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The Halo Games Will Arrive on PCs Later This Year Via Steam

343 Industries is focused on making all the Halo titles perfectly compatible with mouse and keyboard controls, and ensuring they support multiple screen resolutions and different frame rates. However, the games will arrive one by one starting with Halo: Reach.

 & Michael Kan Principal Reporter

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The Halo game series is finally coming to PCs.

On Tuesday, the games' developer 343 Industries announced that Halo: The Master Chief Collection was arriving to Windows via both the Microsoft Store and Steam.

The games will start dropping one by one later this year, so that the development teams can faithfully transfer each title to the PC and let gamers begin enjoying them right away.

"Our current plan is for this journey to begin with the launch of Halo: Reach — the fictional beginnings of Master Chief's saga — with the rest of the titles following in chronological order thereafter," 343 Industries said in the announcement.

The games will also be more than just a basic PC port, according to 343 Industries' community director Brian Jarrard. "All the bells and whistles you'd expect to find on a modern PC title, that's the kind of thing the team is really committed to doing," he said on Microsoft's Inside Xbox show.

As a result, 343 Industries is focused on making all the Halo titles perfectly compatible with mouse and keyboard controls, and ensuring they support multiple screen resolutions and different frame rates. "And yes, there will be support for Xbox gamepads and other PC controllers," 343 Industries said in the announcement.

The Halo games were originally launched as Xbox exclusive titles starting with the first game, Halo: Combat Evolved, which arrived back in 2001. The original games were then compiled into a new Master Collection, which was released for the Xbox One in 2014.

Unfortunately, there's no word on pricing and when the games will exactly arrive. The developer also cautioned that one game in the series may have different PC features than another. In the meantime, 343 Industries plans on keeping the community in the loop about the upcoming collection via the developer's website.

The Halo: Master Chief Collection is currently available for Xbox One for $29.99. It originally only included the four first Halo games. However, on Tuesday, 343 Industries said it was also bringing Halo: Reach to the Xbox One collection as downloadable content.

"Halo: Reach's multiplayer content (which includes Forge and the Theater) will be automatically included for everyone who owns MCC while Halo: Reach's Campaign and Firefight experiences will be offered together as a premium digital add-on," the developer said. "Xbox Game Pass subscribers will have access to the entirety of Halo: Reach within MCC as part of their subscription."

About Our Expert

Michael Kan

Michael Kan

Principal Reporter

My Experience

I've been a journalist for over 15 years. I got my start as a schools and cities reporter in Kansas City and joined PCMag in 2017, where I cover satellite internet services, cybersecurity, PC hardware, and more. I'm currently based in San Francisco, but previously spent over five years in China, covering the country's technology sector.

Since 2020, I've covered the launch and explosive growth of SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet service, writing 600+ stories on availability and feature launches, but also the regulatory battles over the expansion of satellite constellations, fights with rival providers like AST SpaceMobile and Amazon, and the effort to expand into satellite-based mobile service. I've combed through FCC filings for the latest news and driven to remote corners of California to test Starlink's cellular service.

I also cover cyber threats, from ransomware gangs to the emergence of AI-based malware. In 2024 and 2025, the FTC forced Avast to pay consumers $16.5 million for secretly harvesting and selling their personal information to third-party clients, as revealed in my joint investigation with Motherboard.

I also cover the PC graphics card market. Pandemic-era shortages led me to camp out in front of a Best Buy to get an RTX 3000. I'm now following how the AI-driven memory shortage is impacting the entire consumer electronics market. I'm always eager to learn more, so please jump in the comments with feedback and send me tips.

The Best Tech I've Had:

  • My first video game console: a Nintendo Famicom
  • I loved my Sega Saturn despite PlayStation's popularity.
  • The iPod Video I received as a gift in college
  • Xbox 360 FTW
  • The Galaxy Nexus was the first smartphone I was proud to own.
  • The PC desktop I built in 2013, which still works to this day.

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