Halo: Master Chief Collection

[hitbyambulance]

finally not only on PC, but Steam as well (and not the Microsoft Store)

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/03/12 ... -and-steam

for $30, includes:
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary [Halo remastered]
Halo 2: Anniversary [Halo 2 remastered]
Halo 3 (+ ODST)
Halo 4
Halo: Reach

and LAN multiplayer!

[NickAragua]

If only I hadn't already played through all the Halo games multiple times on console. I'm not sure how I feel about playing Halo on the PC rather than my big screen TV.

That being said, the chances of me investing in an XBone are pretty minimal at this point, so it gives me hope that I'll see Halo Guardians on the PC some day. And maybe Halo Wars 2.

Edit: Check this out:

PC streaming to XBone

I guess that answers my instinctual dislike for playing Halo on a smaller PC screen.

[GreenGoo]

I find the idea of cooking Sims fascinating.

[morlac]

If only I hadn't already played through all the Halo games multiple times on console. I'm not sure how I feel about playing Halo on the PC rather than my big screen TV.

That being said, the chances of me investing in an XBone are pretty minimal at this point, so it gives me hope that I'll see Halo Guardians on the PC some day. And maybe Halo Wars 2.

Edit: Check this out:

PC streaming to XBone

I guess that answers my instinctual dislike for playing Halo on a smaller PC screen.

I picked up two steam Links for a whopping $10 this last year. Works like a champ but just plugging in my PC to my TV works as well

[hitbyambulance]

just released



and it's $40 now, not $30

[Blackhawk]

I just finished Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary from the Master Chief collection. I've got a lot of history with the series. I wrote the GameSpot strategy guide for this one when it first hit PC in 2003, then my kids were absolutely obsessed with everything Halo for years, leading me to playing it at least twice more with them (once on the XBox, once on the 360 when the remaster was first released.) This playthrough reminded me of a couple of things.

1. Halo was revolutionary and special for being a shooter that worked well on consoles. Someone finally got the controls right! It was never special for being a particularly good shooter. It is very, very repetitive with sequences of identical hallways leading to identical rooms, over and over, then reaching the end and going backwards through those same levels a second time. Fortunately, it launched a setting that has spawned a number of much better games (and I'm playing Halo 2 now.)

2. This was a great example of how not to do a remaster. They didn't just update the graphics, they completely changed the atmosphere of the game. It was particularly easy to see as you could swap between the original and updated graphics with a button press. The structures were originally presented as massive, solid, monolithic, ancient structures. They were imposing. When they remastered them, they didn't just clean up the textures, they fundamentally changed them. They took solid walls and added panels, lights, more panels, vents, more panels, more lighted vents, vented panels. It went from being imposing to looking visually cluttered. There were times that I couldn't find the doors because the visuals had become so busy that I couldn't tell it apart from the walls. They took transparent display screens and set them in front of walls that were cluttered to the point that you could no longer make out what was on the screens. It turned the ancient, cold feeling structures and made them feel like generic sci-fi industrial buildings. They even took the Covenant ships and removed most of the purple. That's a really iconic element!

And on top of the overblown textures and models, they severely changed the lighting. Halo originally had some really tense levels where you were making your way through dark alien complexes abandoned for millennia while grotesque creatures followed you. In the remaster they were all brightly and evenly lit. The dark swamp was brightly lit. The underground chambers were brightly lit. The original required regular use of the flashlight. in the remaster the atmosphere is compromised, and the sense of tension is gone. This further increases the repetitiveness by taking way the dark, foreboding levels that used to break up the bright, action-packed levels.

I finished it mostly because I'm wanting to play through the whole thing as a series for the first time.

[hitbyambulance]

i would probably switch to the old graphics while playing it...

[Sudy]

We had so much fun playing the original's local multiplayer on XBox at my friend's house. Not having an XBox, I remember salivating over the PC release and buying it off Ebay for nearly the retail price. I played that online probably more than any other shooter with the possible exception of Quake 2 & 3, Unreal Tournament, and modded Half-Life. What made Halo amazing to me were the vehicles. However, it never really seemed to have a great single-player campaign. I don't know if I ever finished it. The weapons and fighting non-humanoid enemies didn't feel "good". It wasn't impactful. That assault rifle felt like it was spitting pistachio shells across a football field.

I remember when Halo 2 was finally ported to Windows after everyone had given up hope.... I picked it up to play on a new PC build. It might have been a pack-in with my video card. I had a lot of fun with it again... the weapons and combat were improved. But I still wasn't driven to finish the campaign.

And then... that was it. Largely a Halo wasteland on PC until now. I'm intrigued, but kind of feel like there's too much native PC stuff I've skipped that I should play first.

[Blackhawk]

You aren't wrong, but FWIW, Halo was one of those rare games that actually managed to improve with every sequel, at least until after Reach (I barely remember 4, and didn't play 5.)

[Pyperkub]

We had so much fun playing the original's local multiplayer on XBox at my friend's house. Not having an XBox, I remember salivating over the PC release and buying it off Ebay for nearly the retail price. I played that online probably more than any other shooter with the possible exception of Quake 2 & 3, Unreal Tournament, and modded Half-Life. What made Halo amazing to me were the vehicles. However, it never really seemed to have a great single-player campaign. I don't know if I ever finished it. The weapons and fighting non-humanoid enemies didn't feel "good". It wasn't impactful. That assault rifle felt like it was spitting pistachio shells across a football field.

I remember when Halo 2 was finally ported to Windows after everyone had given up hope.... I picked it up to play on a new PC build. It might have been a pack-in with my video card. I had a lot of fun with it again... the weapons and combat were improved. But I still wasn't driven to finish the campaign.

And then... that was it. Largely a Halo wasteland on PC until now. I'm intrigued, but kind of feel like there's too much native PC stuff I've skipped that I should play first.

Yeah, I stopped the Halo 2 campaign around halfway through as well (HD/widescreen version on the 360, as I recall, but it may have been the original xBox).

I just started playing the Halo: CE (first Halo) in this collection on the xBox Series X (Gamepass FTW!) and it has been fun going back through the old levels in ~4k, tho a bit weird (e.g. the 1st sniper mission seemed a LOT easier not being on an SD screen. Also, the enemies seem easier (tho I have died 10 times apparently, once when I shot down a Wraith and it fell on me!).

[Sudy]

Oh man, I almost picked this up when it was 50% off on Steam a week or two ago. I have great memories, but I also know most of them were wrapped up in my friends and multiplayer, and there were always parts of the original's campaign that annoyed me. I want to play the newer games, but I'd also want to start from the beginning. And I'm sure it doesn't even hold up quite as well as I remember. Also, I have so many other FPS in my backlog I haven't even touched.