Halo Infinite Review (Thy jiblet)
To be real, this game has its moments and the core of the shooting is great, but jesus christ does everything else fall flat on its face, wtf was 343 doing for 6 years???
not only it is super bare bones for a triple a game with 6 years of experience but a lot is just not working for instance melee doesnt work at all, big team battle straight up doesnt work, nor does custom games (at time of review) most of the cosmetics are in the shop and they arent all great the armor coating system is a downgrade, same with the emblem, most cores are missing a lot of content e.g. mark 5b having very little coatings, mark 7 having very little wrist utility ect and the yokia core or whatever it was called has like 2 helmets and 2 pads.
By making the game only progress by challenges is frustrating as i don't really want to win 3 games of oddball or use the pulse carbine it also doesn't help when the game decides it doesn't want to track the challenges as well, halo for example mcc had perfect progression with your medals being used as xp and the ability to do challenges if you want to also most games have a season pass every month or two but this first season pass is lasting I think 6 months, 6 months! after that period of time the player base will most likely harshly die down, like halo 5, due to the lack of content.
Triple a studios Tend hire an assisting studio with large live service games to keep content coming, examples like warzone having 2 teams on it and fortnite i think hire extra help for its update, As the game is free they gain money from mirco transactions and i think if they get additional support for the micro transactions while 343 works on the main game that would get a lot more done.
The new trend of releasing half arsed games and then slowly updating them into a decent game is a trend among large studios, The sad fact is when the game is finally good no one want to play because of the bad first impression, this exact thing happened to battlefront 2, will halo infinite be a great game in 2-3 years time, most likely but in the current state it is in rn i foresee a lot of people hopping off the game. I love halo always been a fan, i was put off the series by halo 5 and came back with high hopes, issues:
limited customisation, poor connection on pc, big team finna dont work, progression system flawed, challenges often not counting, vehicles dont feel right (super tanky against ars br ect but super squish agains snipers and hardlight), barebones playlists, systems like armor cores and armor coatings being very scummy, having to unlock each shoulder pad separately as well as skins and stickers, red reticle issues, unbalanced spawns (ghost on one side tank on other, or ravanger on one side and shock rifle on other), weapon pad tiers being unbalanced(mangler is way better than distrupter/plas pistol, br over commando, battlepass pretty bad (you cant unlock all of noble teams armor unless you use a kit which is very restrictive this is by no means a complete list but these are some of the main ones,
The balancing for the most part is very very good, most weapons are usable, there are a few outliers like the plasma pistol and ravager, and I should talk about how the commando is a little underwhelming but not bad, weapons like the hydra, distruptor and pulse carbine seemed crap at the start of this games lifecycle but now know how to use them better. Like I said in the list there a few issues with weapon pads balance, to give a run down weapon pads have tiers you will have rifles on one snipers(non power) on one shotguns ect, there is some issues with the spawns as the mangler which is regarded as the same tier as plasma pistol and distruptor spawns too quick for how strong it is, but apart from that and the br > commando the other 2 pads are pretty balanced (heatwave = bulldog and shockrifle = stalkerrifle). One last issue with balance is there are some sandbox elements missing or nerfed. for example a power shotgun is really needed as swords and hammer feel very strong, spartan lasers replacement, the skewer, feels a lot weaker in the fact it requires 2 shots for anything tankier than a mongoose and tanks require like 5 shots, cindershot is good against vehicles but the weapon in all over the place and at times you can get a weird bouncy shot, the sniper is the best vehicle destroyer which it should not as the sniper is already a very powerful anti spartan weapon.
i would give this game a 6/10 (multi-player) and a meh review but steam only allowed yes or no, I would still recommend this game to halo fans and people new as it is fun but be warned as there is a lot of issues as i listed above