Halo Infinite's 2022 Roadmap is insanely confusing and insanely disappointing. What is 343 Industries thinking?
No one is truly happy with the state of Halo Infinite, seeing as the Roadmap currently has Forge and Campaign Co-Op slated for significantly later this year. On top of that, Season 2 has been delayed by the length of what will eventually be an entire season. This explains, in part, why Season 1's mid-season update was such a farce, and it's a seriously bad sign for 343 Industries who – obviously – want to turn Halo Infinite into a long-lasting game-as-a-service title along the same line as Warzone or Fortnite.
It's a shame, too, as Halo Infinite's opening few months have seen some impressive numbers for the series. In just under three months, Halo Infinite clocked in 20 million players – the best launch of any Halo game in history – yet in that same time the game has managed to go from champion to pariah. Where is the content, 343? Where is what was promised? Two key features are still missing from the game, and the true reality is incredibly simple: this wouldn't be such a big deal if you actually communicated properly with your fan base.
343 Industries remain, to this day, strangely tight-lipped on the game's roadmap. We know that Forge is due to for Season 3, which will likely begin between July and October this year, and Co-Op should be here with Season 2 in May. It's shocking, to be honest, that we are waiting what is – in effect – the better part of a year for Forge, a mode that would usually ship with a mainline Halo game. The developers are working hard, sure, but it seems like Microsoft's decision to release Halo when they did was probably a mistake in the end.
In the interim, though, 343 are releasing all sorts of "exclusive" events. From the devastatingly dull Fractures: Tenrai, to the short-lived and quickly forgotten Cyber Showdown, Halo Infinite has become a game defined by short moments of joy in between hours upon hours of dull and uninteresting Weekly Challenges and – again, of course – an Item Shop so full of expensive microtransactions that it comes close to the likes of Rocket League and Fortnite. That, if anything, is a pretty devastating thing to say.
Fans Are Unhappy About Halo Infinite's 2022 Roadmap
Reddit users and the like are ablaze over Halo Infinite's current roadmap, and the complete lack of communication between 343 and the fans. One particular post, which cited a message from Joseph Staten, complained that "It has been officially one month since Joe Staten has stated that a roadmap is his top priority". In response to the user's following question (which was, for sure given by other Redditors as well), no, we still don't really have an official roadmap.
As of writing, the post has over 11,000 upvotes and more than 1200 comments, most of them pretty negative. The team at 343 are trying to create a community around Halo Infinite, and it is working, but the risk here is that such a lack of upcoming content and non-Event specific content is going to continue that downward trend in players we have witnessed over the last couple of weeks. We all love Halo Infinite, it really is a good game, but this is something that the developers are really going to want to watch over the next few months.