大象传媒

By Jordan Middler // 大象传媒 The Social // 01 December 2021

After what feels like about 40 delays and an infinite number of disappointments along the way, Halo is finally back, and it might just be the best game in the series since Halo 3.

Halo Infinite’s multiplayer beta dropped recently and I’ve spent plenty of time coming to grips with it, dusting off some of my old skills. You see, I was really into my Halo 3. It was a formative game for me and my pals. It came out in that golden era of early Xbox 360 Xbox Live when a bunch of teenagers were let loose with a microphone to talk to their pals. It was anarchy.

We weren’t just playing it to have a venue to call each other horrible names however, there were hunners of games for that, we were doing it because Halo 3 was genuinely brilliant. It’s the first exposure a lot of people had to online first-person shooters, and I think those who pick up Halo Infinite will have a lot of the same experience.

Firstly, it’s hard. If you’re not decent, you’re going to get slaughtered. It’s not like Call of Duty where you’ve got a good chance of getting a dozen or so kills even if you’re holding the controller upside down, Halo is about skill, and a bit of luck.

One of the key moments where I realised that Halo was back was when I just 1v1ing a guy, both armed with assault rifles, and we both instinctively went for the melee button at the exact right time. I managed to win that battle, but the other guy could have just as easily if he’d only landed one more shot than I had.

Halo Infinite’s multiplayer beta is free-to-play, meaning there’s a battle pass you can pay for, or you can just go for the free one. The challenge system has been the only real downside so far. You could play for hours and not really level up all that much if you’re not going after the right things. This is something that developers 343 Industries are said to be looking at for the future, but there’s no real excuse when games have been coming out with good battle passes for years now. You may not like it, but Fortnite is the perfect example of how to do a battle pass. Free-to-play games should be studied closely.

So far I’m having a fantastic time with Halo Infinite multiplayer. It hasn’t quite hooked me enough to buy the battle pass or any of the fancy cosmetic items in the store, but it’s almost there. It’s also a brilliant time with friends and feels like a real throwback to the era when everyone was game for getting on the mic and talking about the game, rather than just sitting in Discord and picking your toes while each of you do something different.