TheHaloseries is very well-known for its captivating stories and memorable characters, but another reason it’s gone down as iconic within the world of gaming is because ofjust how brutally difficult a lot of the games can be. Despite Master Chief being an incredibly powerful Spartan, this doesn’t mean that he’s completely invincible.
In fact, once Chief’s shields are destroyed, he essentially becomes a sitting duck who needs to take cover to restore his health, and while this can be a rare occurrence in a few games, it’s far more common in some of the harder ones which throw hordes of enemies at the player at once.
Admittedly, players are able to ramp up the difficulty to an insane degree by activating Skulls, but even without these modifiers enabled, a lot of theHalogames were still more than challenging enough on their own. Before jumping into this list, it should be noted that this list will only compare the Normal difficulties of the games, and only the mainline titles will be considered.
Halo 3definitely has a couple of tricky missions,Floodgate and Halo being notable examples, but so long as players use every single tool that is at their disposal, the experience won’t ever become too demanding in its challenge. Bungie had clearly taken the feedback concerning the intense difficulty ofHalo 2, and as a result, toned all the enemies down to become much weaker. This included the gigantic Brutes that had become nothing more than bullet sponges, meanwhile the Grunts were barely ever even awake to attack Chief in the first place.
Master Chief also has plenty of equipment that he can use to survive the swarms of Covenant and Flood enemies, one of the strongest being the Bubble Shield which can completely negate any incoming fire, making it extremely powerful and reliable.Halo 3’stight and focused gameplay, along with its fantastic story, still makes it an amazing title to play, but the overall challenge remains pretty manageable for an entire playthrough.
Whilst the Prometheans should be a dangerous in-game enemy considering their powerful role in the lore, they are unfortunately pretty easy to take out inHalo 5considering a lot of them have glaring weakspots which are incredibly hard to miss. There are also a few specific weapons and tools which are insanely powerful in the game, such asthe Boltshots and Suppressorswhich can immediately take out both Promethean and Covenant enemies a little too easily.
Luckily, the squad mechanic did add some level of strategy which would be required to help out with the difficulty, but it could also act as a massive benefit, since teammates could always revive the player. So long as players don’t ignore the Squad mechanic,Halo 5is a relatively straightforward experience.
At the beginning ofHalo Reach, players are dropped right into the middle of the largest war in the entire history of the series, and with how many enemies are thrown at the player in each and every level, it really does feel like being part of a gigantic and bloody conflict. Certain enemies can be pretty relentless in this game, like the Elites, who can easily shake off sniper shots, or the Jackals who are capable of locking their snipers onto the player to pick them off from afar.
The game’s difficulty does still drastically spike at certain points, an infamous example being Exodus where large swarms of the Covenant are focused in very small areas, making it extremely hard to progress through the environment without having the best weapons on-hand.Halo Reachdoes an amazing job at making every enemy feel dangerous and threatening, which really feeds into the wider context of the game.
Halo 4is another one of those games that will severely punish the player if they aren’t utilizing everything they can get their hands on, and that’s primarily because of how lethal a lot of the new enemy types are. The Knights and Watchers are especially annoying because of how many bullets they can shrug off, to the point where if Chief doesn’t have a shotgun or rocket launcher in hand, they can feel impossible to take down.
It’s also much easier to run out of ammo inHalo 4compared to the other games, which forces the player to backtrack to avoid running into an encounter unprepared. Armor Abilities can definitely help make the game a bit easier, but since they are so brief, it only provides the player with a moment of safety before jumping back into the fight.
Because of the open-world nature ofHalo Infinite’scampaign, it does mean there are a lot of sectionswhere players can relax and enjoy their adventure, but the Covenant seem so tanky and powerful that it adds an extra layer of challenge to the experience. The heightened difficulty does also come as a result of small adjustments to the core gameplay, such as the auto-aim being extremely weak and just the general fast-paced nature of the gunfights.
The enemies are also a lot more tactical inHalo Infinite, especially snipers who will always be as far away as possible, and the lightning-fast Banshees who are incredibly hard to shoot because of their speed. The Grapple Hook does admittedly make it much easier to use the environment as a weapon, and it’s an essential tool that players will need to make good use of to survive.
Halo 3’sODST DLC might be fairly short, but it’s an extremely memorable experience, both because of the amazing story, and for how unforgiving it can be. Rather than having a bunch of foot soldiers to distract enemies and soak up damage, the Rookie is all alone whiletraveling through New Mumbasa, and since he’s only an ODST soldier, it makes him far weaker and more susceptible to damage compared to his Spartan counterparts.
Despite being an additional campaign toHalo 3,ODSTactually plays a lot differently, encouraging the player to take a more stealthy approach rather than rushing in all guns blazing, but things can get messy very quickly if even a single Grunt spots them. The difficulty being much harder than the original game was one of many reasons why so manyHalo 3fans gravitated towardsODSTas an expansion.
There’s no doubt that the very firstHalogame was ahead of its time, providing a fun and unique take on the FPS genre that took the world by storm, but considering its age, it can admittedly feel a little rough around the edges. While a lot of Chief’s guns feel pretty strong, the Magnum being the biggest example, a lot of the Covenant’s weapons are also extremely overpowered, and there are a few enemy types that feel like they were designed to be frustrating, with the rocket launcher wieldingFloodbeing a particular annoyance.
Halo Combat Evolvednever drops in its difficulty, providing an intense challenge from the moment players take control of Chief in the Pillar of Autumn, all the way until the iconic final mission. So long as players steer clear of the countless enemy grenades, and always keep the strongest weapons equipped, they’ll be able to make it through and have a fun experience, but they should still be prepared for the death screen to appear more than a few times.
As if the first game wasn’t already a difficult enough experience, Bungie really went above and beyond to makeHalo 2as brutal as possible, anda true test of the players' FPS abilities. In every otherHalogame, players can gradually start to overcome the enemy by improving at the game, but inHalo 2, there’s a random aspect to the gameplay which always keeps it unpredictable.
The enemies are also extremely aggressive and will practically throw themselves at Chief, even the Grunts who are at their toughest in this game. The Brutes, who had only just been introduced inHalo 2, were also clearly far too strong for their own good, almost feeling like they had a magnetic pull that would always keep them in close proximity to Chief when attacking.Halo 2is known for being one of the hardest games ever on Legendary difficulty, but even on Normal, it will still push the player to their absolute limit.
