Halo Infinite’s 2020 Demo Had Many Cut Corners, Says 343 Industries Head

Microsoft corporate vice president and head of 343 Industries Bonnie Ross has revealed in an interview with CNET details about what went behind-the-scenes at the time of Halo Infinite‘s 2020 gameplay demo. During the interview, Ross revealed that her team had cut deep corners to get the demo done in time.

Halo Infinite‘s demo, titled Ascension, suffered from poor public reception, which ultimately led to the game’s delay by one whole year. Ross explained that a lot of it could be blamed on the fact that the team was working remotely, which led to the developers cutting more corners than they should have or would have if things would have been normal.

“I do want to say there were multiple people on the team pointing out, ‘Hey, I think this is wrong,'” she said. “But we’re all looking at it at home on whatever monitor with whatever color grading that we have. And that was a huge wakeup call for us. We did need to have those touch points with people coming in, sitting side by side — at a distance — and looking at monitors.”

She further added that the negative reception was an eye-opener to the fact that they should take a step back and take the time to get things done right.

“We had people on the team already raising flags that we’ve cut too deep,” Ross said. “And I think that was just more of a very public look in the mirror that, ‘Yes, we did indeed cut corners that we shouldn’t have cut,’ and we needed to really take a step back and make sure that we were spending the time we needed.”

Of course, the wait seems to be worth it, as Halo Infinite‘s free-to-play multiplayer has been met with great critical acclaim. The game’s single-player campaign doesn’t launch until tomorrow, although critics have been showering the game with lots of praise (barring technical issues).