From locking regular cosmetics behind microtransactions, to the Armor Core system in general, many Halo Infinite players have been displeased by the game's current customization offerings. One of the most contentious issues though is the Spartan Armor Coatings, and one players shows what would happen if players were able to rotate colors in Halo Infinite.
Unlike previous Halo titles where players could set a primary and secondary color (and sometimes even a third) for their Spartan's armor, players in Halo Infinite are relegated to selecting preset Armor Coatings. These appear as a circle of sorts, separated into six polygons with a sphere in the center; the exterior represents the different colors that comprise the coating, while the center indicates the type of texture the armor will have. Where things get messy though is that it is unclear which portions of the wheel pertain to which part of the Spartan's body, making it more so a guessing game of the actual look of the Armor Coating until it is tested.
Nobletwelvexp on Reddit has shared a concept for rotating Armor Coatings, joining many other proposals for reworked customization in Halo Infinite. In the post to the Halo subreddit, the focus is an image that outlines their concept with multiple Spartan models and examples. Essentially, nobletwelvexp designated numerical values 1-6 for the color portion of the Armor Coating circle, and then assigned each of those areas to a certain spot on the Spartan body, as "currently, armor coatings have no official assignment of armor to any segment of the coating wheel." Therefore, their proposal is that if players could rotate the wheel, then they could get more out of a single Armor Coating than just the one look.
Wanted to use the pepsi man coating to show what it could look like if you were able to rotate colors from halo
Using the red, white, and blue HCS Launch Giveaway Armor Coating, informally known as the Pepsiman skin, nobletwelvexp shows their proposal in action. According to the diagram, the bottommost part of wheel, 4, correlates to part of the legs, helmet, and other areas; this region is blue in the original coating, but by rotating the wheel, the section will eventually become either white or blue, and in turn, change those spots on the Spartan's body. Due to the nature of some coatings, however, nobletwelvexp stipulates, "Some coatings would hardly benefit from being rotated," like the red and gold Vermillion Fire coating.
All in all, nobletwelvexp raises a strong suggestion for players to get more out of their Armor Coatings. Considering Halo Infinite was charging $8 for the color blue, there definitely needs to be more freedom with how players can color their armor. One of the strangest design decision though has to be the fact that the wheel segments do not correlate to specific regions on the Spartan armor. While the game lets players test coatings before they purchase them, ideally, players should be able to look at a wheel and determine whether they want it—or, just let players customize their colors themselves.
Halo Infinite is available on PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.