When Microsoft announced Halo 5 Forge as a free, Windows 10-only game, we wondered exactly what gamers would and wouldn't get from its eventual September launch. We knew the free download would include the series' long-running "Forge" mode (since, hey, it's titular), meaning players would be able to use mice and keyboards to build their own custom Halo 5 maps and online-combat alterations. But what else?

Microsoft confirmed to me in May that the mode would also enable online multiplayer, so users wouldn't have to dash to an Xbox One console to test their Forge creations. You could build your own level and then invite anybody on your Xbox Live friends list to join a battle in Halo 5's "custom game" mode so long as they, too, were running the limited Windows 10 version of the game. That didn't sound like a bad freebie, but it seemed like a pretty limited tease and/or advertisement of what Halo 5 on console offers.

What Microsoft didn't tell me back then, and instead revealed on Thursday with the free download's launch, is that the free game includes some pre-made levels. Not just the weird-looking Forge ones, either.

Halo 5 Forge contains the entire "Arena" mode. All 15 pre-made maps and every Microsoft-built twist on the game's quintet of Forge sandboxes are here, matching the retail version of Halo 5's Arena mode on Xbox One.

I downloaded the free Windows 10 game (yes, this requires the Windows 10 Anniversary update) and connected my rig to a 4K monitor to test out exactly what gamers are getting here. My takeaway is this: Halo 5 Forge is probably the best free, few-strings-attached PC shooter of the past few years, thanks to its surprising depth of content and its astoundingly crisp performance.

So long as you do your own matchmaking







Let's get the bad news out of the way. You will not be able to simply tap "find game" and get into a few rounds of free Halo 5 combat like on Xbox One. You also won't be able to set up a mode in which the game automatically rotates through pre-set modes and options on a level-by-level basis. Instead, Microsoft has thrown this game out to fans and told them, "Set your own lobbies up."

Should you want to enjoy free Halo 5 Arena battling on this free PC version, you'll need to sleuth around and find an online community where like-minded PC gamers are exchanging Xbox Live "gamertags" (user IDs) and joining each other's "custom game" lobbies. Those lobbies are the only way to load and get into online multiplayer in Halo 5 Forge.

Luckily, this is 2016. Those discoveries are a lot easier these days. The way I got into some quick, free fragging was through Discord, a Slack-like chat service that lets gamers create free lobbies on their Web browsers to coordinate this exact sort of ID exchange. Arguably the busiest place to do so right now is this "Halo 5 Forge LFG" Discord channel, which is humming with players on the game's first day.

Of course, you may have a boisterous enough friends list to invite known players to your own custom games without trouble, at which point you can pick from the game's 23 pre-built modes (from standard "Slayer" deathmatch to the beloved "Grifball" combat-sport twist to Halo 5's rapid-fire, round-by-round "Breakout" battles) and load a game on any map, either pre-built or custom-made. Just like on console, this PC build's different Arena modes have different player counts, with Breakout topping out at 4v4 team combat and Slayer capped at 16 players total.

If you want to pick through thousands of fan-made Forge maps, you're stuck with a console-like interface full of giant thumbnails and limited level descriptions, but tabs for "featured" and "most liked" level choices will point you toward decent stuff (and classic level remakes) in a pinch. As a lobby leader, should you pick a fan-made level, everyone in your lobby will immediately and conveniently download that same level.