Halo: The Master Chief Collection Review

Master Chief's adventures first started in 2001 with the release of Halo: Combat Evolved. Fast forward more than a decade and Halo has become the poster boy for Xbox exclusives. With the start of a new generation in Xbox One, it's possible that new adopters may not have experienced a Halo game before, and with Halo 5: Guardians due out next year exclusively for Xbox One, The Master Chief Collection presents a great way for gamers to get acquainted with the legendary Spartan, Master Chief.

The best thing about Halo: The Master Chief Collection is that it offers you the full campaign experience of each core Halo title (Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3, and Halo 4) without any sort of barriers. From the start, every mission from each game is unlocked and available to play. There’s no first having to beat Halo: Combat Evolved before playing Halo 2, or any other type of mission-gating. You are completely free to play what you want, when you want, and it’s all presented to you in a clear, simple-to-use navigation menu. I will recommend, however, that first-timers play the campaign in the order that it was released as the story can get pretty confusing if you jump around.

The Master Chief Collection is more than just a collection of Master Chief’s adventures, though. Improvements have been made on each of the games included. 2001’s Halo: Combat Evolved, which was remastered originally for Xbox 360 in 2011, has once again been enhanced for its debut on Xbox One, running in 1080p at 60fps. What’s neat is that you are able to switch between the original graphics and improved anniversary graphics and remastered audio on-the-fly. It’s pretty amazing how far games have come since 2001, and it was a pleasant surprise to replay the game I had spent so much time with as a kid.

While it’s nice to see Halo 3 and Halo 4 both updated for Xbox One, running in 1080p at 60fps — with improved lighting effects and graphics — Halo 2: Anniversary is definitely the crowning jewel of The Master Chief Collection, if only because it has received the most improvements. Like all the others, Halo 2: Anniversary offers the full original campaign, but it also features almost a full hour of reimagined cinematics from Blur Studio — and they are stunning. I don’t think it necessarily adds any more to the plot, but the visuals that Blur have created are simply magnificent. Like Combat Evolved Anniversary, you are also able to toggle between the classic and remastered graphics and audio on-the-fly, which is cool to see how far we’ve come since 2004.

Even with the improvements made graphically, each individual game in The Master Chief Collection still plays as though you were playing the original. It's funny because replaying Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2 really reminded me of how far the series has come since 2001. Sure, the story is great, but some of the character acting — particularly line delivery — is pretty brutal. The mechanics, particularly in the first two games, are also pretty outdated, but it's still fun to replay the games as though you were playing the original.

For fans looking to dive into the epic story of Halo for the first time, or even refresh themselves in anticipation of 2015’s Halo 5: Guardians, The Master Chief Collection is undoubtedly the easiest and best way to do so. In addition to offering the complete story of Halo’s legendary hero for the first time on one console, there’s also additional features that help set the stage for Halo 5.

Halo: Nightfall, included for free on-disc, is a digital series created i ncollaboration with Ridley Scott’s Scott Free productions. It’s a miniseries that tells the story of a group of operatives from the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI), tasked with investigating and halting a nascent terrorist threat, whose deadly secret is hidden on a damaged fragment of the Halo ring itself. The show features a new character by the name of Agent Locke, who will debut in Halo 5: Guardians. Unfortunately, the show doesn’t premiere until November 11, 2014, so I can’t offer my full opinion on it just yet.

Also included as a special feature is a curated collection of Halo’s Terminals — a collection of story-driven content previously hidden as Easter Eggs within the games. While you can still find these terminals within the game, they are now all readily available to be watched at your leisure. These stories compliment the main fiction, and also included are a direct link to the Halo 2: Anniversary making-off documentary, as well as all of the new Blur Studio cinematics from Halo 2: Anniversary.

When it comes to the single-player campaign of Halo, The Master Chief Collection is the most accessible, most complete collection available. Nothing will prepare you for Halo 5 better than this. The ease at which you can play everything and the simplicity in which the campaigns are presented — allowing you to play any mission in any order, at your leisure — is what makes The Master Chief Collection such a great addition to the Xbox One. Of course, the graphical updates, additional content, and 450+ Achievements are also nice. Even if you’ve fully completed the previous Halo games, working to earn an additional 4500 Gamerscore is a worthy challenge.

If you’re wondering why I have yet to talk about multiplayer, it’s because 343 Industries is conducting online play sessions in timeslots and I’ve yet to play it. In all likelihood, I’d like to wait until the game’s launch so I can properly review the quality of competitive multiplayer when the masses get their hands on it (because we all know online gaming experiences can be a totally different experience when millions are playing as opposed to a select few reviewers).

But while I can’t give you my impressions of the quality of multiplayer, I can at least discuss what Halo: The Master Chief Collection offers to players — more than 100 multiplayer and Spartan Ops maps taken from across all four of the Halo titles, running on their original multiplayer engines. Once again, the way in which multiplayer is presented allows for unprecedented choice in how you experience Halo’s multiplayer. The easily navigable Master Menu offers curated playlists of fan-favorite Halo multiplayer maps and game types, and though matchmaking was down for me, it looks fairly easy to select the multiplayer experience your most interested in.

Some particularly noteworthy multiplayer components include Halo: Combat Evolved maps playable on Xbox LIVE for the first time. What’s also nice is that instead of replicating classic multiplayer maps in the Halo: Reach Engine, as 343 did in Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, they’ve instead included the entire original Halo: Combat Evolved multiplayer map and feature set, including maps that appeared in the PC version of the game.

All 25 original Halo 2 multiplayer maps are also included, plus 6 completely re-imagined maps, as well as each map from Halo 3 and Halo 4. Other multiplayer components like Spartan Ops co-op, the Forge level creation and editing tool, and Theatre mode are all also included. And for those who purchased The Master Chief Collection just to taste the multiplayer of Halo 5: Guardians, you’ll be the first to experience the game when the beta unlocks later this year.

Customizing your Spartan varies by game, and to simplify things, 343 industries has created a top-level tool that allows you to customize your character from a central UI. The customization features you can choose from depends on the game, but you can select armor, gender, color, and species (in the case Halo 2 and Halo 2: Anniversary). For Halo 4, you can also select and modify your weapon and equipment loadouts from the Options and Careers screen. Located deeper within this menu, you can find a Player ID section where you can change your emblem colors, avatar, service ID, clan tag, and nameplate. Again, it’s all very straightforward stuff and very easy to understand and navigate.

To help keep track of all of your progress across all four games, there’s a Career tab where you can view your campaign and multiplayer stats, achievements and progress. Also in this Options and Career tab are leaderboards where you can track your solo and co-op scoring and speed runs for all campaign missions.

With more than ten years worth of Halo content offered on one disc, The Master Chief Collection is one of the most robust curations I’ve ever seen. Not only does it offer you just about everything you could possibly want from Halo, but it does so on your terms, via a simplified navigation menu in which you are free to decide what to play. The freedom in which you can experience Master Chief’s adventures is what I found most appealing with The Master Chief Collection, and the ease and accessibility was just icing on the cake. Sadly, most of my gameplay experience was limited to the single-player campaign — which isn’t too bad considering how epic Master Chief’s adventures are — but I wouldn’t feel comfortable assigning a score until I get the full experience with multiplayer, so check back later for my thoughts and impressions on multiplayer.