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In-depth at E3: Here’s how multiplayer works within Halo: The Master Chief Collection

Speaking with Stevivor at a special E3 Halo briefing, 343’s Dan Ayoub detailed how multiplayer would work in the Halo: Master Chief Collection, comprised of Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, Halo 2: Anniversary, Halo 3 and Halo 4.

As confirmed at Xbox’s E3 Media Briefing, The Master Chief Collection will contain all of the multiplayer maps found in each of the four original games, comprising over 100 maps in total.

The maps will be accessed in a section of the game titled “Multiplayer”. From there, gamers will go into the “Playlists” section to pick a game type. Selecting “Team Slayer” as an example will then take the gamers who have been grouped together in that game type playlist to a voting screen with three options. Each option lists the map the game type will be played on alongside a Halo CE, 2, 3 or 4 logo that indicates which original game the map has come from.

Whichever map wins the vote will then be loaded, most importantly, in the original multiplayer engine the map appeared in. That means Halo 2 maps will be loaded using the Halo 2 multiplayer engine and so on.

Halo fans will remember that Halo: Combat Evolved‘s multiplayer featured CE‘s maps within the Halo: Reach multiplayer engine. This will no longer be the case in The Master Chief Collection, Ayoub confirmed, with Halo: CE‘s multiplayer engine brought back into the mix.

Six Halo 2 maps will also be given the Anniversary treatment using “a modern engine,” Ayoub said. He wouldn’t elaborate any further on the modern engine itself.

For Australian and New Zealand gamers, Ayoub also acknowledged that 343 was aware that dedicated servers weren’t yet in place in our region, but hoped that would be resolved by Microsoft before The Master Chief Collection ships.

Ayoub also said that 343 would be looking into ways to ensure that game type populations would remain as high as possible in lower-population areas like our own to ensure games could be found, and be full, quickly and easily.

Halo: The Master Chief Collection will be available on Xbox One for the holiday season. The game also includes access to Ridley Scott’s episodic Halo: Nightfall and the Halo 5: Guardians beta.


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Steve Wright

Steve's the owner of this very site and an active games journalist nearing twenty (TWENTY!?!) years. He's a Canadian-Australian gay gaming geek, ice hockey player and fan. Husband to Matt and cat dad to Wally and Quinn.