Since the very first Xbox, the Halo series has been one of the most iconic video game franchises for the brand. Halo Infinite's delay from 2020 into 2021 has given fans plenty of time to theorize and speculate what the game will be like and the benefits of a year-long delay. In a gaming culture where plenty of titles release unfinished in any given year, fans are hopeful that the game's delay will allow 343 Industries to take the time it needs to deliver another excellent Halo title.
During the time waiting for an official release date of Halo Infinite, there may have been fans putting plenty of time into replaying the series from start to finish. Halo: The Master Chief Collection is a great place to start for anyone looking to brush up on their Halo lore, but with five entries in the main series, playing through every Halo game in anticipation for Infinite is quite a tall order.
Beating Every Halo Game
The five main titles in the Halo series are Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3, Halo 4 and Halo 5: Guardians. Each game has a single-player campaign that follows the story of Master Chief and the campaigns have varying lengths. Notably, though, completing the main story of each game should take between eight and ten hours.
Halo: Combat Evolved: 1o hours
Halo 2: 9 hours
Halo 3: 8 hours
Halo 4: 7.5 hours
Halo 5: Guardians: 8 hours
Combine each game together, and a playthrough of the main Halo series would take someone roughly 42 and a half hours. While playing through a series in more than 40 hours is certainly a major time commitment, many fans of the series know that there's more to Halo than 1 through 5.
Actually Beating Every Halo Game
While there are only five mainline games in the Halo series, there are actually 15 games in the franchise total. Some are nothing more than a Dave and Buster's lightgun game, but if someone is looking to play through every Halo game in existence, they're going to need to do a little more digging. The spinoff games are Halo Wars, Halo: ODST, Halo Reach, Halo: Spartan Assault, Halo: Spartan Strike, Halo Wars 2, Halo Recruit and Halo: Fireteam Raven.
- Halo Wars: 9 hours
- Halo: ODST: 6.5 hours
- Halo Reach: 8 hours
- Halo: Spartan Assault: 4 hours
- Halo: Spartan Strike: 5 hours
- Halo Wars 2: 8 hours
- Halo Recruit: 5 minutes
- Halo: Fireteam Raven: 45 minutes
All in all, adding up each spinoff totals an additional 40 hours and 20 minutes of playtime. So, for a full playthrough of the entire Halo series, it would take roughly 82 hours and 50 minutes. There are still two more games that need to be added to the total playtime, however. While they aren't different games technically speaking, the anniversary remasters of both Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2 deserve their own separate playthroughs as significant work was done on them to warrant a rerelease.
- Halo: Combat Evolved - Anniversary: 10 hours
- Halo 2: Anniversary: 8 hours
Now, all things considered, a true, full playthrough of the entire Halo franchise would take 100 hours and 50 minutes.
Halo Infinite and Beyond
Obviously, most people looking to replay the Halo series aren't headed to Dave and Buster's, but it's interesting to note just how big the franchise has gotten. With a TV series in the works set to air on Paramount Plus and Halo Infinite's rumored massive scope, it's easy to imagine the series growing even bigger from here. There's still no officially announced release date for Infinite, but there are clearly plenty of Halo games to keep fans busy in the meantime.
Halo Infinite is expected to release in 2021 for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.