Can you install PC games on an external hard drive?

I have a question about an external hard drive and I want to know whether it would be possible to install PC games on an external hard drive and play them from there? Unfortunately, my laptop only has a storage capacity of 256GB. Halo Master Chief collection takes up 160GB of storage space. Therefore it is impossible to download this collection to my laptop.
But if I installed Halo MCC on the external hard drive, could I access the game like that?

Thank you in advance for the answers and have a nice day everyone.

Yes that would work

Yes, you can do that.

Would work, of course, then has longer loading times. If possible an external SSD and if your laptop supports it with USB 3.1

This works with many games.

But I wouldn't be so sure about Halo, especially not if it's via the GamePass.

It works, but the game only works on your laptop.

Why couldn't that work? Would be a shame about the money: '

Unfortunately, I'm not a technology savvy. Under which settings can I get this information about what my laptop supports and what doesn't?

Because Microsoft goes a bit different with its programs than the rest of the world. Think they don't want people to copy the games from the GamePass.

Search for "Device Manager", then open it and open "Universal Serial Bus controllers". There you can see the USB ports.