Halo Infinite updated 2022 roadmap leaves fans disappointed

Late Friday night, 343 Industries dropped an updated roadmap for Halo Infinite.  Among the more noticeable and disappointing revelations was the apparent delays of campaign co-op, Forge and split-screen.

Campaign co-op was expected to release next month after getting delayed from the initial launch. However, it now appears that 343i is targeting a late August launch along with campaign mission replayability. Again, I just want to point out how crazy it is that a game such as Halo Infinite doesn’t currently allow you to replay specific campaign missions.

Perhaps sensing player frustration, Joseph Staten, Halo Infinite’s Head of Creative, wrote:

"We know we need to deliver more content and more features more quickly. Staying true to priority zero means that sometimes we need to slow down in order to stay healthy and move faster later. But we’re also aggressively looking at ways to accelerate."

On that note, 343i is targeting a Forge open beta later in Season 2 sometime in September. After successful private flighting with a limited audience, 343i has opted to go right into an open beta in order to get the core Forge tools out to everyone more quickly.

But even with that, the Halo Infinite community is upset at the lack of meaningful progress on long-awaited features. 343 Industries’ struggles with meeting timelines for Halo Infinite has been well-documented and just a couple of weeks ago, community director Brian Jarrard addressed player frustrations.

"There are indeed a lot of challenges and constraints. We’re certainly not happy to be unable to meet player and community expectations, it’s a difficult situation that’s going to take the team time to work through… Meanwhile a lot of production planning, costing, planning, hiring, etc.. is all happening which doesn’t really lend to detailed regular updates. We understand the community is simply out of patience and frankly, I think understandably tired of words. We just need some time for the team to get the details sorted and then we can certainly share as much as we can."

Even beyond things like Forge, campaign co-op and such, seemingly simple things like new maps, modes and cosmetics have taken unusually long to deliver. Halo Infinite launched with just 10 maps, the lowest number in all of the games. Post-launch DLC has been lacking as well. As Halo Infinite was marketed as a “live service” game, fans have expected new content to be delivered on a more regular basis.

On the bright side, Season 2: Lone Wolves is just a few weeks away. Slated to run from May 3 through November 7, the new season will introduce two new maps, Catalyst (Arena) and Breaker (BTB), along with new game modes king o the Hill, Land Grab and Last Spartan Standing. While these are nice additions, the fact it has taken this long to deliver modes that have been in previous Halo games is disappointing.

Season 3, which starts November 8, promises more new maps and modes, new sandbox items, Forge open beta, quality of life improvements and in-game events. Campaign splitscreen co-op is still TBD.

Confidence in 343’s ability to manage a franchise as important as Halo is starting to waver among the community and fanbase. Their inability meet deadlines and deliver content regularly is starting to take its toll and frustration has seemingly reached a tipping point.