Halo Infinite's Second Technical Preview Is Off To An Impressive Start

Ugh no campaign ugh it's gonna be bad ugh Sony is better TRIPLE A IN MY ASS. Halo sucks it sucks so hard I hate it

@DezzY7 Come on, you can do better for your joke. At least say no co-op campaign since there's still going to be a campaign...

Going to get alot of hate for this but it honestly looked & felt like I was playing an Xbox 360 game on my one s I was expecting better from a game with such a huge budget I prefer splitgate but its not released yet so I may change my mind when it's officially launched

I tried playing last night and received an error stating my privacy settings needed to be changed. I changed and then when I tried to play it said I was banned. So…yeah.

@Would_you_kindly Yeah, I definitely think Infinite is designed with the Series consoles and PC in mind.

I believe Digital Foundry says that it runs as low as 540P Resolution and 30FPS, whereas on Xbox Series S it runs at 1080p 60FPS, and Xbox Series X it runs at 4k 60FPS, and XSX/XSS both have the option to play at 120FPS as well, whereas XBO is stuck at 30FPS.

They basically ended the analysis by saying people shouldn't really consider playing Infinite on the XBO, as it won't be practical against next-gen and PC users who are running at 4x the frame rate and will be able to see and react much faster.

I think they've designed it for next-gen, and are just "allowing" it to run on XBO, but aren't really pushing it as an XBO game, it's just an option that is there for people that really want to play it on old hardware.

I think it looks pretty good on the next-gen consoles, I play it on XSS and it looks "good", nothing exceptional though.

The same might be true of Forza Horizon 5, they haven't shown XBO footage of that yet, so I'm expecting a fair few downgrades for that game when they finally reveal what the XBO will play it like.

@Xeno_Aura only have a one s & don't have the money to upgrade yet (I'll be getting a ps5 first when I do eventually upgrade) so the game might play fine on better consoles but for me it just feels sluggish & graphically inferior to other FPS

Things are looking good. Skipping the betas and waiting for December personally. Seems to be very well recieved

Glad to see it's getting such good feedback

@Would_you_kindly I am also playing on One S.
Honestly it looks good for a One S game. I can even say it looks better than what I expected from it as it is much sharper and more detailed than Halo 5 for example. It is on par if not better than Gears 5 on One (which I think is the best looking X1 game).

Does it look good next to PC and Series ? Big no! and sadly it is what it is.

@Xeno_Aura Yeah there is definite frame-rate disadvantage. But if the campaign manages to look like MP or better, I won't mind playing the campaign on One S. It doesn't look that bad.

@BrilliantBill Yeah, for campaign the cross-platform isn't an issue. And it looks like multiplayer and campaign are being made by different teams from what I've seen of 343. Maybe the campaign will run at a different performance to multiplayer, who knows.

@Xeno_Aura probably in campaign they push harder to stick to the higher resolutions or the quality mode.
while in MP, frame rate or performance mode is more important. So the dynamic res can go down quite a bit just to maintain a 30fps.

@KilloWertz
In one simple swoop Microsoft can put my faith back in them, with this one game and campaign
Along with FH5.
After a not great start for me games wise this generation with Xbox.
Let’s wait and when the games are released and are top AAA, then we can shot about it.
I will be shouting as well, but I’m holding off until they are out.

@BrilliantBill modern warfare (2019) looks really good on the one s & the frame rate isn't bad either

@Dezzy70 I see you're passionate about triple A, but you can see how it starting to sound like a director's cut version of the "Xbox has no games" rhetoric. Just pointing out why some people might take offence. Also, consider not everyone on this site is as pumped or motivated by only triple A games. Just a heads up 😊 I understand though, Xbox has promised more triple A but without gameplay trailers it's asking a lot for us to believe them. But they're coming.
whether they are to your taste is a different matter entirely. You might find that they don't appeal to you. Something worth thinking on.

I played last night on xbox one s digital and yes it's very smooth. Graphics are amazing bullets take long time to kill people though

I played it last night on XSX and it was smooth and very responsive. Of all the shooters, Destiny/Halo were always more up my street. Response and fun are top of my wants for something like this, but the graphics were impressive, considering the resolution etc. Not ‘asghadismywitnesshesbrokeninhalf’ amazing, but very good. Definitely seems to be aimed towards series and souped pc rigs….

@Dezzy70 Yeah, for a little while they roped me in and I was willing to just wait it out. Then I realized I have several of those options with the PS5 and was being a bit silly. Still don't regret getting my Series X as it will get used more often eventually, but they need to bring it. In the meantime, my PS5 will continue getting plenty of usage.

As for Halo Infinite though, I hope they eventually fix Total Control as it's severely glitched. I managed to get about an hour with the beta late last night and the one time Total Control came up with got completely destroyed because most of the time when I would capture Point B it wouldn't register any points for the team even if I was standing in it and it never said it was being contested. Otherwise a pretty enjoyable experience, closing out the night with an intense sudden death loss in CTF.

@KilloWertz
Yeah prefer my series x as a console and the features and the controller and game pass is good.
They just need to bring the games and start showing real gameplay footage for games next year. They seem very slow at Xbox studios compared to Sony studios.
I mean a lot of the Xbox studios are very well established studios.
Anyway FH5 November and Halo campaign December, let’s hope they are both AAA quality and it’s the start of things to come.

I am looking forward to playing the campaign. I’ve been playing the preview and I believe it performs well and looks nice technically speaking. However, I have lost my taste for the Halo multiplayer. I used to play it all the time back in the day, but I am not a huge fan of what it is now. Maybe when they introduce big team battle next week. I always enjoyed the vehicles… I was originally planning on skipping COD this year for the first time since the MW3 fiasco, but I’m not sure anymore. I’ve been playing on a series x btw- I have a one s as well but didn’t download the client on that.

DISCLAIMER: Part of this post is copied from the latest "What Are You Playing This Weekend?" article.

Been playing the Halo Infinite preview, mostly focusing on the modes with Bots. Here are my thoughts after a few hours:

1) The Bots are much more competent in Slayer than they are in more complex modes like Capture the Flag or Stronghold. Twice in a single match I watched Bots grab our flag only to suddenly and inexplicably stop and back into a corner as I approached. The typical time for a CTF victory was less than 3-4 minutes, and Stronghold saw scores of 200-0. So no, they're simply not ready for Prime Time, at least in those modes.

2) In Slayer they tend to do better, although they'll never provide as challenge for "pro" Halo players as currently constituted. For the record, I consider myself far below average at Halo; I've only played the series sporadically since Halo 2. Even so, I routinely had Killing Sprees and even entire matches where I didn't die, and that NEVER happens against human players.

ADDENDUM: For some reason the Bots actually seem to be much more competent in Training Mode than in the arenas with human players. They appear to coordinate (pincer moves) and jump and move erratically more often to avoid fire. At any rate my kill/loss ratio is much lower than in the multiplayer arenas with Bots. I really like what I'm seeing, though.

All that said, Bots are absolutely a huge step in the right direction for Halo, especially for less experienced or skilled players who are more interested in casual play...particularly in local splitscreen matches...than serious competition or the eSports scene. With an IP as huge as Halo, there's a place for both groups, but up until now the skill gap (and all too often a toxic online environment) has made for a discouraging barrier for many folks, myself included.

It could also work wonders for the Forge by filling out team rosters, because up till now unless you had an extensive Friends List and the ability to coordinate, you were left with mostly empty arenas and nobody ever got to enjoy the fruits of your efforts.

Right now the Bots are a work-in-progress, but that's to be expected. If 343 puts the effort necessary into their AI routines, I see them becoming a staple option for the future that will make Halo much more accessible to far more players. I really hope 343 will consider expanding their use in other modes, including Social Multiplayer (they could really help especially when servers have fewer players to go around). And for me at least they're a MUST for local splitscreen multiplayer and the Forge.

Looking forward anxiously to next weekend's Big Team Battle preview. Some things I'll be paying close attention to will include how capably Bots man/drive vehicles and their weaponry, as well as how they fare in larger numbers (coordinating to fulfill objectives or kill human players). Bots have proven to struggle against human players in modes with added complexity like CTF and Stronghold in this week's preview (their directive to avoid human players in CTF after grabbing the enemy flag is so strong right now that they literally back themselves into corners and just stand there, wide open), and Big Team Battle will likewise be an important test since it has extra nuances for them to deal with.

It's important to remember that we're playing a preview build, and that even at launch the game's AI will leave some things to be desired with regard to Bots. But given time I really think 343 will get them refined to the point they can provide a decent challenge for players of any skill level.