Subscribe to download
Halo CE 1749

This is the 1749 beta build of Halo: Combat Evolved fully brought to the Master Chief Collection. 1749 is a pre-release version of Halo CE dated for August 15th 2001, 3 months before the final Xbox release. Despite being so close to the release date, this build will look and feel wildly different. Everything from models to sounds to AI and weapon balancing will be significantly changed.

You need BOTH campaign and multiplayer installed for Halo CE

VIDEO:
https://youtu.be/yEJrDhJ5PjA

NEXUS:
https://www.nexusmods.com/halothemasterchiefcollection/mods/2606

This port features BOTH the 1749 single player campaign and the 1749 multiplayer. Coop campaign is also fully working.

NOTE: The original 1749 only featured three difficulties: Normal, Heroic, and Legendary. Due to limitations with MCC's mod tools, I cannot fully remove the Easy difficulty. To get around this, I made Easy functionally the same as Normal difficulty (at least as much as I could with the tools). Regardless, I recommend sticking with the original three difficulties to avoid any potential issues.

IMPORTANT:
Please read the section on softlocks and confusing sections. ALL 1749 softlocks have been fixed for this port, but there are several sections where it’s unclear how to proceed even for seasoned CE vets. Read this section before starting so you don’t get stuck.

WARNING VERY DIFFICULT:
This build was before all in-game balancing was tuned. As a result, the higher difficulties are extremely difficult. There's triple the amount of enemies in certain sections and you have less health and shields overall. Recommend sticking with Normal or Heroic unless you really want a challenge.

FEATURES:
- Single Player Campaign (including coop)
- Multiplayer
- All original 1749 softlocks have been FIXED
- Difficulty (Legendary is extremely hard)
- Lighting
- AI
- In-game Models
- Cutscenes
- Weapons
- Vehicles (including janky physics)
- Sounds and Dialogue
- Beta Health and Weapon Balancing
- New Encounters

WHAT TO EXPECT

This build will feel like a fever dream, almost everything you encounter will look and feel completely different than what you’re used to. Here’s some examples:

- All Covenant speak English (including Hunters)
- Blue Elites and Armored Marines have variations in their armor. Some will spawn without shoulder or leg guards
- Beta health pack models (same one from the CE manual)
- AI reacts lightning quick, you literally cannot sneak up on them
- Chief has much less health and shields on Legendary (extremely difficult)
- Double/Triple the amount of enemies in certain sections on Legendary (again, very difficult...)
- Very few health and ammo pickups
- Plasma Pistol and Needler animations are unfinished
- Cutscenes are unfinished and glitchy, many cutscenes are missing
- Keyes does not give you an unloaded pistol on the first mission, instead you acquire one from a crewman
- Captain Keyes is dead from the very beginning on the mission "Keyes"
- Assault on the Control Room is instead called "Fortress World"
- Shotgun appears on the second and third missions, but the weapon has been significantly nerfed (shoots and melees much slower)
- Flamethrower appears in the campaign and has completely unique HUD elements, but the weapon is unfinished and hard to use
- Killing an enemy with the flamethrower causes them to run around screaming for a few seconds before dying
- Pelican turns its wings to hover
- Tank drives almost twice as fast
- Plasma weapons in multiplayer stun players making them much more OP

SOFTLOCKS

The original 1749 beta notoriously had softlocks on four levels. As part of this port ALL softlocks have been FIXED:

Pillar of Autumn:
- Fixed scripting error preventing the maintenance doors from opening after the lifepod section

Truth and Reconciliation:
- Spawn Captain Keyes after the prison cutscene. Without this, the game thinks Keyes is dead leading to an infinite game over loop
- Make final button pressable at the end of the level to kick off the ending cutscene

Two Betrayals:
- Fixed scripting error where deactivating the final pulse generator did not end the level

The Maw:
- Fix fall timer to support the big warthog drop after Foehammer section

CONFUSING SECTIONS

Despite the above, there are several sections where it’s unclear how to proceed even if you’ve beaten the base game several times. THIS MAY NOT BE A COMPLETE LIST. It's very easy to accidentally skip certain progression triggers so try not to rush too much.

Pillar of Autumn:
- In the maintenance section, you need to walk up to the red (locked) doors. Cortana will then open them up for you. There’s no NAV marker hinting at this.

Truth and Reconciliation:
- Enemies like to hide at the lift. If the lift cutscene doesn’t play after killing the hunters, just look around, there’s likely a grunt hiding somewhere
- On the return after the prison, the bridge door is “locked’, but you can still go through it. Make sure Keyes is with you as there’s no way back once you return to the bridge

Fortress World (Assault on the Control Room):
- Some rooms have arrows pointing the wrong way
- The open area after the tank tunnel section does not have any enemy spawns

343 Guilty Spark:
- After the reveal cutscene, the section where flood forms break down the doors is extremely confusing. First stand on one of the two raised up portions in the center of the room, then look at each door. You must do this for EVERY door in the room except the one you used to enter the room. Don’t forget the two doors on the second floor.

Two Betrayals:
- Buttons to open the starting doors are misaligned, just look around for the actual hologram
- In the area with the 2nd generator, there's the room with the "4th generator". This one does not do anything. If you enter second gen and see no enemies, you're actually in the wrong room, go to the other one on the other end

The Maw:
- After the bridge placeholder cutscene DO NOT go back through the cafeteria, instead go to the door on the left

LIGHTING

The sections in 1749 where there were no lightmaps had to be re-created in MCC. The CE engine in MCC does not render maps correctly when no lightmaps are provided. To get around this, I needed to generate “bad” lightmaps to closely resemble the flat and weird shading in the OG 1749 build. This combined with slightly over-exposing the resulting lightmaps led to lighting that resembles the OG 1749 reasonably well. It's not perfect, but it's a lot closer than I ever expected to get.

CREDITS:

VengefulVadam - Modding know-how and 1749 analysis

SiliconMaster - Help with MCC/1749 lighting

Helpless7 - Gave me this idea along with the original maps and build. Primary tester.

Invader Developers - Tag/Script extraction from the original 1749 maps