Halo : The Master Chief Collection to launch with a single ranked playlist

It isn’t long before Halo : The Master Chief Collection releases and the fans are waiting desperately for the game. The build-up to the release is really high given that the last Halo game to release was two years ago. Taking the four mainline entries in the series, this collection is not expected to be full of surprises, though Halo 2 is getting a great facelift. As a result, it appears to be the priority online, with it being the only one getting a ranked playlist at launch.

As revealed by Halo Waypoint, while all four games will have online play from the start, Halo 2 Anniversary will be the only one with a ranked playlist. Here’s the word from the developers...

“Additionally, we built Halo: The Master Chief Collections’ ranking system to emulate the exact Halo 2-style leveling, but it is a system that has been built from the ground up. This is the first time we’ve built a Matchmaking and ranking system that will work across multiple games, and as a result, we’ll be rolling out ranking for each playlist post-launch, and will launch with one ranked playlist, Team Halo 2: Anniversary.

As time goes on, we’ll be rolling out the official ranked version for each ranked playlist. For example, the Halo 3 and Halo 4 playlists will not be ranked immediately at launch (however, they will still have skill matchmaking underneath to ensure balanced matches), but will each receive ranked play post-launch. As this is a new system custom built for this game, we do expect some players to make every effort to exploit the system, and will be agile in issuing fixes and updates. Additionally, if needed, we will reset ranks after launch to ensure that all player’s ranks are fair, consistent, and accurate. We’ll provide more details on ranking and the playlist ranking rollout in the near future.”

That is disappointing to some extent but it is better to wait for an efficiently working ranked playlist rather than to have to adjust with something which isn’t quite upto the mark. The game is set for a release on November 11 for Xbox One and the remaining ranked playlists are expected to arrive soon.