Halo Infinite campaign preview: Familiar yet surprising, 5 hours in

Splat. Splat. Halo InfiniteWhen its blue projectiles hit an enemy, it makes a satisfying and quiet sound. Halo Infinite’s new, open world is filled with these small, carefully crafted details that at once feel both familiar and foreign. The world is filled with these sights, sounds and secrets. Halo Infinite’s more linear campaign, making for an experience that’s nothing like any Halo game I’ve played, but somehow evokes feelings reminiscent of the earlier games.

Get ahead of Halo Infinite’s Dec. 8 release date, I played a preview build of the game’s campaign, encompassing the first four story missions, as well as access to the open world surrounding them. I cautiously touched down on Halo Infinite’s new Zeta Halo ring, unsure how the storied franchise would fit into an open world. The landscape was full of life and action.

Halo Infinite begins with Chief, a pilot, and a new AI partner called The Weapon setting off into Zeta Halo to figure out what’s happened after Halo 5. At least on Zeta Halo the trio is left behind in a trail of destruction: Cortana, The Banished and a group exiled Covenant supporters last seen in Halo Wars IIIt is a sad world. In the seconds before Master Chief finds his pilot companion, so is Master Chief.

Chief’s first major goal is to start gaining some sort of control on Zeta Halo. This can be accomplished mainly by taking control of UNSC Forward Operating bases (FOBs), that The Banished overran when they overthrew the UNSC. Re-capturing these spaces means gaining “safe zones” on the Zeta Halo, small areas stocked with weapons, tools, vehicles, and even UNSC Marines. At first, the options are very limited. But, after destroying The Banished propaganda, saving groups of captive marines and earning more tools, I was able to select from basic weapons, modified cars, and stronger and more specialized marines that would follow me into battle.

Image: 343 Industries/Xbox Game Studios

Halo Infinite’s world isn’t completely open from the start. Portions are sectioned off into small “islands,” for lack of a better word: Zeta Halo is basically a space archipelago. At first, there’s no easy way for Chief to cross the large chasms of space that separate the land — you can see the other sides, but can’t actually easily reach them right away. You cannot access the storyline missions if you are not in close proximity to each other. To access story missions, you don’t have to simply stumble upon certain locations. Instead, they’re specifically marked on the map — different from any other objective — with the Weapon often nudging you toward them. While side missions can be unstructured, story missions are arranged chronologically. Some of these story missions are in portions of the map otherwise hard to reach, but story missions “unlock” these areas, so to speak, by dropping Chief around the map via Pelican. Once they’re unlocked, I can fast travel any time.

Capturing bases also reveals more map areas, as well as places where I might be able to collect. Halo Infinite’s new collectibles: Spartan Cores, which upgrade armor with abilities like the grappling hook; and pieces of Mjolnir armor, which act as cosmetics in Halo Infinite’s multiplayer. There are also larger side missions — assassinating high-profile Banished leaders or clearing important Banished bases, to name a couple — that sometimes grant unique, customized gear.

This is a new area for the franchise. However, 343 Industries captures the Halo vibe in the smaller encounters. These aren’t the side missions or fetch quests I’ve come to expect from a 2021 open-world game; I’m not running from quest-giver to quest-giver to deliver items or news. I’m battling my way through the powerful and sometimes daunting hierarchy of the Banished forces, using every tool at my disposal to get the job done. It’s Master Chief doing Master Chief things, scaled down into Halo-esque moments that break up the open world.

Image: 343 Industries/Xbox Game Studios

This is where the small details — those familiar sights and sounds — make a huge difference. It’s the satisfying whap of a carbine blast hitting an enemy. This is the hilarious and sometimes ridiculous dialogue. Halo Infinite’s grunts. You can find more of the story in these small scenes, set up at distant camps with hidden sound bits and weapons. OthersPeople around the globe. Halo Infinite is, largely, about Master Chief and his journey, but that doesn’t mean that everything else is neglected; some of my favorite moments playing Halo InfiniteWe found small Banished outposts as we drove around in our vehicle with many eager marines during the preview. I loved navigating our doomed Warthog up rocks — and sometimes off of cliffs — marines egging me on as I (sometimes) made a perfect landing. Other times, I wandered into shockingly hard battles that weren’t even plotted out on the map: Where I thought I was simply clearing a propaganda tower, I ended up taking on waves of reinforcements with high-level troops.

The early morning hours Halo InfiniteOn the preview version, I did not find many of the missions that required clearing bases to be challenging. These side missions are refreshingly different from the linear and sometimes lengthy story missions. Even after this four mission preview, I’ve barely scratched the surface of Halo Infinite’s newly unfurled world.

Halo Infinite’s Campaign The release will take place on December 8th on Windows PCs and Xbox Series X. Its multiplayer component can be played now. Microsoft gave the Xbox Series X prerelease download code. The preview was made possible by this Xbox Series X. Vox Media is an affiliate partner. They do not affect editorial content. However, Vox Media might earn commissions for products bought via affiliate links. Here are some links to help you find. additional information about Polygon’s ethics policy here.