343 Industries has announced its plans for the Halo Master Chief Collection update, laying out the changes with the purpose of improving the game, as the developer hopes that the relatively old Xbox One title will receive a jolt in popularity as a result of these planned improvements. Xbox One X owners will be particularly interested to see these improvements, with the FPS set to receive visual enhancements on the console.
In a post on Halo Waypoint, 343 Industries explained that public flighting is a “critical component of the plan,” with it seeing the developer releasing standalone work-in-progress builds for members of the Halo MCC Insider program to assist in testing, similar to a beta or alpha testing for a game.
Anyone who wishes to participate in the flight program does not actually need to own a copy of Halo The Master Chief Collection, as the content is a standalone download that does not require the game. However, players with experience playing the game will have a much higher chance of being selected into the program.
The upcoming update for the game has been dubbed “Milestone 5.” The list of priorities in the update includes bug fixes, texture streaming for faster multiplayer map loading times and enabling players to eventually have the option of only installing one or more specific titles within the game, or even changing which language they want to install.
Here’s a list of all the planned changes in the upcoming first retail update:
- Intelligent Install
- Xbox One X Visual Enhancements
- HDR/SDR Calibration Settings
- Networking and Matchmaking Improvements (Continuous Matchmaking, Network/Multiplayer API updates)
- P1 & P2 Bug Fixes
- LAN Support
- UI & UX Updates (Main Menu, Title Screen Video, Button States/Highlight States)
The development team working on the update also shared their progress with a few screenshots from the new build of Halo The Master Chief Collection. These include a cool new “splash screen” and an updated UI for the main menu. Halo MCC Art Director Jeremy Cook said: “Artistically, I wanted to visually simplify things, declutter and give everything a cohesive, Halo look, regardless of what “Halo” you’re playing.”
