In an act that is both technically impressive and presumably legally dubious, a developer has got a build of the original Halo: Combat Evolved working in a web browser. And no, I didn't play the game instead of writing this article in a timely fashion; why do you ask?
Developer Mitchell Hynes recently took to X to share their browser-based rendition of Halo, and it works surprisingly well. Simply click on the site, wait for the browser to download anything it needs, and start playing. It even has full mouse and keyboard support.
It's all built off the decompilation project from Bnunu, who have been reverse-engineering the game for some time. It, combined with a fork from team Cybersecurity, supports 128-player multiplayer and works on Windows, Linux, and Android.
The site saw so much traffic from X that it very briefly went down, as it was automatically flagged for "suspected phishing", but has since come back online. Within just five hours, the browser-based project saw almost 20,000 games across 115 countries, according to the developer.
Notably, word of the site has since spread off X and has now made it to the Halo subreddit, where players are creating lobbies to battle it out.
IT'S HERE!!! HALO CE (XBOX) IN THE BROWSER!Features:✅ WORKING Splitscreen Co-op✅ WORKING Multiplayer up to 128 players (untested)❌ NO GEARBOX MASTER CHIEF pic.twitter.com/EgiHI6ji6lSeptember 29, 2026
One Redditor says, "Lmao this is great. Got a couple good kills back and forth just using trackpad. I need to get back to work now but I'm excited for such a simple way to play with people."
The only issue with multiplayer is that there doesn't appear to be any matchmaking functionality. When you click on the multiplayer mode, it gives you a room link, which you can send to others to have them play with you. Servers are peer-to-peer, as you might expect, so make sure your host has a good connection.
In my experience, it works surprisingly well. It takes a while to load a mission, which I assume has something to do with my internet connection not being great today—but it's smooth to play, and the audio sounds great too.
My only concern is that this is a free way to play a classic game, and Microsoft just launched Halo: Campaign Evolved last month. I can't imagine MS likes the idea of players playing its games for free, and in a mere moment. Still, it's fun while it lasts.
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