Halo Infinite

About

Halo Infinite is a mainline video game in the Halo franchise of video games. The game was announced in July of 2018 and was originally scheduled for release in the latter half of 2020 for Windows, Xbox One and Xbox Series X, but was delayed until 2021 in early August 2020. Plotwise, the game follows 2015's Halo 5: Guardians. The game was released on November 15th, 2021.

History

Development on Halo Infinite began following the release of Halo 5: Guardians.^[1] The first trailer for the game released June 10th, 2018, at E3 (shown below, left). A second trailer was shown one year later at the following E3 (shown below, right),

On July 23rd, 2020, the development team released an 8-minute gameplay trailer (shown below).

Online Presence

The 2020 gameplay trailer disappointed some fans who felt it was a letdown from a graphical standpoint. Keemstar tweeted he felt the graphics "sucked ass," gaining over 210 retweets and 3,700 likes^[2] (shown below, left). User @bombosmedallion^[3] joked about the game by comparing it to stills from World of Warcraft (shown below, right), gaining over 900 retweets and 4,300 likes.

On Reddit, user boudewjin^[4] posted a comparison still between footage shown in the 2018 trailer and the 2020 gameplay demo, gaining over 640 points (shown below, left). The user also joked that a still from the demo could also conceivably be from Minecraft, gaining over 740 points (shown below, right).

Halo Infinite Delayed to 2021

On August 11th, 2020, Microsoft and 343 Industries announced their decision to push back the originally planned release date of Halo Infinite until sometime in 2021 on Halo’s official Twitter^[5] account via a development update. The tweet (seen below) received over 66,000 likes, 12,000 retweets and 12,000 quotes in just three hours.

Reactions from users online ranged from apathy to understanding, as well as numerous memes from Sony fans criticizing the delay. That same day, Twitter^[6] user MrDalekJD, tweeted a quote from Shigeru Miyamoto (shown below, left) receiving over 5,200 likes in roughly three hours. Twitter^[7] user TigerCA123 later tweeted a Distracted Boyfriend meme referencing the new Spider-Man Miles Morales PS5 exclusive (shown below, right), receiving over 1,600 likes in three hours.

Subreddit Lockdown

On December 5th, 2021, moderators of /r/Halo temporarily locked down the subreddit due to the toxicity of discussion.^[8] A November 15th open-beta of the game's free-to-play multiplayer mode left many fans unhappy, leading to intense insults and criticism between those fans and fans who were okay with the state of the game.

"At the end of the day the primary thing the mod team cares about is limiting insults and toxicity, because it makes it impossible to have actual conversation," wrote mod mod 343-Guilty-Spark. "This cuts both ways whether you are happy or unhappy with the game as-is. Someone criticizing the game doesn't mean you get to say they're an 'entitled crybaby manchild.' Someone saying they're fine with the game or to give it some time doesn't mean you can call them a 'bootlicking dicksucker.'"

"Some users on the sub have even been responsible for doxxing and death threats. We're temporarily putting the sub on lockdown so people can hopefully settle down a bit and we can hit the reset button before launch. At the end of the day this is a video game and this level of vitriol is unwarranted."

Search Interest

External references