Halo Infinite’s head of design ‘feels everyone’s pain’ on multiplayer progression

The head of design on Halo Infinite has said he “feels everyone’s pain” when it comes to progression in Halo Infinite’s free-to-play online multiplayer.

Jerry Hook stated on Twitter that the situation remains the top priority for the development team.

The team has been on holiday for the past few days. On November 24 the game’s community director Brian Jarrad tweeted: “Changes will take time and our priority this week is giving the team a much deserved break for the holiday after a long final stretch.”

But Hook says that once the team returns to work this week, tweaking the progression system for online multiplayer will be the main focus.

“Yes, I am still playing Halo and feeling everyone’s pain on progression,” he tweeted. “We are back at it next week and this will be top of my list with the team.”

The game’s free-to-play multiplayer component was launched in beta form on November 15 to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Xbox, rather than on its previously planned release date of December 8, which is when Halo Infinite’s campaign will arrive.

However, after its launch some players started to raise issue with the game’s Battle Pass, which is used to unlock new items in the game.

According to some players, it takes too long to level up the Battle Pass, mainly because the XP earned to upgrade it can only be acquired through specific challenges.

Rather than simply gaining XP naturally by playing the game, players have to make sure they accomplish certain tasks (like getting kills with specific weapons or playing specific modes) to earn XP.

343 Industries then stated a few days after launch that it would be making changes to the Battle Pass structure.

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Some of these changes have already been implemented. New ‘Play 1 Game’ challenges have been added to ensure that players can still gain some XP by simply playing any match type they want.

Halo Infinite Season 1, which is titled ‘Heroes of Reach’, features free and premium tracks offering over 100 unlockable items including armour pieces, weapon charms, visors, coatings, emblems and armour FX.

Coinciding with the early multiplayer launch, Halo Infinite head of creative Joseph Staten revealed that the Season 1 Battle Pass had been extended to May 2022, a change from 343’s original goal of shipping a new season every three months.

Microsoft previously confirmed that Halo Infinite’s battle passes won’t expire, meaning that in future seasons, players can purchase old battle passes as well as the current one and choose which pass to put their progression towards.