Halo The Master Chief Collection Review
First published on the Galleon (Portsmouth University’s Student newspaper) on 18th December 2014. Included here for completion.
The Master Chief Collection includes four incredible games, a live-action show produced by Ridley Scott and access to the Halo 5: Guardians multiplayer beta. One thing becomes apparent very quickly: this collection is incredible value for money and a must-have for owners of the Xbox One.
First up, let’s talk about the campaigns: Halo 1-4 sport some of the greatest moments that gaming can offer. The stories are deep and intriguing and feature incredible characters. For those who want more, each game has hidden terminals that fill you in on lore and backstories. The gameplay varies between each game, making every experience something new and refreshing. Halo 1 plays more like an old-school shooter like Doom, whereas Halo 4 plays like a very refined modern title. Being able to experience the development of the FPS genre on one disc is an amazing experience.
The campaigns also have some of the greatest music composed in the gaming genre with the Halo 4’s soundtrack somewhat lagging behind the others. Special mention needs to be made to Halo 1and Halo 2 which have both received special anniversary treatment meaning their scores, sound and graphics have been updated. This can instantly be swapped back and forth between the original and remastered modes with the press of a button.
This unique feature sets Halo apart from the numerous other re-releases that have slowly saturated the gaming market over the past few years. The campaigns are also highly replayable with secrets and easter eggs to be found, high scores and speed runs to be set, a 4500 GamerScore to earn and a wealth of skulls to activate that add modifications to the gameplay. It’s also worthy of mention that each game supports co-op both online and split-screen. The multi-player also supports four-player local split-screen and the customization options are incredibly in depth. Forge mode is also available for the remastered Halo 2 maps and Halo 3 and 4, which allows players to modify maps or even create their own.
The collection also features over 100 multi-player maps, with each game’s multi-player being fully playable online. Swapping from the different modes is an incredibly fun experience; it’s just a shame that at launch the online matchmaking was awful, taking over 15 minutes to sometimes find a game which would often then be laggy or buggy. At the time of writing, most of the issues have been resolved but the launch of the game will go down as one of the worst gaming has ever seen, with multiple updates needed to finally get the game to an acceptable standard.
Halo: The Master Chief Collection serves as a love letter to existing Halo fans but doesn’t offer them much in the way of new content. However, it acts as the perfect starting point for new fans to the series, and should not be missed by anyone who owns an Xbox One.