The closest games to Halo 4 are Halo Infinite, Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 5: Guardians. Below, 9 picks with the reason for each — what carries over from Halo 4, and what does not.
Halo 4 is the first one 343 made, and it is the entry where the series stopped being about the sandbox and started being about Cortana. The Prometheans are divisive, the sprint and loadouts moved it toward its competitors, and the Master Chief's story got the best writing it has ever had.
Halo 4 released on the Xbox 360. The list below is not restricted to that console — a recommendation is only useful if you can actually play it, so it spans generations and platforms.
The best the series has played since Halo 3, and free to play in multiplayer.
The original sandbox, and the one to play if the shooting is what you want.
The direct sequel, if you want the story continued.
By Halo's original studio, and the gunfeel carried over completely.
The best campaign in a modern shooter and the best movement in any.
Push-forward combat with a resource economy that never lets you idle.
The other Xbox shooter pillar, heavier and cover-led.
A single-player shooter campaign that still commits to being one.
The PlayStation answer, with a far stranger arsenal.
Several of these have their own page here: games like Halo: Combat Evolved, games like Destiny 2, games like Titanfall 2, games like Gears of War, games like Wolfenstein: The New Order.
The 6 of these picks that have a page here, and the console each is catalogued under. Most are on more platforms than one — remasters and back catalogues move constantly — so treat this as where to start looking rather than a complete availability list.
| Game | Catalogued under |
|---|---|
| Halo: Combat Evolved | Xbox |
| Destiny 2 | PC |
| Titanfall 2 | Xbox One |
| Gears of War | Xbox 360 |
| Wolfenstein: The New Order | PS4 |
| Resistance: Fall of Man | PS3 |
Halo Infinite. The best the series has played since Halo 3, and free to play in multiplayer.
Halo Infinite, Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 5: Guardians are the closest. The full list of Halo 4 similar games is on this page — 9 of them, each with the reason it is here rather than a genre tag that happens to match.
Yes — Gears of War is catalogued on the Xbox 360 here. The Xbox 360 list further down has more from that library.
Because the thing you liked about Halo 4 is not a property of the hardware. Restricting the list to one console would drop most of the good answers, so the picks above span platforms and eras. If you specifically want more from that library, the Xbox 360 list further down is the place to start.
By hand, one game at a time, on what the source game actually does — its pacing, its movement, its difficulty, its tone. Genre tags alone put Halo 4 next to games that feel nothing like it, so they are not the basis for this list. Each pick carries the reason it is here so you can judge it yourself.
No. The whole list is on this page, free, with no sign-in and no email. We earn a small affiliate commission if you buy through a retailer link, which is what pays for the site.
If you already know what kind of answer you want, these are the same list cut by genre — and each one says what it leaves out as well as what it includes:
More from the Xbox 360 library, each with its own recommendations page: