After weeks of playing Halo Infinite multiplayer, fans have been eagerly anticipating the drop of the game's campaign. Unfortunately, it appears that players can't get a jump start on installing the Halo Infinite campaign as no pre-load options are being made available.
Halo Infinite's campaign has received great reviews ahead of its full launch this week. Many are praising the game's openendedness, offering players many ways of proceeding through Zeta Halo, and its depiction of Master Chief, returning to the roots of the character as a vessel for the player. 343 Industries published the release times for Halo Infinite's campaign, the times being staggered from 10 AM PST, the studio being located in Redmond, Washington. This means that players in other parts of the world will gain access to the game increasingly late into the day, or even the following one, with places like Sydney, Australia not getting it until 5 AM AEDT on December 9.
343 Industries has announced that there are no pre-load options for the Halo Infinite campaign, meaning players will have to wait until the official release to begin downloading it. The news comes from a tweet by Brian Jarrard, the Halo Community Director at 343 Industries, in response to a couple of fans wondering about the game's pre-load options, as no news about its availability had yet to be made. Recently, Jarrard revealed why Halo Infinite Multiplayer lacked a Slayer-only playlist.
Pre-loading is a pretty convenient feature of the modern video game industry, with titles becoming increasingly large, in some cases beings tens or hundreds of gigabytes. When games offer the feature, it allows for players who have already purchased the game to have the game begin installing on their system so that when it officially launches, they can jump in right away, without having to wait for the (potentially) lengthy download and installation process. This issue will likely become moot after the game's launch, but will certainly be a headache for those hoping to play the game right at drop time. An issue that might run a little longer than this one though is that Halo Infinite's story missions cannot be replayed at launch.
It is pretty surprising that Halo Infinite, a flagship title from Xbox, is lacking any sort of pre-load option. Furthermore, the fact Jarrard cannot provide some sort of technical reason is a bit disappointing, though him sharing the information is nonetheless helpful. One suspected reason for the inconvenience is that Halo Infinite is already partially installed by those playing the multiplayer, and so the drop of the campaign may work more like an update than as a separate release. Even those who buy Halo Infinite physically will have to wait a bit to play it, as not all of the game's data is on the disc.
The Halo Infinite multiplayer beta is available now on PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S, with the full game releasing on December 8.