Yesterday, Halo Infinite developer 343 Industries shared the updated roadmap for the game's free-to-play live service multiplayer. Season 2, 'Lone Wolves,' is set to begin on May 3rd and will last for over six months, ending on November 7th just ahead of the beginning of Season 3.

　　On the upside, the arrival of the campaign network co-op has been confirmed for late August (alongside the ability to replay campaign missions), while the Forge mode has been brought forward to September with an Open Beta release.

　　On the downside, Halo Infinite fans were certainly hoping for a shorter season after the exceedingly long first season, but it looks like they'll have to cope with another six months for Lone Wolves. 343 Industries said that's because it's also aiming to deliver some much-needed Quality of Life updates called Drop Pods during Seasons, with the target being one Drop Pod per month.

　　We know we need to deliver more content and more features more quickly. Staying true to priority zero means that sometimes we need to slow down in order to stay healthy and move faster later. But we’re also aggressively looking at ways to accelerate.

　　For example, we want to get the Forge toolset into your hands sooner rather than later so that awesome community maps and modes can more rapidly make their way into the game.

　　To make this happen, we’re targeting a Forge open beta later in Season 2. We’ve successfully had Forge in private flighting with a limited audience for some time, so we’ve decided to forgo a large-scale formal flighting program and go right to open beta. With this approach, we can get the core Forge tools out to everyone quicker while also remaining focused on our core priority of continuing to improve foundational aspects of Halo Infinite. Forge will persist from the open beta onwards, evolving and growing over time.

　　As we continue to improve and ramp up, please understand that all of us at 343 are fully committed to making Halo Infinite the best Halo experience ever. Indeed, the primary reason that we’re extending Season 2 is to give us time before shipping another Season to fully address “quality of life” improvements based on learnings from Season 1 as well as other data and feedback we’ve collected.

　　What do you think of this updated Halo Infinite multiplayer roadmap?