Best Halo games: every mainline series entry ranked
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The bestHalogames showcase why the series has long been an absoluteMicrosoftstaple. When Microsoft entered the console market, they knew they needed a strong exclusive – enter 2001’sHalo: Combat Evolved. The shooter, sold alongside more than half of all Xbox consoles, felt cinematic and gave us a recognizable hero in Master Chief. Its combat felt great, thanks to smart enemy AI – and those vehicles!
In short, players loved plenty ofHaloand its multiplayer provided entertainment in many living rooms and college dorms over the years.Halo’s success is largely credited to Bungie, now developers of one of thebest FPS gamesout there, multiplayer blockbusterDestiny 2, but that wouldn’t be entirely fair to currentHalodeveloper 343 Industries, whoseHalois simply different – because it’s a different studio.
Halohas become a pop culture powerhouse with spinoff games, its own TV show, and plenty of novels in the universe, so of course you’d want to know what the bestHalogames are. Whether you’re new to the series and want to take the jump (which you can easily do onGame Pass), or you just want to have a look at our ranking to see how wrong we are, welcome. Let’s have a look at the bestHalogames.
Best Halo games
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Halo Wars: Definitive Edition
Developed by Ensemble Studios,Halo Warstakes place 21 years before the events ofHalo: Combat Evolved. With sumptuous pre-rendered cinematics and a control scheme that worked extremely well on a controller,Halo Warswas a bold attempt to make the RTS genre work on consoles – and it certainly accomplished that goal.
WhileHalo Wars 2expanded on many of its ideas,Halo Warswas generally well-received by critics and fans alike. It was also the first time the series branched out from Master Chief’s core adventures. It may not be remembered as one of the bestHalogames ever made, but if you never quite clicked with first-person shooters, it was great having the option to experience theHaloUniverse as a real-time strategy game.
Halo Wars 2
It might seem unfair to pitHalo Wars 2against the main entries in the series – it’s a real-time strategy game after all. ButHalo Wars 2is worthy of a mention, partly because the game’s main antagonists, The Banished, are the enemy faction you face off against inHalo Infinite.
Halo Wars 2was a valiant effort that attempted to pack the core elements of theHalouniverse into an RTS game. And in many ways, renowned strategy developer Creative Assembly achieved this.Halo Wars 2is a fast-paced game that has a fairly engaging story that focuses on a new menacing villain, Atriox, and there’s a generous amount of content for players to delve into.
While it’s almost an impossible task to cram everything that makesHalogreat into an entirely new genre,Halo Wars 2did a fine job at nailing the fundamentals, and it’s awesome to see armies of soldiers collide with Brutes and Covenant forces from a top-down perspective. If you ever wanted to be the master and commander of a miniatureHaloarmy,Halo Wars 2lets you do exactly that.
Halo 5: Guardians
Let’s just say it –Halo 5: Guardiansgot a lot of things wrong. Its marketing campaign promised an exciting story that centered on a supposed betrayal by Master Chief, but that never actually transpired. Instead, we were left to chase Master Chief across the galaxy as Spartan Locke – one of the driest and most boring individuals we’ve ever encountered.
We did at least get to play as Chief, but only sparingly, as the majority of the campaign’s missions revolved around Locke and his band of equally uninspiring teammates. Throw in dreary four-player co-op that never felt fun to play due to the awful Promethean enemies – and frankly broken AI when playing alone – and it’s easy to argue thatHalo 5might feature the worst campaign of the entire series.
While it’s never a good idea to make a fan-favorite character into a heel, 343 Industries decided that Chief’s faithful AI companion, Cortana, would also turn rogue. Two of the series’ beloved stalwarts were now brandished as baddies, and unsurprisingly, that never sat quite right with fans.Halo 5’s campaign also assumed every player had read all of theHalonovels, and its story was horribly convoluted and bloated as a result.
It wasn’t all bad, though –Halo 5: Guardiansmultiplayer was truly exceptional. After the missteps ofHalo 4’sCall of Duty-esque approach,Halo 5: Guardiansmanaged to successfully transitionHalo’s legendary multiplayer modes into something fit for modern players. It didn’t get a pass from the purists, of course, but the gunplay, fluidity of movement, and incredible multiplayer map designs absolutely deliver.
Halo Infinite
Our expert review:
More than five years lie betweenHalo 5andHalo Infinite, enough time for fans to worry that the game they thought of when they thoughtHalowas maybe a thing of the past. Underwhelming first looks at the gameplay and multiple delays did nothing but assuage those fears in most fans.
In reality, the changes thatHalo: Infinitebrings to the series are nothing we didn’t expect 343 to eventually tackle. Environments opened up gradually from game to game untilHalowent open-world at last, the grappling hook is fun to use, and the multiplayer went free and released separately from the campaign – all things players are long used to elsewhere. There are even boss fights now.
Halo Infiniteis a very good game with great encounters that does not need to hide behind any other series or even games within the larger franchise, and the multiplayer is fantastic. After a long wait,Halo Infiniteco-op, often so vital to the Halo experience, is also available. The campaign does feel like it’s slightly lagging behind, however, still trying to live up to greats like Halo 2 while introducing new mechanics to the formula long after everyone else.
Halo 4
Halo 4was always going to be intensely scrutinized, perhaps unfairly, for being the firstHalogame after Bungie passed on the baton for the franchise. But 343 Industries decided to bravely implement their own vision of whereHalowas heading, which deserves some credit.
WhileHalohas never really been praised for its visual fidelity in the past,Halo 4was absolutely gorgeous when it was released on Xbox 360. The campaign is full of evocative moments, too, as Cortana battles against the ‘rampancy’ that is affecting her mental state. We’d like to have faced off against fewer Forerunner and Promethean enemies, but overall it’s an entertaining ride.
Halo 4’s multiplayer was where the game faltered, however, as it was a dramatic change from whatHalofans were used to. It tried to ape the speed and twitch-like nature ofCall of Dutygames, but unlike its successful muse,Halo 4never felt really satisfying to play.
Halo 3: ODST
ODST is a curious entry in theHalofranchise, in that you don’t play as Master Chief at all. Instead, you play one of the UNSC’s Orbital Drop Shock Troopers – a rank of soldier that plummets into battle inside a protective missile – who wakes up from a crash landing in a ruined, Covenant-covered city and pieces together the events of the night before.
The so-called ‘detective’ elements are light, with Bungie content to use a smashed-up vehicle or waylaid helmet as a prompt for a ‘flashback’ to another ODST’s mission. The tight alleyways and corridors are certainly a change from the usual vistas of otherHalogames, while it’s hard not to feel underpowered compared to Master Chief’s usual capabilities (or underwhelmed by some of the scripted cutscenes). You’ll end up backtracking through a lot of areas, too.
But ODST goes off the beaten path as aHalogame, encouraging you to put the pieces of this day-old warzone together, and deserves its fifth-place slot in our list of bestHalogames for that reason.
Halo 2
IfHalo 3was the game that helped cement the Xbox 360 as a genuine contender in the console space,Halo 2was the litmus test that helped Xbox Live grow into the service it is today. The game’s multiplayer was the perfect companion for Microsoft’s burgeoning online services – and it also upped the ante from the first game considerably. It was so popular that Microsoft only shut down the online servers in 2010.
Multiplayer aside,Halo 2also brought many innovations to the series. Regenerating health replaced the need to find first aid kits, dual-wielding was introduced, and the game lets players step into the eight-foot frame of the Arbiter, a Covenant elite. Much likeHalo: Combat Evolvedhelped popularize first-person shooters on consoles,Halo 2paved the way for the likes ofCall of Dutyby making online first-person shooters a mainstay for console gamers.
Halo 3
The game that called for players to ‘finish the fight’ was certainly worthy of the trilogy that it ended, even if Microsoft was never going to let the franchise end there. As the firstHalogame to launch on the Xbox 360, it offered a big graphical upgrade over the first two iterations, with expansive and detailed levels that required real strategy to navigate, and incredibly explosive set pieces that stick in the mind years later. Who can forget blowing up a Scarab from the inside for the first time?Halo 3belongs high up on the ranking of bestHalogames for such moments alone.
We’re always sad to miss the chance to fight off Elites – a sad side-effect of the alliance made in the previous game – and the Cortana level will remain divisive for some. ButHalo 3’s carefully woven plot makes this a truly variedHalogame that always earns its stripes as one of the bestHalogames.
Halo: Reach
Halo Reachholds a special place in many gamers’ hearts, as the swansong of Bungie before it passed the mantle onto 343 Industires. This prequel game takes place on the planet ofReach, a farming planet that fell to the Covenant in the early years of humanity’s struggle with the galactic cult. This game is all about goodbyes, both from Bungie and its array of Spartan characters, as Reach’s team of super soldiers are slowly picked off in a brutal battle for survival. The last-stand endgame, too, is one of the finest and most memorable levels in the franchise, and it’s hard not to shed a tear for what was lost.
It’s not all frowns and sorrow, though. Reach’s campaign is a thrilling and off-beat look at theHalouniverse, introducing new power-ups for sprinting, invulnerable ‘armor locks’, and hologram decoys. The spaceship battle level is a startling break in pacing, too, pitting you against Covenant warships before putting you back, breathless, on the ground. The biggest tragedy? That the campaign never ends at all.
Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo: Combat Evolvedis the game that started it all, and it’s hard to overstate its importance. Microsoft making a game console seemed like a laughable prospect only 20 years ago, butHalo: CEhad a massive part in proving the company knew what it was doing. Its vision of galactic warfare, alien technology, and humanity on the brink of defeat captured the hearts of so many players and showed that Xbox was here to stay.
More than anything else, though,Halo: CEshowed off what Bungie’s team could do with gunplay. The iconic pistol and assault rifle were introduced here, while the chance to flip between human and alien weaponry was inspired, making each encounter a thrilling chance to shake up the way you played.
The opening levels ofHalo: CEmay still be the franchise’s best, with the chaos of a claustrophobic ship boarded by Covenant soldiers, leading into the calm and open vistas of aHaloring – and it’s this tussle of on and off, fast and slow, hurting and healing, that makesHalowhat it is. For all its successors, this is where the formula was forged, and that makes it the bestHalogame, bar none.
How we made out best Halo games list
The team at TechRadar Gaming has an excessive experience with theHaloseries, with multiple members of the team pouring hundreds of hours into each game. Because of this, we’ve got a decent community ofHalofanatics who have come together to be able to offer valuable opinions on which games are the very best.
Because of our experience with the series, we’re convinced that we can provide opinions that you can trust. We’re educated on the subject, so we know exactly what makes aHalogame one of the best.
Now you’ve covered all grounds for the best Halo games, thebest FPS gamesmay be worth looking at if you’re ready for what’s next. For more multiplayer action, our guides to thebest co-op gamesmight also help.
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Adam was formerly TRG’s Hardware Editor. A law graduate with an exceptional track record in content creation and online engagement, Adam has penned scintillating copy for various technology sites and also established his very own award-nominated video games website. He’s previously worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor and once played Halo 5: Guardians for over 51 hours for charity. He is now an editor at The Shortcut.
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