Welcome to Zeta Halo. Well-worn dirt tracks giving way to tall grass, slate cliffs topped with rows of pine and, off in the distance, towering alien structures silhouetted against the gentle sunlight of a mild winter’s day – it looks, well, a little familiar. This setting, in all its Pacific Northwest beauty, is just one of the many ways 343 Industries is directly quoting Combat Evolved, as it attempts once more to recapture the glory of Xbox’s most-lauded shooter. Gone is any suggestion of Spartan Locke or the Prometheans; in its place, a classic adventure that puts an AI in your head and a well-rounded pistol in your hand. It all feels like an attempt to poke your inner monologue – as the rest of you thunders across the landscape in a half-dead Warthog – towards phrases such as ‘return to form’. Infinite isn’t that. But it’s certainly 343’s best shot yet.

Zeta takes these archetypal surroundings and expands them into something more closely resembling an open world, without ever quite being one. The developer has pushed back on describing the game that way, and for good reason. Zeta’s boundaries are tighter than those in any game from Ubisoft’s stable, and set clearly: the world is a floating archipelago, giving way at the edges to sharp-angled Giant’s Causeway pillars and then nothingness. Aside from a few ramps that allow you to close the gap between islands, most attempts to push past these limits will result in an endless fall into the abyss (itself something of a series tradition).

Nevertheless, flip open the map screen – yes, there’s a map screen now – and you’ll find the standard openworld littering of icons: Far Cry-style outposts to recapture; squads of marines to rescue from aliens; powerful Banished lieutenants and warlords to be taken down. And that, campaign missions aside, is more or less your lot. There’s not a lot of variety to be found on Zeta. Not that it matters when you’re in the thick of things, darting between vehicles and grappling hooks, electric grenades and deployable forcefields, with primary-coloured artillery pouring in from all directions.