XBOX REVIEW | Halo: Campaign Evolved

I’ve been a Halo fan since the original one launched back in 2001. My friend Gareth and I would hang out every Saturday at the shopping mall, head to our local game store and play on the demo booth for hours until we got kicked out. I was thirteen at the time, and because I didn’t have a job, buying an Xbox with Halo just wasn’t on the cards. So each Saturday like clockwork, we repeated the process until it became muscle memory. Eventually, I did manage to get an Xbox and some of my fondest memories growing up was taking it around to his house and playing all night completing the game over and over again.

Here we are, twenty five years later, and Halo is back with Halo Studios remaking the first game in the series with Campaign Evolved. An absolutely gorgeous looking game. Xbox Game Studios have pulled all the punches and remade one of the closest games to my heart. But how does it stack up to the original?

Things I liked!

• The Music | Expecting to hear remade versions of the classic Halo symphony? Well, you got it! The series’ legendary music has been beautifully reinvented with the power and scale of a full orchestra. Every familiar melody carries far more weight, making even the quietest moments feel grand and atmospheric. When the score truly kicks into gear, it delivers that unmistakable rush of excitement that only Halo’s music can provide. It honors everything that made the original soundtrack iconic while giving it the spectacular modern treatment it deserves.

• The Gunplay | Halo: Campaign Evolved features a huge variety of weapons, giving you plenty of different ways to tear through the Covenant. Every weapon feels distinct, from the satisfying punch of the UNSC assault rifle to the colourful chaos of the Needler. The gunplay is incredibly responsive, with tight aiming, impactful sound design and enemies that react convincingly to every shot.
  
  Constantly switching weapons as ammunition runs dry keeps encounters fast, frantic and wonderfully unpredictable. Covenant weapons are just as enjoyable to use, making it genuinely exciting whenever something powerful drops onto the battlefield. Altogether, the excellent weapon variety and fantastic gunplay ensure that combat rarely loses its spark.
  
  
• Nostalgia Blast | Halo: Campaign Evolved is absolutely overflowing with nostalgia, bringing back countless locations, encounters and moments that fans will remember fondly. Seeing these iconic environments rebuilt in Unreal Engine 5 is genuinely breathtaking, with spectacular lighting and incredible detail giving the entire campaign a fresh sense of life. Despite the enormous visual upgrade, the world still feels unmistakably like the Halo we fell in love with all those years ago.
  
  Familiar sights regularly trigger that wonderful feeling of remembering exactly where you were when you first experienced them. There is something incredibly special about revisiting such an important piece of gaming history in all its modern-day gorgeousness. For longtime fans, it feels like coming home, only this time, everything looks better than we could ever have imagined.
  
  
• Updated Level Design | The level design has also received several subtle but meaningful changes to bring the campaign into the modern age. Environments now offer greater verticality, creating more opportunities to gain the high ground and approach encounters from different angles. Additional terrain and environmental set pieces provide plenty of natural cover during firefights, making combat spaces feel more considered and dynamic.
  
  Some areas have also been opened up considerably, giving you far more freedom to explore and manoeuvre around the battlefield. This extra space is especially welcome when driving vehicles, allowing you to tear across the landscape without constantly fighting against narrow paths. Crucially, these changes enhance the original design without stripping away the identity of the levels fans remember.
  
  
• Online Co-op | The entire campaign can also be enjoyed cooperatively, whether you prefer playing online or sharing the same screen through traditional couch co-op. Online multiplayer makes it easy to join forces with a friend and battle through the Covenant together, even when you are miles apart. However, the inclusion of split-screen co-op is especially welcome at a time when so many modern games have abandoned it entirely. Sitting beside someone and experiencing the campaign together captures the social magic that helped make Halo so beloved in the first place. Whichever option you choose, having another Spartan by your side makes every firefight, vehicle section and accidental betrayal that much more entertaining.
  
  
• Campaign Remix | Campaign Remix adds even more replay value by transforming completed missions into unpredictable new experiences. Enemy spawns and weapon pickups are randomized, forcing you to adapt rather than simply rely on your knowledge of the original encounters. Active modifiers can change the rules even further, creating moments that range from intensely challenging to completely chaotic.
  
  You never quite know what the next area will throw at you, which helps familiar missions feel surprisingly fresh. It is a fantastic reward for progressing through the campaign and offers fans a compelling reason to revisit missions long after the credits have rolled.
  
  
• Utterly Gorgeous | Halo Campaign Evolved is by far the best-looking game in the franchise. The team at Halo studios have moved away from their in-house engine, and have instead opted to use the full feature set of Unreal Engine 5. While some people may not like that, the game looks amazing, and so much love and care has gone into making it look fantastic. Even with Unreal Engine’s heavy workload, “mega lights”, Halo manages to run well and look great at the same time.
  
  Weather effects look realistic, and lighting throughout is phenomenal. Light cascades through all areas of the environment creating a realistic set in which the game takes place. Reflections on shiny surfaces also look properly diffused, with shadows also creating some intense-looking scenes, especially when the Flood are introduced. Cutscenes are well presented with cinematography and lighting making it look like you are watching a movie. Graphically, I haven’t seen anything else look as impressive as this in a long time. I even love how Halo Studios managed to make it not look like a typical Unreal Engine game.

Mixed & disliked!

• No Multiplayer Death Matches | Unfortunately, Halo: Campaign Evolved does not include any form of online competitive multiplayer. That means there are no traditional Team Deathmatch battles, Capture the Flag contests, King of the Hill matches or any of the other modes that helped define Halo’s multiplayer legacy. While the campaign and its cooperative options provide plenty of entertainment, the absence of competitive play leaves the overall package feeling somewhat incomplete.
  
  Halo has always been just as much about battling other Spartans as it is about fighting the Covenant, so its omission is difficult to ignore. It is genuinely sad to see such an important part of the Halo experience missing from an otherwise lovingly remade classic.

• How long did I play the review before publishing? 8 hours
• How long to beat the story? 8 Hours
• How many Achievements did I earn before publishing? 20/58
• How long to get 100%? | 20 hours
• You’ll love this game if you like these | Halo the Master chief Collection, Destiny 2, DOOM

Score: 90/100

Halo: Campaign Evolved beautifully modernises a legendary campaign with stunning visuals, fantastic gunplay, refined level design, co-op options and plenty of nostalgia. Despite the disappointing absence of competitive multiplayer, this exceptional remake demands your attention.

Aaron

Gaming is in my blood.  Be it handheld games, Xbox, PC, Switch or Playstation, I am all over it.
I make my own games as part of my profession and love playing co op games with friends in my spare time. Avid dog lover and camper van enthusiast.