Halo: Campaign Evolved - Review
Ever since the announcement of Halo: Campaign Evolved, I’ve only felt strange about it. After having played it, my thoughts couldn’t be more mixed. Halo as a franchise just cannot seem to catch a break. Ever since 343 Industries took over, there are as many fans of their titles as those who despise them. Not to mention it’s shall we say… polarizing television adaptation?
All in all, Halo fans (such as myself) need a win. Halo Infinite was admittedly a bit of a whimper as a whole when Master Chief needed a howl. Now with a full rebrand as Halo Studios, and they’ve gotta prove themselves to keep Halo in the conversations of gaming greats for decades to come. This is what led to switching graphical engines, and finally launching on PlayStation for the very first time. Though I know Sony is punching the air because they had to manufacture their competition’s game on physical discs.
Halo Studios’ first title is a full blown remake of 2001’s Halo: Combat Evolved (CE), titled Halo Campaign Evolved. CE means a lot to a lot of people, myself included. It was the first shooter I ever experienced on a computer. I have fond memories of being in the computer lab in high school rushing to finish the assignment so my friends and I can download an 80 MB compressed version of Custom Edition to play Battle Creek Slayer at 20 FPS.
While overall there is absolutely fun to be had with Halo: Campaign Evolved, that’s because it’s simply Halo again. Only now you have to deal with playing it on Unreal Engine 5, three words that admittedly immediately drive me up the wall. Ultimately, all Campaign Evolved does is serve as a test run for how Halo will look and feel on this new engine going forward. I did enjoy myself more than I anticipated, however I can’t say I’m exactly thrilled about Halo’s future.
Every developer and their mother is switching to Unreal Engine and I get it as it’s an engine most know how to program at this point. However, this means weaker GPUs with only 8 GBs of VRAM or less are going to suffer as this engine requires more power. Performance on previous generation cards such as the 3070 TI struggles to maintain at least 60 FPS without community mods and egregious upscaling. The game isn’t unplayable, but it does feature your fair share of UE5 headaches such as shader stuttering, blur, and potentially input latency via upscaling.
Despite a rocky swap in engines, this is still undoubtedly Halo and that is Campaign Evolved’s biggest strength. From the modern mechanics to the core visual identity, once I got into a flow state I basically couldn’t put the game down until I beat it in just a handful of sessions. Regardless of its shortcomings, mainly my disdain for UE5 and the quality of the prequel missions, there is a fun campaign here to blast through.
Optimization aside, the game does retain Halo’s vivid style. Despite the modern overhaul to both the gunplay and the visuals, it’s the age old expression of riding a bike. I know there are purists who will be up in arms about the addition of modern inclusions such as sprinting or zooming in. But this is meant to be a modern retreading of the game and it does stick to those guns. Once you get into a groove you just feel like a badass on the battlefield, as Master Chief should be.
Every weapon is more viable than ever. I love CE as much as the next guy, but let’s not pretend that its weapon sandbox is perfect. Especially where the Covenant’s weapons are concerned. Think about how many Needler shots it takes to explode and that’s if all the needles even track. Everything you pick up has a purpose, and that’s how Halo was always intended. I also appreciate the added accuracy for weapons such as the Assault Rifle, allowing you to perfectly headshot grunts without having to use the Magnum.
Personally though, this Magnum just doesn’t hit the same. It feels more like Halo 5’s magnum just with CE’s design and fire rate. But if this whole review was me nitpicking comparisons then this would be petty to read, and boring to write. At the same time, it’s difficult to really say too much because at the end of the day, you are just getting another way to play Combat Evolved. At the end of the day, it is just Halo again. Though, I don’t see people who didn’t like Halo before converting with this remake due to how similar it really is.
In terms of new content, well for starters there is no inclusion of Multiplayer whatsoever. I know this is “Campaign” Evolved but it’s still disappointing to have a Halo game without it. There isn’t even a firefight mode either. Instead what you get apart from horrific Master Chief skins are three missions that take place before the main story. Now in concept that sounds great, in execution these missions could’ve been forgotten.
For starters, they treat the first two missions as a pseudo firefight mode as you’re just locked in rooms forced to survive. Not to mention every Covenant room you travel to looks the same. The balancing is all out of whack too with enemies being tankier than ever forcing the Needle Rifle as the mainstay in your arsenal. Then the third mission does open up a bit more allowing you to fight in not a damn corrodor for once. It even features a dogfight in space. Which, admittedly, is really cool though not as cool as Reach’s.
However, this is Halo Studios’ first crack at “new” Halo content with these three prequel missions and the quality is so inconsistent. The lacking level design at first and downright annoying characters such as Lieutenant Williams juxtaposed with the capability to create engaging combat environments later on frankly scares me for how erratic the quality is.
Halo: Campaign Evolved is at least available on Xbox Game Pass and is being sold for $50 instead of the coveted $70. If you never gave Halo a shot, I don’t see the harm in giving this a try as it is just Combat Evolved with an Unreal coat of paint. However, I do not see this taking over as the default way to experience the first Halo. At the same time, I am just happy to see Master Chief and hear Steve Downes’ beautiful voice yet again.
Halo: Campaign Evolved
Halo: Campaign Evolved works because it's Combat Evolved again. However, this evolution feels like one step forward and one step back.
