Halo: Campaign Evolved Early Access Review: The Game I Remembered, Behind a Login Screen

The campaign that built a generation of Halo fans is back — and on PC, it spends the first hour fighting you.

By Dom Lee, Staff Writer

I have history with this campaign. Staying up too late with my brothers, racing a Warthog through the Pillar of Autumn, dreading 343 Guilty Spark on Legendary at ten years old. Campaign Evolved is a remake of the game that made me care about games at all — which is exactly why the rough edges of this launch land the way they do.

The launch is a mess

Start with getting in at all.

Overloaded servers and Microsoft’s account-linking DRM left Steam players unable to launch what is, at its core, a single-player campaign. Getting past the login screen didn’t guarantee much either: crashes, driver conflicts, and bugs strange enough that some workarounds involved deleting specific DLC just to boot the game.

Requiring a server handshake to play a solo campaign is a decision that punishes paying customers and nobody else. At $49.99 standard and $69.99 premium, that’s not a small ask.

Halo Studios has since opened early access across all platforms and handed out a Sandstone Ancient armor style as an apology, which is something. It doesn’t retroactively give anyone back a wasted Thursday night.

No split-screen on PC

Here’s the one that stings.

Campaign Evolved supports two-player local split-screen on Xbox Series X|S and PS5. On PC, there is none.

Split-screen Halo on a couch is not a nostalgic accessory to this franchise — it’s most of what the franchise was. Leaving it out of the PC version of the game specifically built to recreate that memory is a strange call, and PC players who wanted to hand a controller to someone are simply out of luck.

Even on console it’s fussier than it should be: on PS5, player two’s PSN account has to be linked to a Microsoft account before they can join. (An early claim that both players needed PlayStation Plus was debunked, at least.)

Unreal Engine 5, for better and worse

The move to UE5 changes how the game feels. Performance is inconsistent, and the new presentation trades the original’s clean, readable art direction for something heavier and more saturated that doesn’t always flatter the ring.

Some of that is taste. Frame rate isn’t.

Underneath it, though — it’s Halo

Past the login screens and the stutter, the game is fun.

The remixed campaign takes real swings. Altered missions, weapons pulled forward from later entries, and additions that ten-year-old me would have lost his mind over: dual wielding in Halo 1, and finally getting to pick up the fuel rod cannon off a Hunter. Those changes give a campaign I’ve finished more times than I can count something genuinely new.

Operation: METEORITE adds new recon missions, there’s a Campaign Remix mode, and 42 collectibles scattered around for people who want a reason to comb the levels again.

Not everything lands. Removing health packs flattens the risk-reward loop that made the original tense — ducking behind cover until everything refills takes the fear out of pushing to the next checkpoint. Guilty Spark on Legendary was terrifying because every health pack was a decision. That tension is gone, and the campaign is a little smaller for it.

Verdict

Play it if: you want the campaign as your memory renders it, and you’re patient with an early access build.

Wait if: you’re on PC, price-sensitive, or allergic to launch bugs. A few patches from now this settles into something worth revisiting.

The value math: $49.99–$69.99 for one remastered campaign and no competitive multiplayer is a hard sell when The Master Chief Collection costs $40 and includes Reach, Halo 1–4, ODST, all their multiplayers, and Forge. Wait for a sale — or start there.

Halo: Campaign Evolved launches fully on July 28 for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC, and cloud, free on Game Pass.

This review reflects the early access build on PC. We’ll revisit at full launch.