Halo Infinite initially launched to what many would consider a successful player turnout. With the constant rollout of updates hotfixes and the creativity from players through Forge, Halo Infinite seemed primed for years of success. But players began falling off sharply, with a drop-off rate of -50% each month following its initial launch. Today, it’s rare to find 1000 concurrent players on Steam charts. Now with no new Halo game on the immediate horizon and slow drip-fed Halo Infinite live service content, players are looking elsewhere for their Master Chief fix.
Much of the migration has naturally flowed toward the Master Chief Collection. But there’s one game conspicuously missing from it: Halo 5 Guardians. Despite being landlocked to Xbox, Halo 5 has seen a growing number of players filling its multiplayer lobbies, and for good reason. The fast pace of the movement and the intricate map design fulfil a unique niche in the series worth exploring. With 2025 marking Halo 5’s 10-year anniversary, there’s no better time take a look back on Halo Infinite’s predecessor.
The only way to access Halo 5 is through the Xbox ecosystem. The new ROG Xbox handheld is a good candidate to access the game, but for most, an old Xbox One or Series X/S will do the job. There’s been no word on an official PC release and Halo 5 remains the only one missing from the Master Chief Collection besides Infinite, putting Halo 5 in an inaccessible position today.
Still, multiplayer lobbies continue to be populated. It’s still relatively easy to find matches in Slayer, Deathmatch, and Capture the Flag modes. And then there’s the game’s 24-player Warzone mode, which can take longer to find matches in, especially outside of peak hours. Expanded search is a good way to find custom lobbies already in progress. In general, the Halo 5 multiplayer community is surprisingly active despite being landlocked to the Xbox ecosystem.
Halo 5 may be 10 years old, but it still looks like a new game. Since the scope is more zoomed-in and focused than Infinite, graphical fidelity was still high and framerates manage to be smooth. It looks especially impressive with Xbox Series X’s backwards compatibility. Until it gets an official PC release, the Series X remains the best way to play Halo 5 today.
Multiplayer has continued to be the lifeblood of Halo 5. Many fans consider Halo 5 as the pinnacle of Halo multiplayer in general, but especially of the 343 era. What does it do so well, though? First, there’s mobility. Halo 5 added infinite sprinting and a slide to its movement. While Halo Infinite has sprint, Halo 5’s sprint is notably quicker than Infinite. That extra dash of mobility combined with the gravity-defying jumping ability of Spartans make for some incredibly fun and fast-paced matches.
Halo 5 also emphasized aiming down the sights for its weapons to an unprecedented degree in the franchise. Just about every single gun in the game has sights the player can aim down, making precision shots more feasible than ever before. The ubiquity of sight-aiming along with the sprint led to an overriding sensation that Halo 5 was becoming homogenized. But rather than drag it down, this level of dynamism helped Halo 5 gain a reputation for being the most competitive entry. The quick movement and precise weapon feel lends itself well to top-level tournament play. One can imagine how big the Halo 5 e-sports scene could get with a remastered PC release.
But it’s not just more competitive—Halo 5 also retains the sense of fun that defined the classic games. Player collisions add a mix of comedic relief and physical realism, keeping matches unpredictable and often delightfully chaotic. The thruster pack provides bursts of speed and verticality, which lets players leap across distances with reckless abandon. And then there’s the special air-time ability when aiming down the sights, which grants splash AOE damage.
Forge mode, meanwhile, carries over much of what made Halo 3 and 4’s Forge so fun. Players have a robust set of tools to build, script, and decorate maps and create modes from scratch. Sure, Infinite’s Forge iterates with new additions and features, but Halo 5 has a wealth of creations in its library through the 10 years it’s been active, giving it some seniority over Infinite with regards to its content pool.
Speaking of maps, the multiplayer map design is much more compact and intricate than Infinite’s sprawling zones. There’s more nooks and crannies to hide in and a significantly increased pace thanks to the faster movement speed. The Plaza map’s vertical design, for example, highlights the game’s mobility remarkably well. And objective-based maps like Truth or Colosseum represent some of the most balanced map design in the series’ long history.
The weapons also pack quite a punch. A punchy sound effect unique to Halo 5 accompanies all headshots, distinguishing them from normal hits. The Promethean weapon designs were totally distinct and different from anything else in the series too. Again, accompanied by punchy distinctive sound effects and some cool animation quirks. It’s often argued that Halo 5 has some of the best weapons and it’s not hard to see why.
It’s just a tad unfortunate that the game’s large-scale mode isn’t as active as it once was. The 12v12 Warzone mode was a trend-setter at the time, blending traditional PvP play with AI enemies and boss fights to take down as a team. Warzone was something of a proto-Halo Infinite, with its large map design. It also introduced a controversial loot pack system injected with mircrotransactions, something that would carry over into Halo Infinite as well. Still, the cooperative mayhem with the PvP/PvE layout was unique and provided many unpredictable matches, with plenty a player claiming it as their favorite mode. Warzone servers are still up and active, though notably less so than the compact deathmatch modes today.
The campaign in Halo 5: Guardians is often regarded as lackluster and, for most, the weakest in the series’ rich history. From both a gameplay and story perspective, Halo 5’s single player offering suffered from a number of substantial issues, making it difficult to come back to and recommend today.
Gameplay-wise, the campaign leans on frustrating design choices that make combat repetitive and unbalanced. The overuse of homing enemy weapons from Promethean units forces one into a constant loop of retreating to cover rather than improvising with other tactics. Turning Halo into a cover-based shooter just wasn’t the way to go. Encounters quickly become predictable, undermining Halo’s classic face-paced ‘get-up-and-go’ rhythm. It’s especially egregious considering the enhanced mobility injected into the entry.
And then there’s the squad system, which was meant to add teamwork and tactical depth but often does the exact opposite. Unlike other Halo games, you issue commands to your team of Spartans and must rely on your mates for success. A team-based campaign is awesome in theory, but the AI here is just too unreliable and awful in some cases. AI Spartans will often ignore your pleas for help even when they’re just a few feet away. The campaign’s difficulty balance assumes that these revives happen regularly, which makes the experience frustratingly uneven. Not only do you not feel like a one-man army here, you don’t even feel like much of a functional team because the AI fails you so often.
There’s also the spongy boss health which pad out the experience, making it more monotonous and irritating than it should be. Seriously, if I have to fight another Warden Eternal, I’ll consider just playing Infinite instead. Those enemies don’t just have padded health, their attacks are repetitive and uninteresting to boot. And don’t get me started on the higher difficulties.
Narratively, it ain’t much better. Playing a story version of “Red Vs Blue” can be intriguing for some players, and could have been amazing, but it just kinda fell flat for most. Playing as Locke is cool at times. He’s a Spartan with some depth and a likeable personality, but the other no-name Spartans hog a lot of the screen time. And the worst thing is Master Chief gets a mere three missions total in the campaign and that’s it. The insistence on focusing on a bunch of no-name Spartans at the expense of the Chief is both puzzling and lame, especially since many of them are about as interesting as my Forge creations.
There’s also a bit of external homework required to understand details of the story, which is unfortunate. A mainline game shouldn’t require external narrative research to comprehend, especially with an iconic story-focused series like Halo. And finally there’s the nail in the narrative coffin. The story twist with Cortana, which understandably confounded and angered players. If you’re going to pull a cheeky narrative subversion for shock effect, at least make it somewhat consistent with the character.
Between Halo Infinite’s declining player base and Halo Studios’ silence regarding a new entry (besides the recently revealed Halo 1 remake), the future of the series seems like it’s still a tad bit in the air. But remastering Halo 5 and putting it on PC would be a step in the right direction. If the team wrinkles out some of the microtransaction gunk and polishes optimization for PC support, it would rekindle some of that old-school Halo flame that seems to be dimming in recent years.
Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.
