Take an Extensive Look at Halo Infinite’s Multiplayer Technical Preview

Today Microsoft and 343 Industries provided an extensive look at the upcoming technical preview of the multiplayer of Halo Infinite.

Not only do we get to see plenty of shooting and fighting, but the developers also provided an interesting glimpse at the multiplayer’s customization features that will let you pretty much design your Spartan.

You can check the full video below.

According to an extensive blog post, the technical preview will happen at the following times:

• Thursday, July 29: Tech preview is officially live! Go wild, Spartans.
• Friday, July 30 Scheduled Play Times: 12-2 PM PT, 7-9 PM PT
• Saturday, July 31 Scheduled Play Times: 12-2 PM PT, 7-9 PM PT
• Sunday, August 1 Scheduled Play Times: 12-2 PM PT, 7-9 PM PT
• Monday, August 2: Tech preview closes at 10 AM PT

We also get an overview of what we can expect to enjoy when it goes live.

BOT SLAYER

At the very center of this tech preview will be the Bot Slayer playlists which feature 4 players squaring off against 4 Bots on one of three possible maps (Live Fire, Bazaar, and Recharge). Please note that while players can team up online, splitscreen is not supported in this build.

With bots being a brand-new addition to Halo, we’re excited to get a chance to let you go toe-to-toe with our state-of-the-art spar partners. Bots also utilize our dedicated servers in a different way than standard matchmade games so it’s extra critical we get large-scale, real-world testing to help ensure a smooth launch this holiday.

We’re going to kick things off with the lowest skill level of Bots on a single map to help everyone get acclimated and ease into the experience. If the community can collectively help us hit our daily engagement goals over the course of the flight, we’ll increase the Bots’ skill and add more maps. The more bots you slay, the more the experience will evolve! They’ll get more deadly with each update – so, dive in early and often to make sure you’ve got a handle on what skills they’re bringing to the battlefield.

Be sure to drop in each day to play and do your part to slay some bots, unlock more content, and help us gather data! And keep an eye on @Halo each day for updates to the available matchmaking content. We’re also going to be shouting out the top Bot Slayer, the player with the most daily wins, and the team who can win the fastest each day and looking to award these heroes a special nameplate when the game launches this holiday.

Show us your clips! If you pull off incredible feats or wacky shenanigans, please share your clip with us on Twitter using #InfinitePlays – we can’t wait to see the medals and magical moments that await.

SOCIAL ARENA (CONDITIONAL)

If we’re able to hit our target engagement and testing goals for the Bot Slayer before the flight concludes, we’re looking to enable a brief opportunity for some good old fashion 4v4 Social Arena Slayer. If we hit this phase, expect it to land sometime in the final stretch of the flight (i.e. Sunday evening) and expect there to be a few potential hiccups with your experience.

Specifically, we know that in some cases players will end up in a bad state as a session is forming and after a brief delay, will be kicked back to the main menu. As a result, the game itself will start as 4v3 which is certainly a less than desired experience all-around. However, as a technical preview, getting additional scale data around this problem, across a breadth of hardware, can be invaluable to the team as they work to solve this issue. Based on our prior private flights, we can generally expect that on average, a match will start with a full 4v4 approx. 60% of the time while the other 40% involves a 4v3 start with the final player joining-in-progress within a minute.  

We’d love to get some additional testing and data to help the team, but we really want to ensure players understand the experience and potential hiccups before jumping in. Tech preview participants should stay tuned to @Halo and the in-game news feed to know if and when Social Arena gets enabled.

WEAPON DRILLS

Interested in locking in your aim? Are you certain your skills with the Commando surpass that of all your friends? Now you can prove it. In this tech preview you can put your skills to the test with the following subset of Weapon Drills:

• MA40 AR
• BR75
• MK50 Sidekick
• CQS48 Bulldog
• Needler
• VK78 Commando
• S7 Sniper
• Plasma Pistol
• Pulse Carbine
• Ravager
• Heatwave
• Skewer

BATTLE PASS AND MENU UI

In the upcoming tech preview, we’re going to be granting Halo Insiders a set amount of in-game credits (cR) so that they can dig in with a very trimmed-down version of our first Battle Pass. (Worry not, we’re saving plenty of content for launch.) As a reminder, none of the items unlocked over the course of tech previews will carry over to the game’s release later this year. Everything should be considered work-in-progress and not indicative of the final shipping systems including the cost of customization pieces in the store, the order in which they’re unlocked in the Pass, the XP granted by challenges, and more.

The key focus here will be to test out if the systems that dictate when you unlock and equip items are working correctly. So, keep an eye out for anything that doesn’t work how you would expect and let us know. We’re going to have our ears open for your feedback!

Halo Infinite releases this holiday season for Xbox series X, Xbox One, and PC.