Halo Infinite received a major update this morning, announced in an exhaustive post from lead engineer Richard Watson. Geofiltering, a feature that can be exploited to gain the upper hand in matchmaking, will be actively prevented according to the 343 Industries team. The feature gained prominence due to a recent cheating controversy in online competitive play.
In an official post on Waypoint, Watson claimed geofiltering would remain a supported setting no longer. “Geofiltering is when players manipulate their system files or router settings in an effort to force the matchmaking system to give them matches hosted on servers located near them,” senior community manager John Junyszek also clarified their decision on the official Halo forum.
“Many do so thinking that they are creating their own ‘server selection’ within the matchmaking system, but that is not what’s happening. Instead, they are simply forcing the game to be played on their chosen datacenter, regardless of where the other players in the game are located.”
During the Halo Championship series, professional Halo Infinite player Mathew “Royal2” Fiorante was suspended after an internal investigation confirmed he had been using geofiltering to slap his competition with high ping, which he later claimed was an honest mistake. Regardless, the official HCS statement denounced his alleged faux pas as “server manipulation.”
Richard Watson further detailed the issues the update has addressed, including prioritizing low ping and facilitating matchmaking based on region. “This step should help you match with local players, and therefore have a better connection, more often,” Richard elaborated. More key information mentioned in the post advised their PC base to set simulation quality to ‘ultra,’ which should result “in better determinism between client and server.” According to the official Halo Twitter, Infinite is their most successful launch title to date.
