Now that we know that Halo: Reach is coming to PC on December 3, people have been wondering about the next PC Halo release. And, now we might have an idea of when we'll see the landmark original game hit the PC again.
In an interview with PCGamesN, 343 Industries community director Brian Jarrard said that "we'll start to flight Halo CE" once Reach hits the streets on December 3. Now, for folks that aren't in the loop, 'flight' is what 343 Industries has been calling its Halo: Reach beta tests.
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There are probably some people out there saying "but, Halo CE is already on PC," and while that's technically true, you have to run Windows Vista to play the game. And, while there are some ways around that requirement, nobody wants to run that ancient operating system – nobody even wanted to run it while it was new.
Of course, this PC version of Halo CE will be based on the Master Chief Collection, which features improved visuals and a modernized version of the classic multiplayer. And, with the more powerful hardware that PCs inherently offer, we could finally play Halo at 120 frames per second the way we've always wanted to.
So, obviously there is some work that needs to go into making this game ready for the PC platform. PC gamers are notoriously fickle about the features games have, especially when it comes to scalability and performance. Luckily, Jarrard says that 343 Industries is "trying to account for all the requirements that PC gamers expect nowadays." Hopefully that means we'll see a great PC port, rather than the mess that was the Red Dead Redemption 2 PC launch.
When will we actually see it?
However, the PC beta for Halo: Reach was delayed from its original target launch, so we might see the beta for Halo CE come out a bit later. Initially we heard that 343 would be putting out test flights for Halo Reach in May 2019, but it missed that window. It wasn't until the end of June that we saw the first test flight come out, and even then it was a very slim group of testers.
343 Industries is apparently targeting the Halo CE test flights to happen after the holidays, but we don't know how narrow that window is. If it follows the same timetable that Halo: Reach did for its PC tests, we might not see it in testers' hands until February or March 2020.
We won't know until 343 Industries actually announces the PC flight for the game. Either way, finally having the classic shooter series on PC where it arguably belongs can only be a net positive, so we're happy to wait.
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