Ever since Halo: Campaign Evolved was announced, I’ve been thinking about what’s next for Halo as a franchise. There’s the high-level stuff, like the long-rumored multiplayer-only game or a brand-new Halo title that features both a robust campaign and sizeable multiplayer offerings. That said, there are some smaller-scale steps Halo Studios could take to regain some goodwill.
One of those things would be finally porting Halo 5: Guardians to PC. Over a decade after its initial release, Halo 5 is the only game in the series that’s still Xbox console exclusive. It didn’t even receive an Xbox Series X remaster like many other Xbox One titles. Although Halo Studios might want to forget about this game because of how controversial it was, Halo 5 does deserve to be brought over to PC as part of this new era for the franchise being kicked off by Halo: Campaign Evolved.
A look back at Halo 5, 10 years later
A controversial, but important game in the franchise
Halo Studios, formerly known as 343 Productions, has struggled to get Halo quite right since taking the reins from Bungie. Halo 4, The Master Chief Collection, Halo 5, and Halo Infinite have all received backlash in different ways, but Halo 5 definitely received the worst of it. That mostly comes from how the game handled its campaign.
Ahead of its release, it seemed like this game could have the best Halo campaign yet, as Master Chief is being hunted down by his former allies. While that is technically what Halo 5 is about, what we actually got was a lot less intriguing as that premise wasn’t as satisfyingly seen through as the pre-release marketing suggested it would be. Most of the game follows characters not nearly as compelling as Master Chief and Cortana, and the campaign level design itself just isn’t as good as previous games in the series.
That, alongside some changes to game feel in multiplayer, has made Halo 5 a bit of a black sheep within the wider Halo series in the decade since its release. That’s not helped by the fact that The Master Chief Collection made a resounding recovery, and that it and Halo Infinite have found stable, if occasionally troubled, communities across Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. In comparison, Halo 5 is mostly forgotten about outside of the occasional Reddit post.
Enough time has passed that I think it’s worth reassessing Halo 5. It’s nowhere near the best Halo game, but some people may like it more if they approach it with a fresh perspective, not one informed by marketing. It’s also going to be a part of a series-wide revisit that many people, myself included, will likely do after the launch of Halo: Campaign Evolved. That’s why it’s so inconvenient that it’s still exclusive to Xbox consoles.
The least widely available of the Halo games
It’s not available outside of Xbox games
Halo Studios even released the video above to celebrate Halo 5’s tenth anniversary last month, but no ports were announced alongside it. That means you still need to buy an Xbox One, Series S, or Series X console in order to play Halo 5 at a time when Microsoft is giving you reasons not to do so. Oddly, the only Halo 5-related thing that ever came to PC was its Forge tool in 2016.
In retrospect, it’s quite baffling that the game itself didn’t come to PC around the same time, especially considering that was right around when Xbox’s Play Anywhere initiative was ramping up. Xbox’s console-to-PC compatibility requirements for Play Anywhere are one of the main reasons why the rest of the franchise is easily playable on PC.
Currently, Microsoft is fully embracing its multiplatform approach. Games like Ninja Gaiden 4 and The Outer Worlds 2 launched day-and-date on PS5, as will Halo: Campaign Evolved next year. At the same time, it’s continuing to bring all of its games to PC with Xbox Play Anywhere support. It’s pretty awesome to be able to revisit a big chunk of the franchise through The Master Chief Collection on PC, but Halo 5 is the only pre-Infinite shooter that’s not a part of that collection.
Ultimately, it seems like Halo 5 fell through the cracks in that mix. Unlike Gears of War 4, which came out just a few months after it, the game never came to PC. Despite Xbox’s efforts to make all of its games as widely available as possible in the years since, it has just never been revisited to give that treatment. Perhaps that’s because its so controversial, or maybe it’s because other titles are just a higher priority for Microsoft. Regardless, its lack of a PC presence is frustrating.
Halo 5: Guardians deserves to be available on PC
If Halo: Campaign Evolved is on PC and PS5, why can’t it be?
A decade on from its original release, Halo 5 remains a controversial piece of the series’ history. That said, even games that aren’t beloved deserve to be preserved and made as widely available as possible. Halo Studios has been great about expanding the Halo franchise’s availability on platforms like PC and PS5, but Halo 5 does not currently seem to be part of those plans.
Still, I think all games within the Halo franchise deserve to be easily accessible to anyone interested in checking them out. At some point between Halo: Campaign Evolved and whatever else comes next from this iconic Xbox series, I hope Halo Studios takes the time to bring Halo 5 to PC, whether that’s as a remake, a remaster that’s part of The Master Chief Collection, or just a simple port.
After Halo: Campaign Evolved, this controversial Xbox One exclusive needs to come to PC
