Halo Infinite dev "has sort of a love-hate relationship with Craig"

Halo Infinite developer 343 showed off the campaign for the first time in over a year this week - and in doing so revealed the infamous Brute dubbed Craig has received quite the glow-up.

Microsoft's reveal of Halo Infinite's campaign last year went so badly it delayed the game to this Christmas, and part of the negative reception had to do with the flat visuals. A closeup of a Brute enemy dubbed Craig by the Halo community became an instant meme - and to be fair developer 343 subsequently leaned into it.

After this week's re-reveal of the Halo Infinite campaign, we saw Craig had received a makeover - and now sports a tidy beard on his chin.

In a follow-up blog post, character and combat director Steve Dyck spoke about the reaction to Craig and how the developers at 343 dealt with it internally.

"... the team has sort of a love-hate relationship with Craig," Dyck said. "While it was fun to see the community gravitate towards Craig, he unfortunately represented some content and systems that were not ready for prime time in that demo.

"The positive outcome of Craig was that he was one of the factors in gaining some more time to finish work and get Brutes to a place where the team is happy with them.

"This is one of the many positive examples of 343 working with and aligning with the Halo community around expectations. Players who look hard enough will still be able to find some evidence of Craig in Halo Infinite, his spirit lives on!"

Bryan Repka, character art lead for Infinite's campaign, declared: "Craig is in good hands, trust me!"

"He has gone through some changes, but I am here to say that he has glammed up. He is feeling very good about himself and has fit back in well with the rest of his Brute friends. He has also picked up a new hobby and has done well for himself. Long live Craig!"

343 released an impressively-detailed render of Craig as he is now in Halo Infinite, which shows just how much he's changed since last year. This isn't necessarily how Craig will appear in Infinite when you sit down to play the game in December, but it shows the potential detail on offer.

Meanwhile, in the same blog post 343 confirmed many Halo fans' suspicions about the new enemy dubbed the Skimmer: that it is a new species of alien.

There are new species in Halo Infinite, Dyck confirmed, as well as new variants unique to the game. Here's the quote on the Skimmer:

"While I won't give away everything about them, what I can say is they are a mid-tier combatant, sort of on the level with the Jackals and higher tier Grunts," Dyck said.

"They aren't full flying enemies but have hover packs to allow them to move around quickly and provide unique challenges and opportunities to the player while on foot or in a vehicle.

"We didn't want to pursue a full flying enemy as we found in an FPS flying enemies can get a little frustrating and disorienting as the player is forced to look up. Skimmers, like their namesake, move around by just skimming above the ground.

"We can't talk too many other specifics before release, but we are just beginning to scratch the surface of the mysteries this ring holds and that includes enemies. We can't wait for fans to get their hands on the game and discover the new goodies."

There's no mention of the The Harbinger, though. There are plenty of theories floating around about what this new enemy is. A new race? A Precursor? All we know for sure is The Harbinger is not a Prelate. Counting its fingers was worth it, then!

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