McFarlane Toys/Halo: Anniversary Edition Series 1 - Advance

The McFarlane Halo: Anniversary Edition figures are a series of five-inch action figures made by McFarlane Toys, based off of the characters from the Halo series in celebration of the tenth anniversary of the first game's release. The first wave of figures, Series 1 - Advance, was essentially a re-release of specific Halo 3 figures with minor changes. Unlike the second wave (Series 1), these figures do not come with any difficulty plaque parts. The figures were released in July, 2011.

Elite Combat
This figure is a crimson repaint of the Halo 3 Elite figures. It comes with a Plasma Rifle and a Plasma Grenade.

The Plasma Grenade does not have a weapon peg, even though there is a hole for one. The inside bubble of the packaging does not fit the Plasma Rifle. The spot is too small, and therefore crushes the soft-plastic weapon. It also has no place to store it. This can be fixed by soaking the weapon in hot water, bending it in the right position, and quickly cooling it. Also, the figure does not use the hinged-finger hands that were featured on later Series of Halo 3 Elite that made putting in weapons easier. Instead, it uses the original hands found on the initial Elite figures without the hinges, which makes holding weapons harder. The card back shows the Elite as being a bright "Covenant Purple", but the actual figure is crimson.

Master Chief
There are two Master Chief figures in this series. The first is a solid platinum repaint of the Halo 3 Master Chief figures. It comes with an Assault Rifle and two Frag Grenades of matching color. The second is a standard Master Chief figure with regular colors, with the same accessories, also in regular colors. McFarlane's site does not acknowledge the existence of the regular-colored figure and released no stock photos of it. Both packages are the same, showing the platinum figure on the front and back.

The figures are in scale with the Halo: Reach figures rather than the Halo 3 figures, making them slightly larger than previous version of the figure.

ODST
The ODST figure from this series is almost identical to the Halo 3 Series 2 ODST figure. There are some minor changes, such as having slightly larger shoulder armor, with white highlights instead of a solid black. Also, the figure has additional pouches on its belt. It comes with a Battle Rifle, like the original version.

Spartan Recon
This figure is a Halo 3 Multiplayer Spartan with Recon armor. Unlike the Master Chief figure, these Spartans are the original Halo 3 Spartans, not the Halo: Reach size ones. There are two color available, red and blue. However, McFarlane's website only lists the red figure, and there are no stock photos of the blue figure. Both comes with a Plasma Rifle and a deactivated Energy Sword hilt. The red and blue recon armor were previously on available through the Halo Points promotion, but are now available with a body. The figures have weapon storage on both legs, which was only seen before in Series 8 Spartans. Packaging for both figures are the same, showing only the red Spartan on the front and the back.