nephew in advance of infinite...effectively makes it a 2022 release for me then. On the plus side I guess I won't need to renew my GP sub when it runs out in October, gives me a few months to work on the backlog

Personally, it doesn't affect me that much. I have only once tried playing any of the campaigns in co-op, and my mate didn't enjoy the game, and so the run was abandoned.

I've always managed to completed every single game solo on Legendary, and have always felt a little cheated that there is no way of knowing whether a person has completed the game solo or in co-op (which is undoubtedly easier). If I recall correctly, one of the campaigns did have an achievement for completing it on Legendary solo, but most of them don't. It's the same with Gears, where again, the games are much easier in co-op than solo, and again, there is so way to differentiate those that did it solo (such as myself) and thus with added difficulty, and those that took the easier route.

Has to be said though, for those that do enjoy the co-op game, this sucks big time. How on earth the game was supposed to be ready to launch last year is beyond me. I get the pandemic has caused problems, but the pandemic began to cause problems in the workplace around March last year, the game, at that point was supposed to come out in November. There is absolutely no way it would have been ready, regardless of the pandemic, and indeed the pandemic likely gifted Microsoft an excuse to delay the game. Now there has been/will have been an additional 12 months work done on the game (accepted that the workplace is still a problem) and the game is still not ready or complete. It appears to me that this game was announced at least 12 months too early...

@Residentsteve01 Hopefully not. I still have to catch up on that series.

It's fair that Reach and ODST don't beat Gears for you, I just wondered if you enjoyed them more than the mainline Halo games.

@VisitingComet1 Look I think the franchise needs to be on different hands. No question we’ll actually I feel like since Joseph is back the ship is on course again. However, they were left with several choices and I honestly believe that the MP should be released at the bare minimum in beta mode to all the chorus of “delay the whole game”. Holding the MP back because campaign isn’t done and “reasons” seems a unfair to a pretty big group of people that weren’t even planning to touch the campaign in the first place. That said I’m not entirely sure how many people play the game in co-op to be effected but given this current decision the number might be a lot smaller than the vocal internet presents.

They are bringing the two most important modes that the majority fans will want and that’s campaign and MP. I do agree with others though that co-op and forge should of been added on release considering how long 343i have had with the game along with the one year delay but thankfully I’m in the majority who only cares more for the campaign and MP.

I also agree that the Halo franchise should be handed to another studio, 343i are not doing what’s expected of Halo it deserves to be better than the way 343i have handled it.

@mousieone no I agree with you don't delay it for those modes multiplayer will be where I spend most of my time that is what makes Halo great playing with friends getting sniped from impossible distances and having fun.
I really just think that since 343 took over it has been going downhill and I am tired of the excuses they have had a whole year and are still behind.
I was not blind buying the series x I knew games like fable were a long way out but Halo was supposed to be done by now it is just frustrating to see it loose so much luster in the hands of these clowns.