Halo Infinite chose delay over being broken into pieces
Keep your head down.
Getting Halo Infinite out of the door this year was kind of a big deal. But while serious consideration was given to severing the game's singleplayer from its multiplayer, the folks at Xbox instead opted to delay Halo Infinite into next year. It's better, they reckon, to deliver all of Halo all at once, even if it means waiting a few months to finish the fight.
Rumours that Infinite might be snipped into various parts floated around following the game's extended reveal last month. With news that Infinite's multiplayer would be going free-to-play, a staggered release seemed all the more likely. If you don't need the retail box to hop into Slayer, the reasoning goes, why wait at all?
This week, we learned there may even have been merits to that speculation. Speaking on Gary Whitta's Animal Talking (a sort of chatshow filmed inside Animal Crossing: New Horizons), Xbox head Phil Spencer explained that he, 343's Bonnie Ross and Xbox Game Studios chief Matt Booty did, in fact, consider carving up Infinite to make a 2020 release date. But in Spencer's words: "it just didn't feel, to all of us, like the Halo release that we would want."
Ultimately, the gang chose to keep Infinite intact, postponing the game's on Steam and the Windows Store into 2021 - well past the game's intended November release. .
Spencer admits it's "disappointing" not to release alongside a new console, something Halo hasn't done since the first one. But if Infinite is meant to be this 10-year platform for all things Captain Motocross, as Studio head Chris Lee told IGN, it makes sense starting the decade with its best armoured green foot possible.
Cheers, Eurogamer.