JANUARY 2020 PCWorld 37setup, the
colorful
comrades-in-
arms, it’s all very
different at least.
Ambitious
too, and it’s easy
to draw a line
between the
more sprawling
environments of
Reach and what Bungie did next with Destiny.
Reach is more primitive of course, and suffers
from some strange pacing and repetitive
objectives as a result, but it’s still a pretty neat
capstone to the Halo-that-Bungie-built.
Plus, that ending. I’m excited to see it again.
GET ME THOMAS THE TANK
ENGINE
I’m also excited to see what happens with the
mod community. Aside from mouse-and-
keyboard controls, that’s the best reason to
play on PC.
343’s facilitated mod support by providing
two different launch options for The Master
Chief Collection. The default includes anti-
cheat measures to try and ensure the integrity
of the multiplayer experience. You can also
launch the game with anti-cheat disabled
though, which disables achievements but
allows you to do pretty much whatever you’d
like outside of matchmaking.
It’s not quite seamless, as you’ll need to
restore the unmodded file directory to access
matchmaking again if you changed anything.
343’s said it’s working on a more elegant
solution (go.pcworld.com/eleg) for the
future, and official mod tools as well. Still,
this is a good start.BOTTOM LINE
Nostalgia will probably carry Halo: Reach
and the rest of The Master Chief Collection even
if the ports aren’t great. That’s the short of it. I’m
hoping 343 can fix some of my issues,
especially with the controls, but it’s a faint hope.
As I said, 343 ran a multitude of beta tests this
year, enough to delay the release by six months
or so. The fact that these problems weren’t
ironed out makes me worried they can’t be.
Just keep it in mind, that’s all. There are a
lot of caveats at the moment. But hey, it’s Halo
on PC right? The original Halo is reputedly
due in early 2020, with the rest of The Master
Chief Collection to follow throughout the year.
See you in Zanzibar.