It is no exaggeration to say that the $39.99 Halo: The Master Chief Collection has been fraught with issues. The compilation's many games have been released piecemeal since late 2019, and every title thus far has had its share of problems. Halo 3's release begs the question: What's wrong this time? The answer, quite surprisingly, is very little. Halo 3 is easily the best game released in the MCC, one that retains the same visuals and assets from the Xbox 360 original while pushing the resolution and frame rate. Plus, Halo 3's action holds up shockingly well, making it easily worth the meager $9.99 asking price if purchased as a standalone PC game.
Finishing This Fight
Halo 3 picks up immediately after Halo 2's cliffhanger ending, with Master Chief and the Covenant landing on Earth. Master Chief and Earth's UNSC forces scramble to defend themselves from the Covenant invasion, while also pursuing the Covenant leader to prevent him from activating the Halos. Cortana is still missing after she and Chief parted ways during Halo 2’s climax, and the parasitic Flood's machinations are an unknown, looming threat to all parties involved.
Master Chief is your playable character throughout Halo 3's campaign. The Arbiter fights alongside you during most of the game, but the story never switches to his perspective as it did in Halo 2. Instead, Halo 3 introduces new weapons to keep the experience interesting, including the fiendishly powerful Gravity Hammer, adhesive Spike Grenades, and vehicle-piercing Spartan Laser. A new gameplay mechanic comes in the form of personal equipment, one-time use items strewn across each map that grant defensive effects. One creates bullet-screening bubbles, for example, while another drops a rapid shield-regeneration zone. Only one personal equipment item can carried at a time, but they are reasonably abundant and prove incredibly useful during intense fire fights.
These additions, while seemingly minor, radically change how you tackle certain situations, as these boons embolden advances or strengthen defense. Factor in Halo's penchant for hiding powerful weaponry throughout each level, and you have many ways to tackle missions.
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Dual-wielding returns in Halo 3, too, albeit with some limitations. Halo 2 let you double-fist damn near anything that wasn't a large rifle, but at the cost of restricting your grenade lobbing. In Halo 3, dual-wielding is limited to light weaponry, such as pistols, SMGs and plasma guns, which heavily limit the mechanic's usefulness. Dual-wielding has its moments, such as when you face swarms of fodder Grunts and bug-like Drones, but I leaned much more heavily on singular weapons this time around. I never thought I would be nostalgic for dual-wielding Needlers, but the inability to do so in Halo 3 made me miss it dearly.
Multiplayer is solid overall. Halo 3 launches with all of the original game's maps, as well as the map-editing Forge tool, so nothing is amiss. You can relive the original game's multiplayer madness once again, though you'll need to grind for your cosmetics again. Halo 3's multiplayer is much more lively than the past few releases, but it comes with a few downsides. AFK players grinding for XP are all too common, as are quitters who drop matches for whatever reason and handicap their team. These aren't the game's fault, though it would be nice if developer 343 Interactive patched in a way to join in-progress matches. Halo 3's greatest multiplayer flaw is its wonky hit detection. Sometimes shots seem to connect, yet do not properly register. It doesn’t always happen, but 343 is aware of the matter and working on a fix.
The Look and Feel of Greatness
On the visual front, Halo 3 is a breath of fresh air when compared to the flat textures, odd lighting, and altered artistic flourishes seen in Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary and Halo 2 Anniversary. Halo 3 is the first game in the collection that is significantly improved over the original game by being on PC. The Xbox 360 version was a good looking game for sure, but it ran at 640p resolution and 30 frames per second (with its visuals capable of being upscaled to 1080p).
Halo 3 on PC is quite a different beast compared to its console predecessor. It runs at a native 4K/60fps, and with the option to unlock the frame rate to reach staggering smoothness. Many of Halo 3's assets are surprisingly high resolution, but they couldn't be adequately displayed due to the Xbox 360's hardware limitations. This is no longer the case on PC, so the game's visuals really pop and give the world a shocking amount of life and personality. Surfaces and objects showcase dense and detailed textures, such as veins in a leaf, scratches in walls, and pockmarks in soil. They’ve always been there, but on PC we can truly appreciate how much work went into Halo 3's graphics.
Thankfully, frame interpolation is a non-issue in Halo 3. All previously released MCC games suffered notable animation or effects problems when played at high frame rates. Plasma shots and energy swords, for example, would update at 30fps, despite the game running at 60fps or greater. This resulted in jittery, distracting visual effects. This isn't the case in Halo 3, so all effects animate at 60fps or better. Explosions look fantastic, particles are wonderfully detailed, and animations are great across the board.
In addition to the flat resolution and frame rate improvements, you can adjust the field of view slider to widen your general viewing range from the original’s narrow default. Halo 3 also boasts the same enhanced graphics option as the other games in the MCC, though here the difference is not quite as noticeable. The only real improvement is an increase in draw distance, which lets your PC render effects and details from farther away than normal. It is most noticeable with grass and dead bodies, but is not significant enough of a visual boon to keep on if your PC doesn't have the horsepower to smoothly run it.
Lastly, Halo 3 brings with it improvements to previously released MCC games. Most notably, Halo: Reach has finally gotten its audio mixing fixed, making in-game sounds much more faithful to the original game. Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary also received a surprise update to its weapon textures, which increases the resolution and smooths pixelated details.
All Systems Go
To play Halo 3 at a bare minimum, you need a PC that has at least a Windows 7 operating system, 2GB or RAM, an i7-975 or AMD A12-9800 APU CPU, and an AMD Radeon R7 or Nvidia GeForce GTS 450 GPU. With this baseline, you can play on Performance mode at 1080p/30fps.
On a desktop computer equipped with an Nvidia GeForce GTX 970 graphics card and AMD Ryzen 5 3600 CPU, Halo 3 ran at 1440p/60fps, with no frame rate dips or issues whatsoever. Halo 3 performs extremely well, and with an uncapped frame rate the game runs at more than 150fps. Like the rest of the MCC games, Halo 3 offers controller support, key remapping, Steam Achievements, Steam Trading Cards, and online multiplayer play.
Why You Should Game on a PC
The Legend Lives
Halo 3 is a must-own shooter. It's easily the most polished Master Chief Collection game released to date, offering excellent shoot-from-the-hip action, cool new weapons and mechanics, and a dramatic conclusion to Halo 2's conflict. Plus, Halo 3 looks better than ever, so if you find yourself itching to replay it, or if you never had the chance to do so before, consider the game a fantastic buy.
For more Steam game reviews and previews, check out PCMag's Steam Curator page.
Boasting beautiful, detailed graphics, numerous high-powered weapons, and an uncapped frame rate, Halo 3 is easily the best game released in the Master Chief Collection.
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