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Halo’s original art director thinks Campaign Evolved’s rings look too new

Marcus Lehto praised the remake's movement, cinematics, visuals, and lighting while criticizing the scale and finish of its Forerunner rings.

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Master Chief stands armed in a forested landscape with a towering Halo ring in the background.

Marcus Lehto, the art director on Halo: Combat Evolved and its two direct sequels, has a very specific complaint about Halo: Campaign Evolved: its Forerunner rings look too clean, too shiny, and far too recently built.

The remake rebuilds Combat Evolved in Unreal Engine 5, and much of it still looks faithful to the original game. The launch trailer captures that familiar Halo feel, even as the updated presentation gives the campaign a fresh visual layer.

Lehto wants Halo’s rings to feel ancient

Lehto explained his concerns in an August 13 X post comparing the original and remake versions of the Halo rings. He argued that the structures should look like ancient, living places that had endured unimaginable conflict, not polished constructions from the recent past.

“While Forerunner tech was metal (not stone) it was also ancient, vast, alive, and a tomb to the horrors that lurked within,” Lehto wrote. “It had seen hundreds of millennia of conflict. Yet the [new] game shows it as shiny metal that looks like it was built a few years ago.”

He took particular aim at the ring shown on the game’s main menu, calling it “the most offensive thing we see every time we boot up the game.” In a follow-up X post, Lehto described the remake’s version as “a shiny new toy — out of scale, no mystery, damn ugly,” arguing that it should feel massive, dark, mysterious, and sinister while still retaining a sense of wonder.

Lehto also pointed to the wear that war, Flood outbreaks, repairs, and collisions should have left on the structure. He said the design needed more small details to communicate its enormous scale and give it the feeling of an ancient tomb.

He also argued that the original ring’s position far out on the fringe of the Milky Way helped sell its distance and isolation through the background. In his view, the remake’s menu presentation does not communicate that same feeling of remoteness.

Lehto still likes most of the remake

The criticism does not amount to a rejection of Campaign Evolved. In a separate X post from August 4, Lehto praised the remake’s upgrades, including its movement, cinematics, visuals, and lighting.

“Overall, I really love the upgrades—movement, cinematics, visuals—damn the lighting is brilliant,” he wrote. “Do I have gripes? A few, but they are taking a back seat to the fun.”

Lehto’s comments were focused on the Forerunner side of the remake’s art direction. He said the Covenant and Flood aesthetics remained strong throughout Campaign Evolved, keeping his criticism aimed at the ring and the atmosphere surrounding it rather than every updated asset.

So the verdict from one of Halo’s original visual architects is fairly clear: the remake is doing plenty right, but its rings need more age, damage, detail, and mystery. Forerunner architecture was never supposed to look like it had just left the showroom.

What do you think of Lehto’s criticism of the remake’s Forerunner design? Share your thoughts in the comments, and follow us on X, Bluesky, YouTube, Instagram, Steam, Telegram.

Halo: Campaign Evolved is a faithful yet modernized remake of Halo: Combat Evolved’s campaign. Experience the original story rebuilt with high-definition visuals, updated cinematics, and refined controls, plus three brand-new prequel missions featuring the Master Chief and Sgt. Johnson. A broader arsenal of weapons, vehicles, enemies, and gameplay-modifying “Skulls” – optional modifiers that change combat in fun and challenging ways – add fresh tactics and endless replayability.