The Halo franchise has been one of the hallmarks of Microsoft Studios gaming since the introduction of the original Xbox in 2001. It should come as no surprise that Microsoft Studios opted to re-release four of its heaviest hitters on the Xbox One in the form of Halo: The Master Chief Collection (MCC).
If you are or plan to be the owner of the MCC it is a safe bet that you enjoyed at least one of these Halo titles in the past. Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, Halo 2 Anniversary, Halo 3, and Halo 4 all ship with this Collection in their entirety.
The MCC ships with each game’s respective multiplayer as well, which will be examined in more depth later. With a few patches and bug fixes being the exception, each game exists as it did in its original form. 343 Industries, building off of Bungie’s original intellectual property, worked with Saber Interactive, Certain Affinity, Ruffian Games, and United Front Games to bring this Collection together.
Here, we’ll take a look at what went right, what went wrong, and what it all means moving forward.
Gameplay
If you have ever played a first person shooter released on the Xbox 360, Halo will be easy enough to pick up and get into fairly quickly even for newcomers to the franchise. While each new installment of Halo or Battlefield or Call of Duty tries to do something to set it apart from the competition, at the end of the day most first person shooters handle very similarly. Even the control scheme for Halo has not changed in many significant ways since its inception, and that is reflected as players swap between the different titles in the collection. The MCC offers an interesting option for players – you can either set a uniform control scheme for all four titles, or select an individual button layout for each game. Some of the options allow for customization of individual button settings, but for the most part, the buttons are mapped to certain configurations. Once you find some configurations which work best for you in each game, or one which doesn’t hamper you as you swap between titles, controller configuration becomes a non-issue.
While the Halo titles all handle similarly, it is an interesting experience to feel the games transition in one collection. Combat Evolved enemy AI move in simple patterns which are easy to learn. Halo 4 included an advanced array of Spartan Abilities. Halo 2 introduced the Energy Sword. The Flood in Halo 3 could dynamically alter the battlefield by infecting allies and enemies alike. These differences don’t necessarily directly correlate to each other, but they are examples of different elements in each individual title that change how the game is played from title to title, and they are all available to be experienced at the same time.
Visuals and Audio
The attention to detail in the visual and audio quality of these games naturally increased as the technology to render and record evolved. This is noticeable when comparing successive titles to their predecessors, and obvious when comparing Halo 4 to Combat Evolved. Character models, weapons, environments and more have progressed from simple, blocky shapes to sophisticated designs almost convincing enough in some instances to fool the human mind into thinking they are real. The MCC, either intentionally or as a byproduct of its design, underscores this evolution not just in the Halo series, but in the industry as a whole.
For the Anniversary editions of Combat Evolved and Halo 2, enhanced graphical settings serve as the default, along with newly recorded and remastered sounds and music. Players can switch back to the original settings at the touch of a button. This effect is much more pronounced in Halo 2 Anniversary; the enhanced graphical overlay is beautifully married to new sounds for weapons and environments and a rerecorded soundtrack. Ultimately, at 1080p and 60fps, all of the titles in this collection look gorgeous.
Halo 2 Anniversary is the undisputed crown jewel of this collection when it comes to sights and sounds. There are a few making-of documentaries which touch on the attention to detail 343i paid to this title. The in-game visuals are at least on par with Halo 4, which is to say they are fantastic. The cutscenes, newly rendered by the tech wizards at Blur, are simply breathtaking. While it is easy for the human mind to recognize that the Covenant council chambers on High Charity and the Gravemind are not real, there are some moments, such as the commendation ceremony aboard the Cairo and Sergeant Johnson’s pep talk before driving across the bridge in New Mombasa, that give pause. While it is ever-so-slightly disappointing that Halo 2 Anniversary’s cutscenes are pre-rendered, the in-game visuals 343i has been able to create, along with their attention to audio fidelity with Halo 2 Anniversary and Halo 4 indicate that gamers are in for a treat with future installments to this franchise.
Functionality
The Halo Channel is a new feature, not unlike Halo Waypoint, which allows players to tune into new episodes of Nightfall, Halo-related news updates on the DLC we all know is coming, and also allows the community to interact with one another on services like Twitch all on one device. Players can transition between the MCC and the Halo Channel, and once the Channel is registered using the code included with the game, the transition is rather simple. There are other tidbits scattered throughout the MCC which help to weave these games into the narrative of the franchise moving forward. Nightfall has a Syfy Original feel to it, which can be a good or bad thing depending on your sensibilities, and the streaming quality can be buggy at times. It is also somewhat annoying to be yanked out of the game when you access a terminal; the content of which is now accessed through the Halo Channel.
MCC contains a dearth of content and customization options. Unfortunately, the menu interface is not very intuitive and often feels cluttered, which is frustrating when you are simply trying to navigate to change your ID tag or select a new color for your avatar. Also available is every single set of unlockable armor in all four titles – including Locus for Halo 4 and Recon for Halo 3, and some new options for Halo 2. There is no customization feature to mix and match armor sets. The collection comes pre-loaded with several campaign playlist options, but lacks a customization feature. My dreams of playing The Library twenty times in a row uninterrupted have been dashed upon the stones of a rocky shore like a frail, wooden canoe. Hopefully this feature will be added in a future update. Owners of the MCC also have access to the Halo 5: Guardians multiplayer beta, which can be accessed through the “Extras” menu when it goes live.
Multiplayer and Online Features
As much as this collection does right, it does plenty of things wrong, too. What the MCC has going for it is that half of its core works, and it works really well. The solo campaigns play almost flawlessly, and so far are subject to the same occasional hiccups and bugs that plague titles which have been available for years. In this respect, the MCC delivers what it promised and then some (with remastered and updated visuals and audio). What it fails to deliver is in the other half of its core – online features and multiplayer.
For a game which ran a cinematic trailer riding partially on the massive success of Halo 2’s original multiplayer, it is almost comical how utterly broken the multiplayer functionality works upon release. Until 343i fixes this issue, players can expect to wait anywhere between five minutes to rapture o’clock to get into a match. I prefer big team battle, which contains maps and game types from all four titles. Since this game released, I have only been able to play one game in that playlist – CTF Gungooses on Bloodline, which was literally barrels of fun while it lasted. I decided to scale down my search results to team slayer, in the hopes of being able to find a game more easily. While I have gotten into more of those matches my total number of multiplayer matches online is less than twenty, and not for a lack of trying.
I was hoping these connectivity issues would be limited to engaging random strangers in battle, but that is sadly not the case. I attempted to join a friend for some campaign co-op. I have been able to join this friend for multiplayer experiences in games like Titanfall and Destiny, but for whatever reason, we were only able to join each other’s party for a few minutes at a time in the MCC, and never got into a game together. Being able to play some of my favorite titles with one of my friends was easily the most appealing aspects of the MCC to me, but until the connectivity issues are addressed, that feature is unavailable to myself and to other players who are looking for a similar experience. I sympathize with my fellow gamers who were hoping for other things from this collection; hopping into certain playlists with old friends to tear it up in BR Slayer, taking on the world in Rumble Pit, and so on.
The Halo 2 maps chosen for the Anniversary treatment by 343i look amazing and are fun to play. The online matchmaking system is nothing we haven’t seen before in older Halo titles, which makes it simple to navigate. That is, of course, assuming you ever get into a match. The lack of dedicated Halo: Combat Evolved servers at launch is a disappointment. There are few options which allow players to jump into a Halo 4 match, since it still has its own online support for the 360; the likely explanation as to why the Spartan Ops missions are not included with this Collection as well. The components of a powerful, engaging, and fun multiplayer experience are all there, but they failed to come together cohesively at launch.
Final Thoughts
The Master Chief Collection does some things right, and even does a few things very well. Where the Collection succeeds is in delivering the original solo campaign experiences and a nice amount of additional content. Where it fails is in delivering a comprehensive and accessible multiplayer experience and online functionality at launch, which is a glaring deficiency. While these issues will inevitably be patched and fixed, the MCC perpetuates the recent trend in the AAA games industry of releasing buggy, broken, and sometimes simply incomplete games at launch. I do not presume to speak for gamers everywhere, but had this Collection been delayed in order for 343i to discover and address these serious problems, it very likely would have been released to a much more positive reception.
Gamers are not unjustified in demanding a working product upon release, and for getting the product which was advertised to them. When these issues with the Collection are addressed and when everything operates the way it should have at launch, particularly with respect to online connectivity and multiplayer issues, this Collection will be a must have for any Xbox One owner – it may even warrant a new review of its content several months from now. Until then, if you haven’t already purchased it, you’re better off waiting until 343i fixes these issues to add it to your library.