Halo Infinite Inside details the PC port and features, cross-play, and more in new update

What you need to know

• Halo Infinite is the next Halo game that's slated to release near the end of 2021 on Xbox and PC.
• The Halo Infinite team at 343 Industries releases an update every month focusing on a different part of Halo Infinite.
• This month, Inside Infinite is all about the PC port of Halo Infinite and making it an amazing experience for PC players.
• That means making Halo Infinite a customizable, accessible experience that's consistent across Xbox and PC devices.

343 Industries wants to ensure that the next Halo experience is one that lasts for years to come, and that means regular communication with the community with updates on progress, features, and so much more. Halo Infinite is bound for Microsoft's next-gen consoles later this year, but it's also the first Halo to come to PC day one in many, many years. Today's April "Inside Infinite" developer update is all about the PC port of Halo Infinite and the work 343i has done to ensure the experience is as native and seamless as possible for hardcore PC players.

There's a ton of information to digest in the latest "Inside Infinite" article, but 343i makes it clear early on that bringing Halo Infinite to PC is not an afterthought. Their focus for making it happen was giving PC players an experience they expect, making the relationship between PC and console versions of Halo Infinite seamless and fun, and ensuring that all settings and features remain accessible regardless of the platform. Let's break down some of the highlights of the latest Halo Infinite update.

To begin, the two developers from 343i (Jeff Guy and Mike Romero) that hosted this month's "Inside Infinite" article wanted to make clear what their overarching vision was with bringing the ambitious Halo Infinite to PC platforms. Mike Romero said "It is... our goal for PC to work harmoniously with console players so you can easily play with your friends regardless of platform. It's honestly a fun challenge to make something both so customizable and advanced yet accessible and cross-platform at the same time."

Source: 343 Industries

This comes down to the huge number of features that Halo Infinite plans to incorporate for players tackling Master Chief's latest adventure on PC, including:

• A native experience for multiple input types, including mouse and keyboard, Xbox controllers, and even third-party controllers
• Ultrawide and super ultrawide monitor support for the game and all UI, cutscenes, animations, and everything else
• Advanced settings for displays, refresh rates, field-of-view, graphics, and much more
• Triple keybinds for highly customizable controls
• Ability to hide and customize the HUD, or show an FPS or ping counter in-game
• Full cross-play between PC and console platforms
• And much more

Ensuring that Halo Infinite provided a native-feeling experience on PC and consoles alike meant the PC team worked very closely with all other Halo Infinite teams, including sandbox, audio, and everyone else. This tight integration also means that Halo Infinite can span PC and console lines easily with a ton of innovative features. Players can expect full cross-play and cross-save support, but it goes even farther than that. LAN games can be hosted by PCs and accept PC and console players into the server, social and custom games can seamlessly combine both platforms, and ranked matches can look for input types rather than platforms.

Part of guaranteeing a smooth multiplayer experience also means effective anti-cheat solutions, which the Halo Infinite team has been working on from within the Slipspace engine to be unobtrusive and hidden, without sacrificing security.

Finally, part of 343i's vision for Halo Infinite on PC means scaling the gap that often divides PC and console versions of other games. Console games are often left with barebones settings and little-to-no customization. With Halo Infinite, 343i wants to give console players more customizability with things like FOV sliders and other granular controls by organizing and dividing settings into core groups that are easy to use and access.

It's clear that 343i intends to make Halo Infinite a premium experience on all platforms, including PC. That makes sense when you take into consideration that Halo: The Master Chief Collection has over 10 million players on PC. Halo is returning to PC in a big way, and it's great to get more of a deeper look into what this means to the developers in the latest article of "Inside Infinite." In case you missed it, last month's "Inside Infinite" dived into Halo Infinite's audio.

Halo Infinite is slated to release at some point in 2021, likely during the Holidays, and is heading to Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PC through Steam and the Microsoft Store, and Xbox Game Pass for consoles and PC. If you want a chance to potentially play Halo Infinite early, be sure to read our ultimate guide on the Halo Infinite beta. If Halo Infinite delivers on its promise of a next-gen Halo experience that will be supported for years to come, it'll undoubtedly make its way onto our list of best Xbox shooters, and can even become one of the best Xbox games of all time.