Halo: Campaign Evolved promises a new experience with the original Halo campaign, but one of the game’s original designers isn’t having it. Revealed yesterday at the Halo World Championship, Halo: Campaign Evolved is an Unreal Engine 5 remake of Master Chief’s first adventure. Campaign Evolved will be the first Halo game to show up on PlayStation consoles, so it could end up being many players’ introduction to the franchise.

Halo: Combat Evolved designer Jaime Griesemer responded to Campaign Evolved gameplay footage on X, critiquing a couple of level design changes. He calls out a topographical change that allows players to “steamroll the Hunters” in the first area with the Warthog, noting that he “intentionally placed rocks in the way” in the original game. Griesemer’s harshest critique is reserved for the addition of trees in the landing area for a jump, which he deems “the worst part.”

Halo: CE Designer Thinks Halo Has Lost Its Way

Halo Is A Product Of Its Time

Griesemer didn’t just drop his takes and disappear, and the replies on X are full of his own responses. He acknowledges and even celebrates that some players were able to get the warthog past the rocks in the original, calling Alpha 9’s workaround a “very clever solution.”

In another reply, Griesemer ultimately posits that Halo‘s modern difficulties stem from being a game “of its time“ — that time being the early 2000s. Halo Studios has been alternately attempting to “take Halo out of 2001 and modernize it” and “take players back to 2001 with nostalgia,” neither of which Griesemer sees as viable paths.

Halo: Campaign Evolved Has Some Challenges Ahead

Griesemer’s frustrations echo many community sentiments, as Halo has struggled to find a consistent footing in the modern era. Not every fan agrees with Griesemer’s critiques, and plenty have come out in defense of Halo: Campaign Evolved‘s changes.

Either way, it’s interesting to get some perspective from the original designer, and his complaints highlight a frequent problem with remasters and remakes. Modernized classics often overwrite game design choices that limit the player, but these choices were usually there for a reason. A similar concern can be raised about Halo: Campaign Evolved‘s addition of sprinting, although purists will have the option to toggle it off.

Halo: Campaign Evolved won’t be out until next year, so Halo fans will likely get to see (and judge) a lot more of the game before they can actually play it. If it turns out to be a disappointment, the original Halo: Combat Evolved is always here as a trusty fallback.