Prelude to Playing Halo Infinite

This is kind of wild. I’m not sure when the last time — if ever — was that I felt something like this going into a new video game. As such, I just wanted to record my thoughts, silly though they may be, before playing it.

I’ve seen it said that nervousness and excitement are basically the same emotion. That would simplify things, as I’m not sure which one I’m feeling right now.

As I write this, I’m just over an hour away from playing Halo Infinite for the first time. In turn, this marks my first time playing Halo — at least, the first-person version — in a long time.

I’ve been a fan of Halo for a while now, albeit a more casual one. My favorite game in the franchise to date has been Halo: Spartan Assault. I have some of the novels, I’ve seen some of the animation, I have a few toys, and I generally like the look and feel of the Halo universe, but one thing has always steered me away from being more involved in the franchise.

It’s a first-person shooter.

I don’t know why I’ve been so averse to FPSes. I dabbled in Doom and Duke Nukem 3D in the ’90s. I rented and played GoldenEye 007 more than a few times. Heck, even Jurassic Park for the Super NES had FPS segments. But for some reason, at some point, I determined they weren’t for me, and so I stayed far, far away from the genre, only dipping my toe in with the occasional release of a Metroid Prime or Bioshock, only to quickly pull it back out. Part of me wanted to like them, but some other part just didn’t take.

I can’t tell you why. Maybe it has something to do with my oft-ridiculed and completely unintended tendency to shoot people in the groin in GoldenEye. Maybe I expected too much of myself when I took part in Halo 2‘s multiplayer at a launch event, and was summarily slaughtered in short order. Maybe I thought I was more comfortable doing my own aiming, as I enjoyed that aspect of Metroid Prime 3 over its predecessors. Heck, maybe I just like to turn my head to look around me at a quick glance — it’s why I don’t like using the more realistic driver’s seat view in Forza, after all.

Or maybe it’s just some combination of all of it that’s just built up over time, each notion reinforcing the others that I didn’t like FPS, and FPS just wasn’t for me, and those notions in turn reinforcing the originals, in an endless, self-perpetuating cycle?

But something has come along that may just break that cycle: Halo Infinite.

I can’t explain it. A lot of people drew ire and gave the original trailer flack, but… there was something about it that drew me in. I wanted to play this… it was an FPS, but I still wanted to play it, anyway.

That anticipation has built over the last year and a half until we’ve reached where we are today. Halo Infinite is here, and I’m going to play it tonight, live on Twitch.tv/Nyteworks at 8pm EST.

This week, we're bringing hope.@LBD_Nytetrayn is new to playing FPS Halo, but is going to jump in to the biggest Halo campaign yet. Join him and @nadiaoxford this Saturday night on Twitch!https://t.co/kWaHOwbMJG pic.twitter.com/kgVHStX48j

— PoisonMushroom.Org (@PoisonMushroomO) December 11, 2021

Maybe this time, I hope, I’ll finally take to it. Maybe this is the night my gaming horizons are broadened in a way I never thought would ever happen.

In 2001, “Combat Evolved” with the release of the first Halo. Now, 20 years later, maybe it’s time I evolved, too.

Update: And in the anticlimax to beat all anticlimaxes, the campaign did not download. Apparently it wasn’t in any of the other two downloads I’d initiated before and after the game’s release. So we wound up playing something else in the meantime, and we’re currently going to try again on Monday night. Keep an eye on the @PoisonMushroomO Twitter (also found in the sidebar) for more information!

Thanks for reading!

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David Oxford is a freelance writer of many varied interests. If you’re interested in hiring him, please drop him a line at david.oxford (at) nyteworks.net.

David Oxford

David Oxford, or “LBD ‘Nytetrayn’,” as he is sometimes also known, is a freelance writer of many varied interests who resides in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. If you’re interested in hiring him, please drop him a line at david.oxford (at) nyteworks.net.

For a full list of places to find him online, click here.