Halo Infinite gets a battle royale-like mode in Season 2 update

halo infinite chief
(Image credit: 343 Industries)

Halo Infinite is heading into Season 2 soon. A new Halo Waypoint blog post reveals the changes that players are going to see when Season 2 launches in about two weeks, on May 3, and it's a mix of new and old. 

King of the Hill is back, first of all, and comes with a new twist. As always, the mode entails capturing a designated "hill" and holding it for as long as possible. In this version of King of the Hill, however, the hill doesn't move on a timer. Instead, standing on a hill fills a control meter. When it's full, the team on the hill earns a point, and a new hill appears somewhere else on the map. However, the other team can contest a capture to stop the meter from filling, and if both teams are pushed off the hill, the meter drops back to zero.

Land Grab is mode two on the list. There are three points on the map to capture, each earning a team one point when locked down. When all three points are captured, three new zones will be revealed and the struggle for land once again begins. First to 11 points wins. 

Perhaps the most interesting of the modes is Last Spartan Standing, which is sort of a small-scale battle royale.

"Last Spartan Standing is based around the Lone Wolves theme of Season 2," reads the blog post. "In this free-for-all experience, 12 players spawn on Big Team Battle maps with a confined loadout and five respawns. Once a player runs out of respawns and can no longer participate, they can either spectate or leave the match without penalty.

"If a player gets a kill in the match, they can upgrade to a different weapon—something players of 'Escalation Slayer' will no doubt be familiar with. The match ends when there is just one Spartan left standing."

So it's a mix of escalation and battle royale tactics. The multiple lives should hopefully make it suited for smaller maps and the playstyle of Halo. If you immediately die in a bullshit way, you've got four more chances. 

In the rest of the post, multiplayer modes and systems designer Zach Boyce breaks down the changes being made to each mode in detail. Messing with King of the Hill is a big deal if you're a long-time Halo fan, after all. Boyce makes a strong case for the control meter, although the old style of King of the Hill will be available as a Custom Game for those who prefer it.

Look for the Season 2 update on May 3.

Imogen has been playing games for as long as she can remember but finally decided games were her passion when she got her hands on Portal 2. Ever since then she’s bounced between hero shooters, RPGs, and indies looking for her next fixation, searching for great puzzles or a sniper build to master. When she’s not working for PC Gamer, she’s entertaining her community live on Twitch, hosting an event like GDC, or in a field shooting her Olympic recurve bow.

Read more
splitgate 2
The Splitgate 2 open alpha is live now and very fun
A mascot character from The Finals winks at the camera while brandishing a minigun.
The Finals new season is here, toting permanent team deathmatch and a giant minigun
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Season 2
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Season 2 will let players battle on boats and bullet-trains, with the Terminator entering the fray 'shortly after launch'
A Guardian with a grenade launcher and a very fancy hat.
Destiny 2's new episode hits next week, sending players back into the giant, haunted spaceship where the first game had its finest moments
overwatch 2 season 15 cosmetics
Overwatch 2 is getting radical changes that might finally help that '2' make sense, starting with a third-person mode and over 160 hero perks
rainbow six siege x dual front mode
Rainbow Six Siege is getting its first permanent mode in 10 years, and it throws every Siege rule out the window
Latest in Halo
Saber Interactive's head honcho pulled a wild stunt to nab the Halo: Combat Evolved remaster, telling Microsoft he'd do the job for free before ultimately squeezing the publisher for millions
Halo 2 e3 2003 demo
Halo 2's playable E3 2003 demo is an astounding feat of preservation, and everything great about PC gaming
Halo Infinite
Welcome to shooter bizarro world: First Fortnite goes FPS, now Halo Infinite's adding a third person mode
Team members standing in an underground cave
'Y'all killed it': Survive the Undead, a community-made PvE zombie mode, is bringing players back to Halo Infinite
Halo Redshift fan mod Trailer Still
Check out the trailer for this big, cooperative Halo campaign mod
halo infinite season 3 echoes within
Halo Infinite is done with seasons, will get smaller 'content updates' from now on
Latest in News
A blue dragon rises into storm clouds
Wizards of the Coast throws a bone to players who miss vanilla Magic: The Gathering with a dragon-themed set called Tarkir: Dragonstorm
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders
Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders is getting a new mountain next month and a whole bunch more throughout the year, including a game editor
Lady smiling with the sun in her face
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's director was 'starving for new turn-based RPGs,' and figured if he wanted them, there would be others out there who'd want to play his game
farcana
'The Middle East's answer to Marvel Rivals' is an 'AI-powered', crypto-infused hero shooter that looks like hot garbage
A monster made of glowing skulls has a brinrevolver aimed at it in Abyssus.
Wield a brinerevolver as a brinehunter in Abyssus, the briniest ‘brinepunk’ shooter this side of the Mariana Trench
Two airships fire broadsides into each other's hull in Echoes of Elysium.
In this airship-building survival game, I faced an enemy worth punching trees over: 'The hubris of man'