343 Explains Halo Infinite’s Current Technical Issues

Following some reported gameplay issues with Halo Infinite, 343 Industries has addressed the problems, sharing what the next steps are for the game and how it hopes to improve it.

In a new Halo Waypoint post, lead engineer of the Sandbox team at 343 Richard Watson stated that the studio is currently looking into the discussion and feedback related to Halo Infinite’s multiplayer, including reports of various network-related issues that players are experiencing.

One of the main issues seems to be being shot and the ability to shoot around corners which, according to Watson, is the most common response online. “Ultimately, we need to ensure that all players are getting the best experience possible,” he said. “To do this, the server has to manage the actions from various machines that are all running at different latencies… There are multiple ways that you can solve the problem of latency compensation, but in Halo we choose to favor the shooter.”

Watson goes on to explain the difference between the latency speed and how a player moves in-game, saying that a Spartan moves at around 8.5 meters per second, so server processing time can vary, causing players to experience the “shooting around corners” issue.

To combat this problem, Watson said that the players’ latencies need to be reduced to close datacenters. “This is something that the Halo Infinite matchmaking system was designed to do, but it hasn’t been performing as well as we’d planned, particularly for players in certain low population regions.”

343 has released some changes to reduce the latencies including increasing the priority of low pings to its servers in the matchmaking process, therefore allowing players to connect to local matches, although these may lead to longer matchmaking wait times.

Missing collision and melee phasing through other players is another issue that has been reported which, again, is something that is related to the game’s latency. Watson confirmed that the team is working on improving its player collision systems, especially during melee gameplay, and is a “very high priority.”

Finally, there’s client desynchronization, where players have found cases where they can permanently desync the client from the server. The lead engineer said that the team has identified the issue and a fix will be deployed in an upcoming build.