Assassinations have been temporarily removed from Halo Infinite because “people just turn them off” • Eurogamer.net

If you’ve noticed that you haven’t been able to pull off any assassinations in the Halo Infinite tech test, there’s a reason for that – they’ve been removed.

Halo Infinite developer, 343 Industries, confirmed assassinations will not be available in the sci-fi shooter during a livestream back at the end of July. However, the recent test flight has seen interest in the notably absent franchise tradition resurface online.

Assassinations – animations that are triggered when you creep up on an enemy player and melee them from behind – have long been a Halo staple. But despite the team at 343i “really lov[ing] assassinations”, they’ve been removed because of the “gameplay disadvantage” to pulling one off.

“[Assassinations] are not in for launch,” said senior mission designer Tom French. “We actually really love assassinations… but what happens at a lot of levels is people just turn them off because there’s a gameplay disadvantage to it.”

Consequently, the team is taking “a step back” and will bring them back only when it “really just feels meaningful so that they’re always an accessible tool”.

ICYMI, despite what you might have read, no, Halo Infinite’s bots are not teabagging you. Well. Not intentionally, anyway.

“Bots are primarily a part of Halo Infinite to help players learn and experiment with the multiplayer experience,” 343i told us in a statement earlier this week. “We want players to feel comfortable making mistakes against bots, because making mistakes means you’re improving and working on skills you haven’t mastered yet.

“We never want to punish learning, especially not by having bots engage in behaviours that a player could feel is exclusionary. For that reason, we don’t have explicit programming that tells the bots to teabag or taunt you in any way.”