Are you having problems connecting to a large multiplayer game of Halo Infinite with a group of pals in the game’s 12-player-per-side Big Team Battle mode? That should soon be a thing of the past, as developer 343 claims it is not only aware of the problem, but also thinks it has “a patch in hand for the fundamental issue” and will release a special hotfix to address it.
“It’s a little early to give an ETA,” the developers write in an official blog post, “but please know our goal is to release this as soon as we can.” They add, “It won’t be this week, but we hope it’s not too far out and we’ll share an update as soon as we have line of sight on a release date (once we clear ‘cert,’ we’re then ready to ship).”
Halo Infinite is the most exciting thing that has happened to me and my gaming friends in years. The game’s free cross-platform Big Team Battle multiplayer option allows us all enter into an enormous battle replete with plasma blasts, grappling hooks, nail-biting gunplay, and vehicle mayhem, regardless of how many players are down, whether they’re on PC or console, and it doesn’t cost a penny.
At least, that’s how it works in theory. Most of the time, we’re twiddling our thumbs waiting for a match to load, only for Microsoft’s servers to randomly disconnect (or even ban) a couple of members of our fireteam because the matchmaking service can’t seem to connect the dots — and this happens over and over until we miraculously luck out.
We eventually got six of us together in matches yesterday evening after making one of our pals the fireteam commander, however the servers mixed some of us up with randos instead of buddies. When one of us left for the night, another person strangely didn’t show up for the game. Our fireteam captain was banned after we all withdrew in solidarity.
I’m looking forward to this being resolved! Halo has been a breath of fresh air in comparison to most of my group’s favorite multiplayer games, which require precisely 3, 4, or 6 players to function successfully.
According to 343 Industries, a second patch will be released in mid-February to fix “certain difficulties with instances of cheating” as well as “wonkiness with the ranked experience,” among other things.
Additional multiplayer playlists for four-player fireteams were previously included in Halo Infinite; I’m hoping that after the Big Team Battle problems are ironed out, we’ll be able to have some more variation in 12-player games as well.
