343 Industries is making progress on Halo Infinite campaign co-op and announced the first campaign co-op test flight, set to begin July 15. 343 shared the announcement in a blog post, where members of the development team discussed some of the features we can expect, including shared world states, how progress carries over for everyone playing, and just how much freedom you’ll have playing the FPS with friends.
How Halo Infinite campaign co-op works
Progress carries over for everyone in Halo Infinite’s campaign co-op, regardless of who the team leader is, and it’s a seamless process. You don’t need a separate co-op save file, and if your friends find a collectible during your co-op session, it counts as if you found it.
“I could be playing Solo campaign, jump into a Co-Op session for a few hours, then launch back into Solo play and all the mission progress, acquired collectibles, equipment found, achievements earned, and upgrades made in either session would be intact,” campaign lead designer John Mulkey said.
There’s also a proofing system that prevents anyone from sequence breaking the narrative, which was one of the challenges the team said prevented them from launching co-op with the main campaign. When you launch a co-op session, the game will mark any mission that everyone has completed as complete, but if one member hasn’t finished it yet, it’ll remain incomplete.
Upgrades are a different story, though, since those are tied to individual players and won’t be shared across the Fireteam.
343 also briefly touched on the Area Of Operations system, a tether that keeps team members from straying across the Ring. Wander off too far, and you’ll get a notice telling you to rejoin the party. If you ignore it, the game kills you, and you respawn by the nearest team member.
It’s not as restrictive as it sounds, though. 343 said the warning kicks in at 800 feet away, and the kill zone is 1,000 feet.
Replaying campaign missions in Halo Infinite
Finally, 343 said the option to replay campaign objectives is coming with the co-op update. You’ll use the Tac-Map to highlight a previous mission and choose to replay it. The game transports you and your team, if you’re in co-op, to the mission location, and while you can replay the objective, you’re not locked into it. You can just choose to do something else.
Whatever your decision, you’ll carry all cores and skulls with you, even to the earliest missions.
How to join Halo Infinite campaign co-op test flight
As with Halo Infinite’s previous test flights, you need to be a Halo Insider program to join, and you need to either own Halo Infinite or have an active Game Pass subscription with the game installed. You’ll receive a notification with a participation key from Halo Insider communications to take part in the flight.
Since the goal of the flight is to test for bugs and refine campaign co-op, don’t expect a completely smooth ride, though.