It Costs Over $1000 to Buy Everything in the Halo Infinite Item Shop

Halo fans have worked out the insane cost of buying every cosmetic item in the Halo Infinite Shop. Who would pay this much for in-game skins?

[SullysCigar]

Can't you just earn these items in game, or by completing challenges or the campaign? Because if you can't, that should definitely be a thing.

[Jin_Sakai]

Like I said in the previous article, why are we adding everything up and making a big deal about it? No one is going to buy everything in the store.

Also why should it be a thing to earn items in the campaign? The MP is free and they have to make money somehow.

[senorfartcushion]

It’s not free, it’s a part of a $70 game called Halo Infinite

[badz149]

@Senor

the MP is F2P though. what are you talking about, dude?

[Gaming4Life1981]

Exactly why add up everything you can buy in a game store. Do that in any game and the price will be high for every item. Like you said Jin nobody will buy every item. The items are all cosmetic anyway so who cares.

The progression system needs fixing for sure though. You should be earning xp for a lot of stuff like killing enemies, winning the match, earning medals etc. That's my only gripe with the mp for right now.

The new Fiesta mode is super fun, never knew random weapons in slayer could be such fun.

[ChubbyBlade]

Why are you defending this? It’s the most money hungry game since fallout 76

[-Hermit-]

@ChubbyBlade

Massive exaggeration. You don't need to pay a penny if you don't want to, so how is it money grabbing? Also, have you not seen gatcha games? they are way worse. This site is so pathetically childish at times.

[Rhythmattic]

Im just putting out there as a thought.
As PS allows MP online without a subscription for F2P games, As I believe MS doing with Xbox consoles now.
So methinks that's the aim? Get people into the Ecosystem , people buy a box, then spend on the DLC... An ecosystem pretty much as Sonys , albeit on a MS Software platform.... Cant imagine this could be played on a PC running Linux....

[Rhythmattic]

My Follow up..

So Gamepass works allowing me to play infinite (not requiring MS DX) on my open hardware platform running Linux?

People get so triggered....
Never go full

[Rachel_Alucard]

No, the only ones you can earn are on the free tier, but they punish you by limiting you to 3 challenges at a time and the items are bloated with challenge swaps, and the challenges themself are set to be RNG, so you'll get really impossible situational ones and are forced to use up a swap to get an easy one. There is no earnable credit like 5 other F2P service titles to buy the next pass, the fracture events are built around FOMO in that you can only ever rank up like 8 times in the time its available because they want you to keep coming back and rushing you each time to do it all. For a game that sold itself on not leaning hard into FOMO in its marketing, all they did was reallocate to other parts of the game like the daily shop and the fracture events. They even advertise cosmetics that are store bought only on the event itself. Nobody wanted F2P for Halo and the people that played past Halos coming into this are obviously disgruntled by it. I don't like the defense of it being F2P means its ok to be worse then every other F2P title on the market. Even with Apex's overpriced skins, at least they give you back credit to buy the next pass without paying more.

[badz149]

you have a point. the MP is structured based on monetization and it already shows.

HOWEVER, personally, I don't care much about MT as I know I won't buy any. like I have never buy anything MT on PS Store except pay for PS+, I wouldn't even pay anything MT for other games either like this one or Fortnite. I'll just play to enjoy the games and if I lose interest or the MT becomes intrusive, I'll just move on to other games. I'm just glad I can make my spartan wears yellow/orange like Griff from RvB haha

[Rachel_Alucard]

The bigger issue is that historically, Halo has always had customization as a focus since at least Reach. 3 had it but it was barebones, and every game after has added to it in some form. This new one has 0 progression beyond the battlepass currently, and it forces you to pay in money or insane time to get what you had in previous titles. There's no way to get easy time or easy money currently and it's no wonder nobody likes it. Currently speaking, that challenge system anyone can dismiss affects everyone in the game, because now you'll be getting matched with teammates and enemies who stall matches, or don't help because they want to complete their challenges over actually playing the game. It's a lot more serious then people realize. 3 things need to change in the current system they have, barring any additional progression of course.

1. They would need to remove the 4 challenge active limit and just do like everyone else and have them up at all times
2. Remove or change super specific challenges, ones that can only be gotten in certain map/mode combinations, and specific weapon challenges, changing them to just Human or Covenant variations for example. This is especially bad since the player has 0 control of what mode they play since you all you have is BTB and complete random 4v4 matches.
3. They would need to change out most of the BP tiers to actually be something good instead of just more solutions to a problem they created with the challenge swaps.

I know the current season lasts for 6 months right at launch, my intuition is telling me this was done for a number of reasons. One theory I have is the fact they were spending most of the last year working on campaign or other things and never had the time or schedule to add an actual rewarding progression system as they said they didn't have time themselves. So they are spending the next 3 months doing that, then spending the following 3 months on Season 2. That's my only theory on the matter. Because they knew all of these points right at launch and planned it.

[Gamer79]

@rachel, nice contradiction. Halo has always had customisation, or only since reach which was the fifth game in the series. There's only been 2 released reach, 4 and 5.

[Rachel_Alucard]

@gamer

Nice job reading the part where I said "as a focus"

[Gamer79]

@rachel, ain't nobody got time for that.

[Chris12]

This is like walking into a supermarket and adding up everything for sale. It's pathetic, especially when none of it is necessary to play the game. Articles like this just fan the flames for fanboy wars and it's the usual suspects that jump straight in every time.

[Kaii]

Its F2P.
People will ignore the cost because they support this form of microtransaction.
Ignorance is bliss

[senorfartcushion]

It’s not free, it’s in beta. It literally comes with the $70 Halo disc you buy from shops

[--Onilink--]

What are you talking about? Its free…anyone can download and play every single map and mode in the multiplayer with purchasing anything. The beta portion is just because they released the mp a couple of weeks earlier

[senorfartcushion]

You don’t understand.

Just because it’s free for a lot of people, doesn’t mean it’s a free to play game. Halo Infinite’s multiplayer costs money if bought with the boxed copy. And if a game is not just free to play, then, as you know, it cannot be called free to play.

[Atom666]

Nope, still free.

[senorfartcushion]

** Donkey noise **

[Killer73nova]

Dude the game is $60. You don’t need to buy the game to play multiplayer .

[ChubbyBlade]

No it doesn’t

[PrinceAli]

I think you're confused... the MP is a separate download without the need of the disc purchase champ lool

[KillaJamm]

Bro you try waaaaay to hard loool

[Hedstrom]

You don't need gamepass?

[--Onilink--]

No, the mp is completely free to play

[MadLad]

It's a free to play.

Nobody needs to buy anything from the shop, let alone everything.

The moment people realized the game will be coming out far, far better than the haters had hoped, it's just been doubling down on Halo's free to play elements acting like a free to play.

Until you're able to buy damage/defense buffs this is just a bunch of whining and derailing.

[EmperorDalek]

No one asked for Halo Infinite to be free to play, most people would prefer to buy it full price and have something like the Halo Reach credit system. Hell, some people are going to pay full price for the game, and most people are going to pay to play it through their Game Pass subscription.
Whether you like it or not, cosmetic items are part of the game, and people have the right to be pissed off when they have to pay for them.

As for the game itself... It's okay, but it's not groundbreaking. This is the worst selection of maps of any Halo game at launch. The top three multiplayer components of the series are probably 3, Reach and 5. Those are all still better than Infinite.

[MadLad]

It's hard to make the blanket statement that "nobody" asked for the multiplayer to be free to play.
You then have to defend the idea that offering a solid and substantial multiplayer experience to literally anyone, at zero cost; the only caveat being that there are inconsequential cosmetics that can be had ALSO at a purchase price, is anything else than pro consumer.

Those who purchase the game, or get it via gamepass, have access to the campaign, which is just as important to the series as the multiplayer.

[EmperorDalek]

"No one asked for Halo Infinite to be free to play" is a generalisation, which is suitable in this case. Most people didn't even think of the possibility, and the few who did were likely the type of people who would have had concerns with the free to play model.

I'm usually fine with this model. However, I would argue it's more shady for Halo Infinite. They knew the sales would be dramatically lower due to Game Pass, so they made the multiplayer free to play in order to justify thousands of dollars of paid microtransactions. Making it free to play overruled the majority of players who likely purchased either the game or a game pass subscription.

We should expect better from Halo. Buying a Halo game used to give you both a campaign and a hefty multiplayer component at launch, with all cosmetics attainable through gameplay. Infinite is free to play to justify outrageous microtransactions, and a serious lack of content and features at launch.

[Lionsguard]

Who cares? At least it's not gacha. You could prob spend $1000-$5000 in a game like Genshin Impact or some other gacha game and still not got everything or even anything that you even wanted and most of what you do get is just shit gear that you'll use to power up your other lesser shitty gear.

[Welshy]

"Here's a worse monetisation scheme in another game ergo my game isn't bad". Worst logic ever.

This moving of goalposts and normalisation is how microtransactions got this bad in the first place. They take 10 steps over the line and walk back one or two to make it look "good" relative to their initial intentions and set a new standard of BS.

[Lionsguard]

It's free to PLAY, but they're still going to find a way to charge you and this is by far the lesser of two demons. It's also 2021 not 2007. If you're not used to companies monetising you, then you'll always be complaining. We bitched and moaned about Oblivion horse armor and yet here we are today. It's all COSMETIC anyway and there are chumps out there that buy 100-$1000+ CS:GO skins in a game where I fondly remember user created skins being completely free way back in the day. How is anyone still surprised that monetizing of this magnitude occurs in today's gaming era?

[Father__Merrin]

N4g Fact:

The same people defending this are the same that cry foul of free to play titles that have monitisation elements....

[MadLad]

Who is being hurt that you can purchase cosmetics?

[Welshy]

People who just want to be able to earn them at a fair pace like they could in Reach for one...

This "it's only cosmetic" argument has been debunked a million times at this point. Cosmetics are part of the game whether you like it or not, if they had "no value" them they wouldn't be charging you silly money for them.

[MadLad]

@Welshy

They've literally opened up the entire multiplayer component to anyone who wants to play.

Free of charge.

Please give me an alternative to simply offering paid skins, which you can still get in game if you grind.

Gamers are such freaking whiners anymore. "Boohoo ... they gave me an entirely free, highly polished multiplayer experience for literally no money. But they give me they give me the option to buy duh Super 1337 Mohawk of Awesomeness instead of just grinding for it. They are literally Satan and Hitler combined!!!

[TinkerNation]

Seriously, I don't get some people here. They expect a multi million dollar highly polished game that everyone can play for free, to have no monetization at all?

[kryteris]

could be a lot worse.

[lonewolf10]

If anyone spends real money on digital rubbish in any game more fool them, never felt the need myself.

[badz149]

amen to that. but many content creators make a living out of streaming these games and they are the least popular if their characters are using the plain free costumes/items. and also, you forgot about the whales!

[MadLad]

Skins have nothing to do with popularity lol. That's literally some random ass take that holds no value.

As for whales, yeah. Most free to plays have them. If they want to waste their money on frivolous nothings, while everyone else just gets to enjoy the game, let them.

That's why this whole thing is such a non-issue. The only reason people are making a big deal of it is because it's Halo; owned by Microsoft.

[TrueStoryGuy]

Free to play offering cosmetics to buy. This is perfectly acceptable. As long as it doesn't affect gameplay, there is no issue with DLC.

[LoveSpuds]

It may not affect the minute to minute gameplay, but it sure as shit has affected the whole design philosophy of the game because it is designed to drive people to use MTs.

[lellkay]

LOL

[irishyort]

Pity multi player is so bad, the single player wint keep people spending all that cash for a 8 hour game.

Spligate is pretty much as good and its free and indie. WTF were they thinking for multiplayer when they decided to release as is?

[Snookies12]

No idea what you were playing, but the MP in Infinite is fantastic considering it's just beginning. Once it's fleshed out, it could be the best Halo MP to date.

[MadLad]

*waves at walking billboard for Splitgate*

Let's see who is still relevant in 2 years.

[InUrFoxHole]

GOTY!!! Loving it. Don't care for cosmetics. The gameplay is solid.

[TheDoomedGuy]

If you want to do it free you are limited and barred from certain collectibles.
So the progression is somewhat free. Heck they even show you when you level up what you are getting alongside what you "could" get. Thats psychological bullshit trying to get you to cough up some money.

As I suspected this "free" thing makes the overall experience worse. I'd rather pay once and never again.

[badz149]

"I'd rather pay once and never again"

considering it's 2021 and the trends in recent games, that also seems like a far dream. ask those who play NBA2K for example

[TheDoomedGuy]

Yeah but when I compare a Sony exclusive to something like NBA it's really not a good comparison. One reeks of quality and passion and pro consumerism. I expect the same from Microsoft exclusives and especially from a big name like halo. Why would I even compare it with NBA...if I must then that's not a good sign.

[Roarke]

Lol, dont understand point of these articles.. its F2P and its shop for cosmetics.. im not commplaying that all goods in BestBuy are costing several millions…

[MadLad]

The game didn't end up the s**show that the haters wanted it to, so now they are just grasping at anything they can to attack the game.

[TheGreatGazoo30]

Or you could just earn them by playing.

Or you could not care about customizing the look of your character in a FPS game where you can't see them anyways.

[AmUnRa]

Free to play games are in the end never free to play, developers want theyr investments back. And how do they do that?? Bingo.....

[hangdang]

Ok, so don't buy them? Stop giving a shit about stupid skins and you'll never have to worry about any of this

[Welshy]

Not true. They design the foundation of the games progression and challenge systems around cosmetics so that you earn currency at a gimps rate to make buying them more attractive. This isn't rocket science.

[hangdang]

So have the slightest bit of discipline and don't buy them? Not rocket science.

Pointless progression system that does nothing but show who plays more via a number next to their name. Wow, what would we do if we didn't take part in something like this?

[Welshy]

@hangdang

That wasn't my point. My point was that progression is gimps for those not paying so that it is deliberately unsatisfying and unrewarding. Whether you pay or not is irrelevant to the fundamental changes made that EVERY player has to deal with.

[ChubbyBlade]

The worst part is the battlepass is pretty useless. Something like 70% of the gear they showed off in all the trailers isn’t in the battlepass. It’s in the shop for $20/$25 EACH.

[MIDGETonSTILTS17]

You can just buy the battle pass for $10, and unlock the cosmetics years from now.

I know F2P creates fomo, but adults should be more comfortable with fomo. This is THE cost of the game since it is 100% free to play.

[kopko]

They need to optimize the progress system. I understand they rely on ingame shop because of f2p decision, but have to find the balance. Give players reasonable rewards for the time spent, and they will reward the devs by buying some stuff there and there. Could be a lot worse tho

[FPS_D3TH]

I simply do not care. The game is free to play. There is no loot box mechanics. The season pass does not expire. It’s hands down the best FPS to play over the competition this holiday season. I have no problems buying a $10 season pass and another $10 skin I enjoyed and leave it at that for several months. I paid 0 dollars other than gamepass I was already enjoying to play this. I can understand the gripe about challenge progression based battle pass but with some tweaks this game is more than fine. I can understand the old fans disliking the lack of customization from the start but at the same time the game is not robbing you of anything. This game is a godsend in times of continuously garbage AAA games and uglier practices. I won’t sit here and cry about it.

Battlefield on the other hand. That games a joke and it’s going to get a battlepass soon too.

[DeadManMMX]

Gee I wonder how much it costs to everything in COD: Warzone. Oh wait I don't give a crap because I have no intention of doing that. In fact I've been playing the game without spending money since it came out. I just bought a GhostFace skin that spoke to me around Halloween other then that nothing. Everything isn't for everybody. These kinds of articles seem entitled and stupid. People want to play games but don't want to ever pay for anything. Now we complain about optional cosmetics. The only real complaints to this game are the need to allow to choose playlists and vote on the next game/map and work on progression. I give 2 craps about anything else. The core of the game is solid.

[TinkerNation]

I agree, no one will buy everything, but it can be an interesting fact to find out. Probably doesn't warrant an entire article, but what really seems entitled and silly is the reaction certain people have to these kinds of articles.

[Proexposed]

Ok first off you guy fell for the click bait hard. I see a lot of confusion or false leading comments. Halo infinite story yes will cost money just like this other small game called fortnite so let’s compare halo story cost money fortnite story single or co-op game save the world cost money but both halo infinite multiplayer and fortnite multiplayer are complete free to play no purchase need just download and enjoy now that we cleared that up.

Let’s talk about these wild micro transactions aka skins hmm 🤔 let’s compare how much halo infinite F2P multiplayer skin add up to $1000 wow now add up the other F2P play games Fortnite, Apex, PUBG, and Warzone I wonder which one has more than halo oh wait every single other F2P game has more than halo infinite.

[anast]

Every knew this was going to be live-service jank. $1000 is not as bad as I thought it would be.

[TinkerNation]

Exactly. And in other games, normally you have garbage like lootboxes, which makes you spend literally several thousands of real life dollars and still not get everything. Or microtransactions tied to things affecting gameplay. Or even worse, both. So this is the absolute best case scenario once we knew it will be free to play.

[TinkerNation]

For a free to play game that is a very low number. Even for many non free to play games. CRIES IN FIFA ULTIMATE TEAM where 1000$ can't even get you the best team.

Edit: oh that's right FIFA is a full price game, where you buy lootboxes, and you gain better players through them. It's pay to win and since you buy lootboxes with miniscule chance of getting players you want, you have to spend 1000s of real life dollars to get a competitive team. In a full price game. And people here be complaining about cosmetics in a free to play game.

[Rhythmattic]

Be great if they had the "Craig" Skin, in all its simple triangle glory.

[GoodGuy09]

Its free 2 play after all. The gameplay is great, maps, weapons, and modes being free and added in occasionally is what matters most. Only complaint I have about the monetization is that the battle pass does not earn you back currency to buy another battle pass.

[Saijahn]

Pvp is f2p...the game will be on gamepass on top of that. And nobody is forcing you to buy anything.

Pretty sure this is standard in all f2p games. How much does all the fortnite stuff cost?

[Tedakin]

It costs millions of dollars to buy everything at Walmart. It's an optional store in a free game, a feature every free game has.

[BlackDoomAx]

Whales: Those are rookie numbers.

[JBlaze226]

I have no issue with they made this f2p with microtransaction and its only cosmetic but with how terrible the leveling up system is I feel they might make you pay to help you level up faster. Another issue is leveling up by doing challanges with a battle pass is a terrible idea and I hope they change it.