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Halo Infinite campaign testing at 343 Industries. [credit:
343 Industries
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The latest Halo Infinite development update has confirmed that the highly anticipated shooter sequel is still slated to land in the vague time window of “Holiday 2021.” But the latest news confirms that the game will ship with a bit less content than series fans might have expected. For the first time in the series’ history, a Halo shooter game will launch without multiplayer co-op as an option for its “campaign” half.
Joseph Staten—a longtime Halo writer and producer who currently serves as Creative Lead of the 343 Industries studio—presented the bad news in an update video on Friday, after going so far as to assert that “campaign co-op is fundamental to the Halo experience.” Though Infinite will eventually get co-op, it won’t be ready as part of the product being sold (or included in paid Xbox Game Pass subscriptions) later this year. The technical reasoning behind the mode’s delay is unclear, but fans may be able to read between the lines of Staten’s explanation about why co-op has yet to reach his team’s “quality bar.”
Staten said: