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Halo Infinite passes Destiny 2 on Xbox's most played games list

FireFly

Member
Have you seen the US list? Halo is behind Destiny 2. This is just one of those Jez Corden land Windows Central articles trying to make Halo Infinite happen much like the one before about the season bump on steam. Now it's dropped back to roughly what it was doing before, the lowly 3k mark.
According to Steam charts, the daily peaks are at around 8k players, compared with ~5k before season 5 launched.

 

Dutchy

Member
Have you seen the US list? Halo is behind Destiny 2. This is just one of those Jez Corden land Windows Central articles trying to make Halo Infinite happen much like the one before about the season bump on steam. Now it's dropped back to roughly what it was doing before, the lowly 3k mark.
Quick, make a thread about how good Destiny 2 is doing!!!!!!
 

Three

Gold Member
According to Steam charts, the daily peaks are at around 8k players, compared with ~5k before season 5 launched.

In the run up to season 5 that's true but it had a boost with peaks of 12k back in March too. Some articles were trying to suggest some massive turn around due to management change but the peaks are going back down as usual for any season, current players is around 2.3k.
 

Dutchy

Member
In the run up to season 5 that's true but it had a boost with peaks of 12k back in March too. Some articles were trying to suggest some massive turn around due to management change but the peaks are going back down as usual for any season, current players is around 2.3k.
Not surprised. The game is inheritly flawed. No game should have to try this hard to retain player numers right after it's release

The bungie games were good, right out of the box. Maintained players for years on end and even continued while sequels were dropping.

I wish people would herald halo 2 and 3 more on this forum. They're 15+ year old games that rival Infinite in playernumbers. That's borderline insane if you think about. Almost like there's some winning formula there 🤭
 

DForce

NaughtyDog Defense Force
You imagine it became F2P only recently?

Counterstrike and Fortnite were released quite a while ago, and they’re still topping the most played games lists on PC and console respectively.

I think this article is premature, but you’re making an illogical argument here.

You're naming Counterstrike and Fortnite to counter his claim when the majority of games don't perform this well over time.

Generally, games decline in player count over time. Halo Infinite certainly wasn't expected to have this low of a player count

They literally use a chart that’s ranked based on actual numbers of people playing. Changing chart positions can indicate upswings or downswings.

Not exactly rocket science.

It's merely a small bump. People are talking about it should have a greater improvement in player count if was something actually worth celebrating.
 

LordOfChaos

Member
Same here. I enjoyed the campaign but really thought they would have added more to it by now. Hell, think I said the same thing last year.

As awkward as the last two games in what had started out planned as a trilogy each dumping the last game's story was, the end of Infinite was getting into the potentially interesting stuff again, and the campaign by itself was quite good.

I hope they continue it, but if they just take years more and start with another reset in a few years, I don't even know, this franchise has so much potential and love but is so mismanaged
 

FireFly

Member
In the run up to season 5 that's true but it had a boost with peaks of 12k back in March too. Some articles were trying to suggest some massive turn around due to management change but the peaks are going back down as usual for any season, current players is around 2.3k.
Right, but even if you take the average monthly players for March, you are looking at 4.2K compared with 5.8K for the last 30 days. The other months since then were 3K to 4K. The last time that average monthly player numbers were this high was in March 2022, and that was off the back of the original launch.

And if you set the graph view to a year, you can see that even though the player numbers have been creeping downwards, we're still above the trendline. When average monthly players drop down to 4K or less, then we will be back to normal.

Edit: Also, lets not forget that Firefight has not released yet.
 
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SHA

Member
Same here. I enjoyed the campaign but really thought they would have added more to it by now. Hell, think I said the same thing last year.
Revenging the Spartans will progress the story dramatically and it seems they don't want to do that cause Spencer said the IP tied with xbox.
 

Ozriel

M$FT
Have you seen the US list? Halo is behind Destiny 2. This is just one of those Jez Corden land Windows Central articles trying to make Halo Infinite happen much like the one before about the season bump on steam. Now it's dropped back to roughly what it was doing before, the lowly 3k mark.

…I literally said this in the same comment you quoted 😏
 

Kydd BlaZe

Member
Might have to re-download Infinite and dive back in. Haven't touched it in a while, but I had a blast with it when it launched. Lack of content killed it for me back then.
 
The multiplayer is excellent for Halo Infinite right now. Plenty of players for matches, lots of maps, good modes. I can see it continuing to improve with players, though they really shot themselves in the foot by not launching with enough content. But this is way more about Destiny falling than Halo rising. Halo has seen a slight uptick in players with the new season drop, but Destiny has dropped significantly over the last year. I think it's probably just the lack of new content and how grindy the game has become with nothing new to work towards.
 

Roxkis_ii

Banned
Look like Destiny passed Halo on the US Xbox charts again, so this is looking like a short lived victory. I didn't realize the multiplayer was free to play on Steam. So maybe I'll try it out to play play around on the lockout to get some Halo 2 nostalgia.
 

Optimus Lime

(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
Halo Infinite went from shit to great. Destiny went from shit, to great, to utterly shit.

This is going to be temporary. But whatever. Doesn't change the fact that Halo Infinite turned out to be really fun, and Destiny is a dying, flyblown sheep that needs to be dragged into a field and shot.
 
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Mr.ODST

Member
Not played Infinite since Season 1 and the game is pretty great, if they can sort the netcode out (Which recently they announced they are doing a huge focus on it) then the game is in the perfect sweet spot, there is tons of content for it now and with Forge and the devs supporting them by putting the maps in a playlist its great.

Enjoyed the Halo 3 Playlist they have atm and they recently changed stuff the community wanted asap like Bandit to BR change etc
 

Jigsaah

Member
edited cuz it was mean.

What's the reason for this recent upsurge in Halo? Should I reinstall this?
 
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Optimus Lime

(L3) + (R3) | Spartan rage activated
Not played Infinite since Season 1 and the game is pretty great, if they can sort the netcode out (Which recently they announced they are doing a huge focus on it) then the game is in the perfect sweet spot, there is tons of content for it now and with Forge and the devs supporting them by putting the maps in a playlist its great.

Enjoyed the Halo 3 Playlist they have atm and they recently changed stuff the community wanted asap like Bandit to BR change etc
Infinite is great. Yes, yes, Craig and all that - but it's ended up in a far, far better place than COD or BF or whatever.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I'd advise anyone who is remotely interested tonfire it up and give it a go. I've played two nights running and it's awesome. Looks like they nailed it with this season.
 

Mr.ODST

Member
Infinite is great. Yes, yes, Craig and all that - but it's ended up in a far, far better place than COD or BF or whatever.
Yeah Season 5 is great fixed alot, Im playing M&K now and feels great and seem to be competing with controller now, content wise there is a lot to do and see, Redemption for Halo Infinite? we will see
 
I'd advise anyone who is remotely interested tonfire it up and give it a go. I've played two nights running and it's awesome. Looks like they nailed it with this season.

True.

From Halo 2 and 3 they only ever needed cool maps, weapons, vehicles and modes of play. The formula didn't even need to change really. This is where GaaS successes like Fortnite or Apex really drive home their core gameplay and just supplement it with modes, maps, tweaks etc. 343 had to reinvent the wheel each game release just because...

It's still mental to me 343 and Bungie for that matter know 50% of their playerbase is campaign only play and yet they don't have roadmaps and dev pipelines to deliver to that audience on the regular. Imagine 2-3 campaign/coop updates every year, decent content that is worthy of campaign expansion and enables more coop play than ever e.g. 3-12 players coop. Bring it and separate Halo from the other GaaS multiplayer only titles. Cross progression and hooks in there would equate to a decent boost for engagement and season passes too.
 
More of an indictment of how much of mess Destiny is right now TBH.

And Halo should've had all this content at launch. Would've been much better received. But it failing led to 343's God awful management finally being cleared out so maybe it was actually a good thing.
 
Can I just say I very much doubt this list? When I click the link there’s no actual numerical order to it either. Why not give us the player count?

Don’t believe for a second that there are more people playing Starfield than Rocket League, GTA online, Forza Horizon 5, EA FC 24.

On Steam where Starfield was actually bought by millions of people, the game is 88th on most played lists but I’m supposed to believe on Xbox it’s a different universe and timeline? Not falling for this bs lol
No console company gives player count. No platform owner gives player count period except for Valve because they are a bunch of libertarians high on laissez faire ideals. The rest of the platform holders keep their cards close to their chest.
 
Can I just say I very much doubt this list? When I click the link there’s no actual numerical order to it either. Why not give us the player count?

Don’t believe for a second that there are more people playing Starfield than Rocket League, GTA online, Forza Horizon 5, EA FC 24.

On Steam where Starfield was actually bought by millions of people, the game is 88th on most played lists but I’m supposed to believe on Xbox it’s a different universe and timeline? Not falling for this bs lol
You should have really thought this through before posting. Steam doesn't have Gamepass 😅😅.
 
Bump because the original article was so 'cringe' as the young'ns like to say. We're like 3-4 weeks into the new Destiny season now, but it has to last 6 months thanks to The Final Shape delay... in another 3-4 months Destiny will probably really be hitting its nadir.

Meanwhile Halo is trying to catch up to last year's last gen Madden as this year's last gen Madden nips at its heels. Catching up to this year's current gen Madden remains a pipe dream, at least until the NFL offseason.

Xbox:
aRxs7M1.png


SteamCharts:
WxoySYT.png
 

SimTourist

Member
Bump because the original article was so 'cringe' as the young'ns like to say. We're like 3-4 weeks into the new Destiny season now, but it has to last 6 months thanks to The Final Shape delay... in another 3-4 months Destiny will probably really be hitting its nadir.

Meanwhile Halo is trying to catch up to last year's last gen Madden as this year's last gen Madden nips at its heels. Catching up to this year's current gen Madden remains a pipe dream, at least until the NFL offseason.

Xbox:
aRxs7M1.png


SteamCharts:
WxoySYT.png
Yeah, it's easy to feel in the game when it takes 5 minutes to find a BTB match and all the matches I get have 300 ms ping. Even Rocket League which has crossplay with everything feels dead in most modes, taking forever to find a match.
 

Spitfire098

Gold Member
Bump because the original article was so 'cringe' as the young'ns like to say. We're like 3-4 weeks into the new Destiny season now, but it has to last 6 months thanks to The Final Shape delay... in another 3-4 months Destiny will probably really be hitting its nadir.

Meanwhile Halo is trying to catch up to last year's last gen Madden as this year's last gen Madden nips at its heels. Catching up to this year's current gen Madden remains a pipe dream, at least until the NFL offseason.

Xbox:
aRxs7M1.png


SteamCharts:
WxoySYT.png
Destiny 2 higher than Starfield & halo infinite 🤔. D2 death was greatly exaggerated.
 
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Yeah, it's easy to feel in the game when it takes 5 minutes to find a BTB match and all the matches I get have 300 ms ping. Even Rocket League which has crossplay with everything feels dead in most modes, taking forever to find a match.
I don't mind the queues in Rocket League, since it gives me time to warm up/practice in free play and workshop maps. Much more bearable than an FPS where you really are just waiting. 2v2s at C3/GC1 in US West are pretty quick. 3v3s can take a while. But I'm not going to play with east coast ping. MMR systems inherently slow down the matchmaking as you start getting away from the skill average. It's no wonder the top guys are off organizing matches on Discord rather than suffering through SSL queue times.

I avoid PVP in D2 unless they force me to go in for some specific weapon quest or there's something particularly PVE meta that only drops there, so I don't have a feel for those queues. The PVE stuff is kind of slow just because of how D2 works. Sometimes it takes like 5+ minutes to load into the Tower and I'll just cancel my Destiny session with an alt+f4 and play something else (usually Rocket League actually, lol). Last time I tried to queue the seasonal activity it just gave me nobody, which ends up being waaaay better anyway. Reminds me that I should dust off the "Destiny 2 Solo Enabler" that lets you queue patrol zones and strikes and the like solo. Much more efficient for grinding out basically anything in the game. Just imagine if Bungie actually figured out a way to make the game *more* fun with other players!
 

LordCBH

Member
If I’m playing PVP, I’d probably pick Infinite too. The D2 PvP experience is fucking trash right now. It’s best PvP years were Year 1 and the Forsaken year. I know a lot of people did not like the double primary era, but, for PvP, it felt great. Today? There’s absolutely no balance, cheaters run rampant. It’s a fucking mess.
 

sigrad

Member
it's nice to see Halo doing well honestly, but it shouldn't have taken this long.

Regardless, I redownloaded the game and am keen to try it out again, I did enjoy it the first couple of months I played.
It is actually really fun now. I play it regularly now. Only took them 2 extra years. Still needs pre and post game lobbies. People are too soft nowadays for that. But I made a lot of friends on older Halo MP.

Hopefully Certain Affinity is working on the next Halo single player campaign. Not a battle Royale.
Infinite was really good but it should/could have been better. The single player only having one biome was pretty lame. Just keep the grapple hook from now on.
 
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sigrad

Member
1.) According to Steam charts MCC had 3,460 players online on average over the last 30 days while Infinite had 5,838.4 players.
2.) The intitial maps were "spartan training simulator" style maps, while the new maps have almost all been "Halo installation" style, focussing on a Halo 1 and Delta Halo style aesthetic.
3.) The core social game modes are not on a rotation. Rotational playlists are mainly reserved for ranked play and the featured "event" (currently Halo 3 Refueled).

Wish they released Xbox numbers. I never have any problem finding a match.
 

Dr.D00p

Member
Are we talking about multiplayer Halo only?

'Cus being a slow, old fart I have zero interest in that, but I did like the campaign, despite its numerous faults.
 
Don't understand how R6: Siege is #5.. The actual shooting in that game feels like dog shit.
Nah, the feel of the shooting is pretty good. I'd guess you're on console and you just don't like the fact that you get zero aim assist. So it would appear that there's a market on console for actually having to aim yourself, or that at least it isn't a deal-breaker for many players.

And it absolutely nails tactical gameplay, and map destruction. There's absolutely nothing in the traditional FPS world that can match the intensity and creative freedom of Siege. Which might explain why the only FPSes ahead of it are BRs. (maybe COD, but I think the vast majority is focused on Warzone)
 
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