Halo Infinite wasn’t running on an Xbox Series X for its gameplay reveal

It turns out that the gameplay reveal of Halo Infinite wasn’t actually running on an Xbox Series X, but on a PC that’s “representative of the experience players will have on Xbox Series X”.

Halo Infinite opened Microsoft’s Xbox Games Showcase in impressive fashion, providing an in-depth look at Master Chief’s next adventure. The game is powered by developer 343 Industries’ new Slipspace engine, and will run at 60fps at 4K resolution. 

However, a developer from 343 confirmed that the game was presented on a PC with similar specs to Microsoft’s new console in a press Q&A session, and wasn’t captured on Xbox Series X hardware.

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This isn’t particularly surprising considering that video games are primarily developed on PC first before they’re optimized specifically for consoles. Halo Infinite is coming to PC when it launches, too, so showing footage from the PC version of the game that’s still in development makes sense.

Rough landing

It does raise some interesting questions, though. Some fans have commented on a couple of technical issues that stood out during the game’s short demo. Pop-in was present when driving around in the Warthog for example, and some textures appeared noticeably flat. 

Seeing pop-in was rather surprising considering the Xbox Series X should be able to load and stream assets on its super-fast SSD drive without a hitch. But maybe this issue will be eliminated when the game is running natively on Microsoft's next-gen console.

343 Industries has also confirmed that ray tracing will be added after launch, which has the potential to add more realistic lighting, reflections and shadows to the game. The developer has promised to evolve Halo Infinite over time, and this would be the first update of many. 

Halo Infinite will launch alongside the Xbox Series X when it releases during "Holiday 2020". The game is included as part of Xbox Game Pass and is also playable on Xbox One and Windows 10 PCs.

• Opinion: the Xbox Series X is already better value than the PS5

Via PCGamesN

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