E3 2021 has led to many of the industry's biggest games starting to reveal more about what players can expect. One of these, is the newest entry in the Halo series, Halo Infinite. The game made its expected appearance at Xbox's E3 showcase which gave fans a brief look at Halo Infinite's campaign as well as the first look at its free-to-play multiplayer. The gameplay trailer showed off a lot of new features for the multiplayer, including player abilities, new weapons, vehicles, and a look at some of the cosmetics that players can expect to unlock while playing.

Cosmetics have always been a big part of Halo and many players have wondered exactly how they will earn the huge library of cosmetics in Halo Infinite. Exactly how players have unlocked cosmetics has changed a lot over the lifetime of the series. Halo Reach allowed players to spend credits to purchase different pieces of armor and effects to equip while Halo: The Master Chief Collection simply gave players all of the cosmetic options available when the game launched. Of course, Halo: The Master Chief Collection has evolved a lot over time, leading players to wonder whether Halo Infinite would feature a progression more similar to Halo: The Master Chief Collection's battle passes or Halo 5: Guardians' REQ system.

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Halo 5: Guardians features an entirely new progression system using REQ Packs. It worked by players earning credits while playing multiplayer matches that they could spend on different levels of REQ Packs that each rewarded the player with a collection of REQ cards. REQ cards could be many things such as armor pieces, weapon skins, or REQ items for the game's new Warzone mode. Warzone items were different versions of weapons and vehicles that players can redeem points to use during Warzone matches. Gold REQ Packs could also be purchased in bundles via microtransactions. Overall, Halo 5's REQ system was contentious due to its encouragement of microtransactions and being so similar to lootboxes.

The REQ progression system also made many players feel as though it wasn't very rewarding and often led to frustration. Only Gold REQ Packs guaranteed players two customization item unlocks and was also the only pack that would drop the highest rarity of items, leading to many players opting to save up credits to purchase Gold REQ Packs. Earning enough credits for Gold REQ Packs, however, took quite a while to earn, meaning that unlocking new items was pretty spread out for most players and led to players becoming frustrated over not getting the items that they were hoping for. The inclusion of being able to purchase REQ Packs as well as them rewarding more powerful one-time-use gear for Warzone led to many players feeling as though the REQ Pack system was edging towards being pay-to-win, which the developers have thankfully confirmed will not happen in Halo Infinite.

It seems that Halo Infinite's progression system is taking cues from Halo: The Master Chief Collection instead. Detailed during a recently released multiplayer overview video, Halo Infinite will instead feature battle passes and will not have loot boxes at all. Halo Infinite will also receive free seasons of new content with each one being accompanied by its own battle pass that players can purchase to unlock additional cosmetic options. Battle passes have become very popular across the industry, especially as an avenue to generate revenue for free-to-play games that do not charge players to jump into the game and get started playing.

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While Halo Infinite's multiplayer mode has been confirmed to be completely free-to-play, it is doing some things very differently with its battle passes than other games. The biggest change with Halo Infinite's battle passes is that they are not tied to the season they are introduced with. If a player purchases a battle pass they can continue to progress on the pass and unlock its content for as long as they'd like. If players purchase another battle pass without fully leveling one up, they will get the option to set which battle pass their earned XP will apply towards throughout a season. Halo Infinite's battle passes will also be similar to Halo: The Master Chief Collection's in that they will only include cosmetic items.

Halo Infinite's progression system seems like a rather large improvement over Halo 5's. One of the largest benefits is the transparency granted by the switch to the battle pass system. When a player purchases a battle pass they are able to see all of the content they are paying for so that they can assess whether or not the content is worth the cost of the battle pass. With Halo 5's REQ system players spending money on Gold REQ Packs are not able to see what they are actually getting with the purchase and it is easy for them to feel disappointed after opening their packs and not getting the items that they were hoping for. It is also a big improvement that the battle passes can be leveled up for as long as it takes players simply by playing Halo Infinite's multiplayer modes.

Being able to keep the battle passes for as long as possible is also a great benefit. All players engage with games on a different level, and not locking battle passes within limited time windows allows any player to unlock the content that they want to no matter how often they play the game. It also helps make sure that everyone who purchases a battle pass gets their money's worth out of it and allows players to skip battle passes they aren't interested in because they can just keep leveling up any battle passes that they haven't been able to finish yet. All in all, it is great to see that Halo Infinite has taken influences from how Halo: The Master Chief Collection has started handling seasonal progression and cosmetics in multiplayer.

Of course, it is also great that Halo Infinite's battle passes will be cosmetic items only so that new players, or players who do not spend more money on the game, do not find themselves at an immediate disadvantage when playing Halo Infinite's multiplayer. It is very exciting that 343 Industries has started revealing more about what players can expect from Halo Infinite when it launches. Thankfully, players only have a few more months to wait to see what lies in the Master Chief's future.

Halo Infinite releases holiday 2021 for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.

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