We have a brief guide for what awaits you in Halo: The Master Chief Collection.
First off, the collection only has games with Master Chief in it. Namely, these are Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3, and Halo 4. You also get Halo Nightfall, the Ridley Scott-produced series focusing on Agent Locke, and the multiplayer beta for Halo 5: Guardians.
The devil is in the details, of course. What’s changed and what’s new? We’ll keep it simple for you here.
The games are, for the most part, kept separate from each other. There is a universal ranking for the purposes of matchmaking and bragging rights. There is also a maximum 4,000 Gamerscore you can accumulate from the collection’s achievements.
The games are, of course, receiving fresh remasters, improving lighting and hitting performance goals of 1080p 60FPS. Otherwise, the games have been preserved to the original as close as possible. All the maps and content will be there and unlocked from the start so you can jump into any map you want at anytime. Microsoft added the option to show classic and remastered graphics at any time for your enjoyment.
This also means they didn’t force the games into an overarching narrative. Each game is its own thing, but there will be a prologue cinematic, and a planned epilogue for the campaign side. All games have online coop as well.
For multiplayer, you won’t be getting ultimate mashups, since they don’t work. Instead, there will be mixed playlists, using maps from different games. Microsoft has some ideas on this end, including making Warthog themed playlists and things like that. Microsoft recognizes these playlists are make-or-break for multiplayer.
Finally, if you owned the previous games, unfortunately, there is no cross-platform play available. Microsoft is exploring discounts, so you can be hopeful on that end.
Need even more details? You can go through a more thorough guide here.
Halo: The Master Chief Collection is coming November 11 exclusively to the Xbox One.