343 Industries has shared a preview of its plans for the next Halo Infinite patch, which includes a change countering the shooter's current competitive Drop Weapon meta. Halo Infinite is about to reach Season 3, which is currently scheduled to begin on March 7. Before the major update arrives, however, 343 Industries is going to deliver another update. The shortlist of changes already confirms some major balance changes to Halo Infinite that could reset the game's entire meta.Halo Infinite has gone through some serious challenges since its launch, culminating in Microsoft's recent decision to lay off a substantial number of Halo Infinite developers at 343 Industries. Continued support for Halo Infinite's multiplayer has remained a focus for the studio, though. Leaks indicate some substantial additions for Season 3, including the release of the highly anticipated Infection Mode, maps including Forbidden and Crystal Cave, and much more.Before Season 3 arrives, 343 Industries has confirmed the release of a February pre-season update arriving February 15. These changes are being made, according to 343, in response to feedback from Halo Infinite players and reported issues submitted through the game'sz support website. While the list of changes is relatively short, they are designed to be impactful. Halo Infinite players will at least have a few weeks to grow accustomed to the big changes before Season 3's competitive resets.
The biggest change, at least for the highest level of Halo Infinite competition, will be the end of the game's so-called Drop Meta. Instead of swapping weapons mid-combat, Halo Infinite players found they could drop weapons to switch to a secondary twice as fast. The February 15 update will make dropping a weapon take just as long as swapping a weapon. Dropping weapons will now take just as long as swapping weapons, which could lead to slower and riskier encounters.
Other substantial changes to Halo Infinite include improvements to the S7 Sniper's ability to no-scope, reduction of semi-automatic weapon gun jamming, a decrease in the damage radius of frag grenades, and a change to Ranked Arenas so that weapon racks won't respawn a weapon until the previous has de-spawned. One big non-gameplay change is a clearer communication of how much a player's CSR goes up or down after a match.
These aren't all the changes that 343 Industries has planned for its February 15 update for Halo Infinite, but even this short list shows how dramatically Halo Infinite's gameplay should change. Making these changes in February rather than with Season 3's launch will allow 343 to evaluate whether more needs to be done or if the changes went too far. Competitive Halo Infinite players will want to check it out and acclimate to prepare for the next season.
Halo Infinite is available now on PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.