Gear up Spartans, Halo Reach has recently been released for the Xbox One and PC. In this video we see how the Xbox One X version compares to the Xbox 360 original!
Right away we see a massive increase in both frame rate and resolution. The game runs at a mostly solid 60fps on the Xbox One X while rendering at 3840×2160. This is a huge jump over the 360 version which runs at 1152×720 while dropping below the target 30fps frame rate quite often. The Xbox One X version also appears to be brighter at the default setting. This may be due to the Xbox 360’s weird gamma curve or a change in the tone mapping from adding HDR to the remastered version. Another difference, and a nice improvement, is the removal of the TAA found in the 360 version. This completely removes any ghosting found in the original release. Overall we’re presented with a much cleaner image and we can finally see a lot of detail that was missing when running at a lower resolution.
Unfortunately the remaster isn’t perfect. The game is almost too clean, losing some of the gritty look found in the older title. Motion blur is missing entirely and personally, I’d like to see it make a return in a future update. Post processing effects like film grain are dialed back and are barely noticeable. This is because post processing effects scale with rendering resolution. So the higher in resolution you go, the less apparent they are. Admittedly the film grain was a bit too heavy in the 360 title, so maybe a setting somewhere in between the Xbox One X and 360 versions would look good. Overall this is a great remaster and still an excellent game, even today. I’m eager to see how 343i respond to player’s feedback and update the game going forward.
What do you think about the Halo Reach remaster? Let us know in the comments below!
-Mike Skiles
