Microsoft just premiered the first Xbox Series X gameplay from Halo Infinite's new campaign, which lasted roughly eight minutes.
The gameplay footage showed off Halo Infinite's beautiful new graphics running on the Xbox Series X, showing Master Chief taking on a slew of different enemies, using a wide range of different weapons. One of the more exciting parts of the demo was seeing Master Chief take advantage of some of his abilities, both new and old. He used classic turret guns, vehicles, and more.
But one of the new features showed off in Infinite's demo was a grappling hook mechanic, which is a first f0r the series. The gameplay mechanic feels very similar to 2019's Doom Eternal, which had a similar ability.
The Halo series has always been known for having very fast, snappy, and fluid gunplay and the grappling hook should only add to that. The grappling hook almost feels like a natural step for the series, with Master Chief already having a wide range of abilities to aid him. How this will impact the online multiplayer portion of Infinite is still unknown, as the multiplayer wasn't shown in today's event, but it should make for some interesting and exciting new scenarios for online players.
The new grappling hook ability was heavily rumored to be coming to the new Halo title, and 343 Industries franchise development director Frank O'Connor even denied the rumors of the new mechanic being true earlier this year. Clearly, he was just trying to throw off fans, so that its reveal would come as more of a surprise to viewers.
The grappling hook seems to be a very popular new game mechanic these days, with many titles seeming to through it in. Other games in recent years have borrowed the grappling hook mechanic, with Doom Eternal being the most notable, but even the recent PlayStation 4 exclusive Ghost of Tsushima has a grappling hook included.
Halo Infinite got its gameplay reveal event today, and was announced to be coming to all of Xbox's major platforms as part of Game Pass.
Halo Infinite releases for Xbox One, Xbox Series X, PC, and Xbox Game Pass in holiday 2020.