Halo: Fight Evolved sits in a pantheon alongside a number of the finest video games ever made, so it wasn’t shocking that Microsoft would launch a second remake of it will definitely. Nevertheless, as a substitute of utilizing a bespoke, in-house engine, this time round Halo Studios opted for Unreal 5,. And whereas that’s superior for anybody with a high-end machine, it does imply it struggles to scale to lower-end and older {hardware}.
That doesn’t imply the sport doesn’t look good although. In case you have the {hardware} to juice up the settings a bit, Halo: Campaign Evolved appears to be like beautiful, with wonderful lighting and environmental element. However not like numerous video games which have come out this yr, like Resident Evil Requiem and Crimson Desert, that are on far more versatile engines, the Halo remake isn’t well-optimized for lower-end {hardware} and turns into an unpleasant mess as soon as it is advisable begin turning down a number of the settings.
Unreal Engine 5
Ever since its debut again in 2022, Unreal 5 has had a little bit of a fame for being fairly heavy on graphics playing cards. And whereas Halo: Campaign Evolved does fare a bit higher than one thing like Silent Hill F or, nicely, the Silent Hill 2 remake, there doesn’t appear to be numerous room to tweak efficiency, not less than in my testing of the sport.
I’ve already talked about how dangerous Halo: Fight Evolved appears to be like on the weakest handhelds, however there typically isn’t a lot room to tweak with out making large swings. You usually have to alter a number of settings to see any type of efficiency enchancment, to the purpose the place you’re most likely higher off simply going to the following preset when you’re seeking to enhance efficiency or constancy.
So, for most individuals, the very best transfer is to only take a look at this helpful little chart and align the preset with which graphics card you may have and the way a lot VRAM you may have. As an example, I plugged within the RTX 3090 as a stand-in for the advisable RTX 3080 Ti, which the chart says ought to run at 60 fps at 4K with the Excessive preset. And, nicely, that’s precisely how the 3090 carried out. However what’s fascinating is that the efficiency didn’t actually transfer all that a lot once I began tweaking with the settings.
The Settings
In my coronary heart of hearts, I adore it when a PC recreation encourages me to tweak with the settings to essentially dial within the efficiency. Halo: Campaign Evolved simply doesn’t appear to be that recreation. However whereas that’s a little bit of a disappointment for me, I don’t assume it is essentially a nasty factor. There’s one thing about rapidly selecting the correct preset and entering into the sport that’s actually interesting, and in a method feels true to Halo’s console roots.
In case you do wish to eke out a bit extra efficiency, although, I’ve scoured by all of the completely different settings to determine what they alter, and which of them it’s best to change first if you wish to enhance efficiency or picture high quality.
Results High quality: Results High quality modifications how complicated visible results like explosions are. In a recreation like Halo, the place there are every kind of various explosions and lasers being shot all over the place on a regular basis, that is one thing I’d keep away from turning down until you actually need to avoid wasting efficiency. Don’t simply flip it down in case your common fps is decrease than you need, although, solely flip it down in case your body charge significantly drops throughout fight.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive
- Handheld: Very Low
Geometric High quality: In numerous video games, this may have an effect on little objects like rocks within the setting, however within the Halo remake, the builders shoved all geometry beneath this one setting. So, this now impacts foolish little rocks, in addition to how complicated character fashions are. I’d preserve this as excessive as attainable till you begin operating out of VRAM.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive
- Handheld: Very Low
International Illumination High quality: For some cause, Halo Studios saved all of the geometry results beneath one setting, however broke world illumination out of the overarching lighting class. As a result of this solely impacts oblique lighting, it doesn’t change efficiency all that a lot if you flip it down, so I’d preserve it turned up.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive
- Handheld: Very Low
Lighting High quality: Identical to geometric high quality, Halo Studios shoved shadows, lighting high quality and lightweight draw distance into one setting right here. So, altering this setting will make large modifications to your efficiency, however at the price of turning down many of the lighting results on the similar time. Ideally, all three of this stuff would have their very own settings, however this may be the very first thing to show down when you’re struggling to hit 60 fps.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive, or Medium on a 60-class card
- Handheld: Very Low
Texture High quality: One of many causes I don’t like presets is as a result of they normally change textures to be both method beneath what your VRAM can deal with, or method above. As an example, on the Radeon RX 9070 I examined the sport with, Halo Studios recommends the excessive preset, however with 16GB of VRAM, the 9070 has greater than sufficient funds to crank textures as much as extremely. For this setting, I’d use the quantity of VRAM to information you.
- 12GB or extra: Extremely
- 8GB-12GB: Excessive
- 4GB-8GB: Medium
- Handheld: Low
Reflections: As a normal rule of thumb, reflections are one of the crucial demanding results in any fashionable recreation. Halo: Campaign Evolved is not any completely different, and it helps that I don’t actually like how they appear on this recreation. That is one thing I’d really feel snug turning all the way down to medium or low to try to squeeze out a few further frames.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive or Medium
- Handheld: Very Low
Atmospheric High quality: This modifications all of the atmospheric results like clouds, fog, or smoke. In a recreation like Halo, I don’t assume atmospherics are that vital, however your mileage will range. If this was one thing like, say, Resident Evil or Metro, atmospherics can be far more vital to the sport’s aesthetic.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive or Low
- Handheld: Very Low
Publish-Processing High quality: This impacts the standard of the varied post-processing results like bloom and god rays. You may flip this down, nevertheless it hardly impacts efficiency, so I’d simply preserve it turned up until you’re actually struggling for fps.
- Mid-range PC: Excessive
- Handheld: Low
Display Shake: It is a easy toggle to allow or disable the display shaking when sure issues occur within the recreation. This received’t have an effect on efficiency, actually, so flip it off if it’s annoying you.
- Mid-range PC: Your selection
- Handheld: Your selection
Movement Blur: Normally I’d say that is one other elective setting, however the movement blur on this recreation is actually dangerous. Perhaps it’s simply my eyes, nevertheless it’s significantly blurry on this recreation, making it laborious to really play the sport. However, once more, go along with your private choice.
- Mid-range PC: Your selection, however leaning to off
- Handheld: Off
Upscaling Approach: This may rely upon which GPU you may have. For AMD customers, use FSR, for Nvidia customers use DLSS and for Intel use XeSS. Simply understand that for some cause, the sport received’t allow you to use XeSS when you received the sport by the Microsoft Retailer or Sport Move.
Upscaling High quality: For some cause, Halo Studios deserted the now-standard verbiage that just about each recreation makes use of for upscaling high quality, as a substitute opting for a similar low-medium-high choices as the remainder of the graphics settings. Regardless of the completely different names, although, the precise tiers are nonetheless normal. Mainly, Extremely is High quality Mode, Medium is Efficiency mode.
- Mid-Vary PC: Excessive (Balanced)
- Handheld: Medium (Efficiency)
Async Compute: From the best way Halo Studios phrases this, it feels like this feature will enable your GPU to maneuver some work, like physics, to a number of the secondary chips in your graphics card. Preserve this off until you may have a brand-new graphics card, a superb CPU, or ideally, each.
Low Latency Mode: Identical to with Upscaling Approach, the best choice right here will rely upon which GPU you’re utilizing. There’s a default choice that’s accessible for all graphics playing cards, however I’d advocate simply going with Nvidia Reflex for Staff Inexperienced and AMD Anti-Lag for Staff Crimson.
Body Era: Adore it or hate it, this makes use of AI to generate further frames between every rendered body. This improves your body charge, however introduces some added latency. As a normal rule of thumb, I’d solely advocate turning this on when you’re already getting not less than 40 fps. In any other case, the sport can flip right into a glitchy, artifact-filled mess.
Jackie Thomas is the {Hardware} and Shopping for Guides Editor at IGN and the PC elements queen. You may comply with her @Jackiecobra