Halo: Campaign Evolved

For reference, I have been a Halo fan since the start, and I'm kind of a Halo lore nerd, but I'm not one of those people who has made hating 343/Halo Studios/Microsoft a significant part of their fan personality. So, take that as you will. My top level, tldr thesis statement would have to be: firmly mid, really hard to recommend when the Master Chief Collection is right there. There are some things I think are cool or interesting, but those things don't outweigh the things that irked me. But, you do have to take into account that I have a lot of time in the original games, and because of all that experience and time, it's impossible for me to separate the two. Truthfully, I think a lot of my issues won't be noticed by the casual player, and that's totally okay. Who is this game for? I think it's for either the people who have never played Halo CE before, or were very casual about it. I think those people would genuinely enjoy the experience. I still think that if you have access to the MCC, that would be your best option. But if you don't for some reason, like a PS5 player with no PC/Steam access, I think that's really the only people who benefit from this "remaster" experience. Please keep in mind that everything I have said, and am saying below, is entirely subjective. YMMV. The Good: - Sure, it looks good. Personally I don't need ultra shiny graphics and hyper realistic water, but overall I can't say it looks bad. - Some interesting lore updates, folding in some concepts that were introduced later in the series in a way that, IMO, makes sense. Can't say too much without spoilers, though. - Some changes to some maps that I thought were neat. Visually I appreciate the updates to the warthog run on The Maw. I also appreciate the visual updates to The Library, and the sense of increasing infestation regarding the Flood levels. - Bringing in some modern gaming features and some weapons from other Halo games was generally appreciated. The Bad: - Questionable voice direction given to the voice actors. Tone seemed off for the situation at hand during some moments. I know the voice actors are capable, so I don't know what happened here. - Dialog also got very repetitive in some moments, punishing sense of exploration. Trying to explore Truth And Reconciliation? Too bad, Cortana needs to remind you every 2 minutes that you're looking for Keyes, using the same canned line each time. - Overall lack of "spirit of exploration" that was present in original CE and Bungie-era Halo games. If you see a rock that's a little out of the way that looks like you can grenade jump onto it, no you can't. There's a death wall there. - The combat AI felt stupid at times? Multiple instances of banshees flying into walls and getting stuck there. - The marine AI also is a little stupid, they struggle to get into vehicles sometimes. - Marines don't drive vehicles anymore. At least not in my game. This was disappointing. Part of the original CE's charm for me was Marines doing their own thing rather than everyone waiting on you all the time for everything, particularly on levels like Assault on the Control Room. It made the game feel a little more alive. - Some weird physics stuff happens once in a while. A few times, my vehicle would just get launched backwards or sideways, with no obvious cause. - Weird little moments that felt like a lack of polish. On their own I could easily write them off, but on top of everything else it just kept poking at me. Things like supplies floating a foot off the ground, Marines holding SMGs with their hands placed incorrectly (one hand too far forward and floating, like they were holding an Assault Rifle), etc. The Meh: - I know there's been some complaints about the cutscenes. Personally I don't have as much of an issue with them. I like a lot of the body language in those scenes. I will agree that the faces fall into uncanny territory sometimes, though. - Vehicle handling has also come up a few times and I do think it is distinctly different from original CE or really any other Halo game to date, but you can get used to it. - Vehicle hijacking is restricted on some levels. That's all I can think of right now. Once again, overall, while I'm glad I played it for a couple of interesting lore stuff, I can't really recommend it. Just go grab the MCC if you haven't already. Original CE is still a pretty good game. Plus you'll get a bunch more Halo.

The game has broken rebind controls.

muddy graphics and runs like sh*t

Honnêtement, avec ma config, je n'ai pas eu de bugs comme le dise d'autres personnes (Chance ?). Je mets un avis négatif, car pour moi le bilan est mitigé. En sois, le jeu en lui même est très bien. La refonte des horribles niveaux "Bibliothèque" est "Keyes" est franchement réussie. La refonte de "La panse" pour le côté cohérence du level design est géniale. Le jeu est beau, l'UE5 sublime les paysages iconiques qui ont bercé notre enfance. Petit bémol pour les visages, mais j'ai toujours trouvé UE très mauvais sur ça, donc on ne peut pas faire de miracles non plus). Ce n'est que mon avis, mais les jeux fait sur UE commencent de plus en plus à me sortir par les yeux : l'optimisation visuelle pas terrible, cachée par du flou de mouvement granuleux absolument immonde... Fort heureusement comme dit précédemment, l'univers et la DA d'Halo est assez unique pour faire passer la pilule, et le moteur fait du très bon travail sur les environnement. En termes de sound design, c'est clean, mais fainéant : réutilisation des sons des anciens jeux (armes, vehicules,...), les musiques originales ont été conservées sans aucune retouche (sauf pour les 3 missions supplémentaires qui font appel à la BO des anciens jeux), ce qui est tantôt sympa, tantôt dommage car on aurait pu avoir un vrai parti prix de réenregistrer les musiques pour qu'elles sonnes un peu plus actuelles et sans dénaturer les compositions originales de Martin O'Donnell. Par contre, le gros point noir, c'est ce dont tout le monde parle : La VF. Le fait que ça ne soit pas les comédiens originaux, ça fait très mal, mais j'aurais pu l'accepter si les nouveaux comédiens avaient été à la hauteur. Problème : C'est une véritable catastrophe, tout est mauvais. J'ai le sentiment que Microsoft (oui car ça m'étonnerait que le problème vienne d'Halo Studio, même s'ils auraient pu se battre un minimum) en a strictement rien à foutre de la communauté française du jeu : Même les traductions/sous titres sont à la ramasse, faits sans le moindre effort. Deuxième point noir, le prix. Disons qu'à 59.99€ le jeu (ou plutôt la campagne SEULEMENT et c'est franchement dommage car l'UE aurait pu faire des merveilles avec les maps multijoueur), c'est du foutage de gueule de ne pas avoir une VF à la hauteur, peu de contenu, et d'avoir quelques bugs très gênant : Sachez que si vous êtes sur clavier, la réattribution des touches n'est pas sauvegardée. Vous devrais la refaire SYSTÉMATIQUEMENT en lançant le jeu. Ce qui prouve bien que les Français sont clairement mis de côté (ils sembleraient que Microsoft soit fâché avec l'AZERTY...). Troisième point noir : Les trois missions préquels sont pas mal (pas exceptionnelles mais sympa), mais n'apportent absolument RIEN à l'histoire principale. La mission avec la bataille spatiale aurait pu être plus spectaculaire comme l'était "Longue nuit de réconfort dans Halo REACH), mais trop peu d'ennemis, trop peu d'envergure par rapport à l'histoire qui est racontée dans ce préquel. Si les trois points noirs cités n'étaient pas présent, ça aurait pu être un EXCELLENT remake. J'ai tout de même passé un bon moment plein de nostalgie, mais bon, il y a des choses qui sont impardonnables et qui font que mon avis est négatif. Je reste tout de même curieux vis à vis d'un remake du deuxième opus (et sûrement d'un troisième), en espérant que l'avalanche d'avis négatifs va faire réagir un minimum Microsoft, qui semble de plus en plus en difficulté (quand on est fainéant et qu'on fait les mauvais choix, on en paie le prix). Enfin, je tiens quand même à soulever un point qui selon moi est très positif. La licence Halo était en train de mourir, et selon moi le choix d'ouvrir Halo à la communauté PlayStation est une bonne idée, bien que visiblement les chiffres ne sont pas au rendez vous. C'était nécessaire pour pouvoir ouvrir la licence à un autre public, et peut être pour la sauver. En espérant que le prochain opus (remake / spin off / suite) puisse faire de meilleures ventes. Cet avis est susceptible d'évoluer, on verra dans le futur si des patch vont corriger les points négatifs que j'ai mentionné. https://www.change.org/p/sauvons-la-vf-de-halo

Gameplay and Graphics are good I cant hate. But is it really worth paying full retail price of a brand new game for a second remaster of a 20+ year old game? No. Especially when you remember that Halo was hijacked by a bunch of woke theater kids, who made the game less about the things that made Halo cool, and more about pushing an agenda that back fired in the most spectacular way. Hence why they had to rebrand themselves from 343 to Halo Studios. It's almost like they realized that nobody cares about their idiotic virtue signaling when they were shoving minority armor sets down our throats in Halo infinite, and were like. "Hey guys we're totally not trying to brainwash new halo fans into voting Democrat, and to prove it we are going to resell the same story that you already paid to experience twice. Only this time Sgt Johnson is actually going to be played by a black guy. Isn't that awesome?!" No it's not. Nobody gave a ♥♥♥♥ then. Nobody gives a ♥♥♥♥ now.

If you don't have MCC get that before this. The only compelling reason to get this is the updated graphics and improved levels. Its like it wasn't quite done or polished before they released it, but if you enjoyed the original or haven't played CE then you'll like this. PREQUEL MISSIONS SUCK and too many people are mad at the state of Halo, causing them to complain about any little thing they don't like about it.

It's clear that a lot of work was put into this remake, but at the end of the day, it does enough things wrong that it's difficult to recommend. Some divergences from the original game (like the changes to the Warthog Run) work very well, but most of what this remake does well comes from what it retains from the original. 1. The voice acting (in English) is substantially worse than the original game. I switched to Japanese; I simply couldn't bear it. 2. The sound design is substantially worse than the original game. The pistol and sniper rifle sounded and felt so amazing before; why downgrade them so much in the remake? 3. The AI and general interaction with the enemies is bizarre. The enemies are frequently completely blockheaded and don't react to you. Other times, they come out of nowhere and instantly kill you. The elite jab melee attack makes close quarters combat with enemies much less fun. Getting one-hit-killed by hunters or the large flood forms on legendary is frustrating and unsatisfying (almost no feedback). 4. There are WAY too many enemies (on legendary at least). Sometimes the enemies feel endless, and combined with them just running me down constantly, it's frustrating (especially combined with the extremely unsatisfying melee combat). 5. Playing against the flood was actually fun in this game, mostly because their melee attacks aren't totally over-powered. 6. The level design is as good as you can expect when a level has to be designed both with and without sprint (i.e., it's pretty bad). They should have just left sprint out. With sprint, you can run past everyone most of the time. Without it, on Keyes, you're basically toast. This game is also buggy enough to be a problem. I was at least able to complete the game, but grenades constantly fell out of the map / didn't detonate, and I accidentally triggered always-on night-vision that I didn't know how to turn off. Sometimes, when I die, all the enemies disappear, and so does Chief. Enemies getting launched from a plasma pistol overcharge was also annoying. And sometimes enemies would spawn *directly behind me*. What?! Seriously, did anyone actually test this game? All that being said, the main problem with this game is that they didn't seem to master the "30 seconds of fun" that was key to the original game. I think anyone who has played the original will understand what I mean. So many people were working on this game, yet the core gameplay loop just doesn't feel right. So yeah, just play the original game, it's actually fun.

Où est la vraie VF, il faut que Microsoft arrêtes ses conneries avec l'IA et vite !