Halo 5: Guardians Reviews

Halo 5: Guardians is ranked in the 93rd percentile of games scored on OpenCritic.
Recommended
Oct 30, 2015

A solid campaign and wonderful competitive multiplayer sees 343 finally make its mark on Halo.

Read full review

IGN
Top Critic
9 / 10.0
Oct 27, 2015

Where single-player has its successes and failures, Halo 5's multiplayer is one big, sustained high point.

Read full review

Oct 26, 2015

Halo 5: Guardians is a true step forward for Microsoft's Halo franchise that makes for a no-brainer buy on Xbox One, but it's not a flawless experience.

Read full review

Oct 26, 2015

Not a bad game, but frustratingly one that succeeds despite its innovations, not because of them. An enjoyable campaign, but not a truly convincing one.

Read full review

8.8 / 10.0
Oct 28, 2015

A strong new entry, but veteran players may feel like the series has moved away from some of its previously established pillars

Read full review

8 / 10
Oct 27, 2015

Like Spartan Locke and his team, 343 is chasing after something bigger than itself, and with Halo 5: Guardians, it comes close. Now if only it could reach out its arm and take hold.

Read full review

Polygon
Top Critic
9 / 10.0
Oct 26, 2015

Halo 5 offers some of the best multiplayer the series has ever seen

Read full review

Oct 26, 2015

You'll spot some rough edges and notice some omissions, but Halo 5 looks great, plays well, and has enough options to keep you coming back.

Read full review

Kotaku
Top Critic
Yes
Oct 30, 2015

The campaign isn't the greatest, but multiplayer manages to succeed in the way it always has, with the addition of a fun and inventive new mode.

Read full review

Kotaku
Top Critic
Unscored
Aug 16, 2018

Its best parts feel basic in all the best ways, both classic and modern at the same time. It never made good on the dream of seeing another more tragic, more complicated side of Master Chief, but years later, through endless updates and balance patches, it's made good on the promise of its multiplayer. Even if that were all that Halo 5 was, at this point that would still make it a very good game.

Read full review

4 / 5.0
Oct 26, 2015

Halo 5: Guardians is a fine tuned machine. It has a robust and highly addictive competitive multiplayer component, a large variety of aesthetically pleasing customizations and some of the tightest controls to ever grace a Halo title. Unfortunately, the campaign leaves much to be desired. ... If you go into Halo 5: Guardians with the intent of primarily playing multiplayer, then this won't disappoint.

Read full review

Oct 26, 2015

Halo 5: Guardians is the best installment yet in Microsoft's storied shooter series, offering exciting gameplay, an engaging story and tons of multiplayer content.

Read full review

83 / 100
Oct 25, 2015

That's the kind of story about Master Chief that I like. He knows what the odds are, and he keeps attacking anyway, taking the fight to enemy. Instead, we get a story about betrayal and an ultimate showdown. But that showdown isn't that satisfying, and it's not even what Microsoft promised in some of its earlier commercials. I was disappointed because I expected something really significant to happen in the ending, and all I got was a cliffhanger.

Read full review

8.5 / 10.0
Oct 26, 2015

The best Halo campaign since Reach, Guardians is a return to form - but more Chief next time, please, and less microtransactions.

Read full review

VideoGamer
Top Critic
9 / 10
Oct 26, 2015

Halo 5 Guardians is as slick and bombastic as an exclusive should be, hitting all the right notes in a campaign that is thrilling from end to end.

Read full review

9 / 10.0
Oct 26, 2015

The Master Chief, accompanied by Agent Locke, give us a tremendously epic adventure, which will satisfy fans of the saga, and which proposes new and most interesting ideas. Its technical section may be the beginning of a new course for first-person shooters.

Review in Spanish | Read full review

8.5 / 10.0
Nov 3, 2015

On the flip side, the team takes the approach of "less is more" in the game's multiplayer as it goes, for the most part, back to basics and it quickly transports you to the franchise of old. If this is the title you've been waiting for before making the jump to Xbox One, you won't be disappointed, as it stands, in my opinion, as the best reason to own Microsoft's console.

Read full review

Erik Kain
Top Critic
9 / 10.0
Oct 26, 2015

All told, Halo 5: Guardians is a smashing success. The campaign isn't the strongest of the series, but it's still a fun space opera romp, and its ending transforms the Halo universe completely.

Read full review

8.7 / 10.0
Oct 29, 2015

One of the most beautiful shooters of recent times, which trudges in single-player and petrifies the competition in multiplayer.

Review in Italian | Read full review

92 / 100
Oct 26, 2015

It has lost elements such as the split screen or armor skills but the content offer is brutal, the balance of the arsenal almost perfect and the news of its multiplayer mode can have us hooked for months.

Review in Spanish | Read full review