Halo Infinite’s troubled development has been a matter of discussion for many for a while now (not least because of its underwhelming showing and subsequent delay last year), and recently, those discussions flared up again when a former 343 Industries employee spoke in an interview about crunch at 343 Industries, cut content from Halo Infinite, and more. Now, the employee has posted another video (via Reddit) in which he clarifies several of those statements.
After stating that his comments were taken largely out of content, he states that his comments about crunch were not particular to 343 Industries, but to the games industry as a whole. He also added that crunch at 343 Industries wasn’t mandated, with developers generally working over time of their own accord, and that 343 allowed people to take days off as well.
He further went on to say that content being cut out isn’t something that only applies to Halo Infinite, and happens in game development all the time (which is true enough). He also brought up his comments warning people to not expect Halo Infinite to be “a masterpiece”, saying that that was less about the quality of the game itself and more about the excessive hype cycles that can be built up around games before their launch, which almost invariably ends up in disappointment.
Halo Infinite is due out later this year for Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC, and it’s likely that we’ll be seeing a lot more of the game at E3 next month.