Halo 4, cross-play, Season 4 content, and more now included in the Master Chief Collection

It seems like a long time ago that we received word of an official PC port for Halo: The Master Chief Collection. Developer 343 first broke the news back in March of 2019, and it wasn’t until around this time last year that Halo: Reach first arrived on PC. Since then, the collection has slowly rolled out to players. Things have been smooth all in all though, and the developer made a point to add plenty of extras along the way. Still, it’s refreshing to say that the promise has finally been fulfilled. Halo 4 is now officially a part of The Master Chief Collection on PC.

That includes the campaign, Spartan Ops, multiplayer, and DLCs that came out later. You can jump back into Halo 4 and explore the Forerunner world of Requiem again (or possibly for the first time) as the Chief himself. There’s a personal tale that awaits, but we won’t spoil any more. Spartan Ops consists of an extension of the campaign, but also adds four-player co-op. Then there’s multiplayer, which features spartan abilities and unique new weapons for the series. You should expect a very different feel from the previous Halo games. Fortunately, if Halo 4 is not for you, the rest of the Master Chief Collection offers plenty of classic gameplay.

Enhancing The Master Chief Collection once again

There are a bunch of long-requested features finally arriving to the collection with this update in addition to some new content that all fans will likely enjoy. Perhaps the most exciting of these features is multiplayer cross-play. For the first time in the franchise’s history, PC and Xbox players will be able to wage war. There is a major catch about this feature though, and it’s something the developer was very quiet about until now. As you may have already noted, cross-play is only limited to multiplayer. The good news is that support extends to matchmaking, Firefight, Forge, and custom games. Many of us were certainly excited to enjoy it in campaign missions, but those features are still available if played on the same platforms. Take that for what it is.

Earn the mythical golden Warthog skin in Halo 3.

On a brighter note, Season 4 begins with this update. The new content consists of more weapon and vehicle skins for Halo 3 and Halo 4. There are also new nameplates. Be prepared to complete some challenges, too. Some of the content is permanently available, but 343 has a few skins that are only available for a limited time. To get these, you will need to hit level 20 in the Recon Slayer playlist. The developer didn’t say when the challenge ends.

Taking care of the details

Besides the major implementations, a regional server selection option is now available for matchmaking. That should help reduce your ping. You can also try out the text chat filtering. This one will be a huge quality of life improvement for content streamers, as you can now filter what chat text you see from other players. Everyone knows that old school Halo lobbies were legendary for their profanity and trash talking. The phenomenon naturally carried over into the game chat, but 343 will now let you cleanse your screen of negativity like a burning Halo ring swept through. Aside from these features, you can try out the new video options which tweak things like lighting.

This Halo 4 update turned out better than expected, but 343 isn’t done with The Master Chief Collection yet. The developer discussed additional features still in development and you can read more about them in our developer blog coverage. You can also check out the official launch trailer for a quick primer on Master Chief’s Halo 4 adventure.

Give the new Halo 4 Forge custom map maker features a spin.