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Halo 5 Guardians: #huntthetruth

samurai1226 said:
Master Chief was the most boring character of the Halo series. He's just running from A to B because Cortana/343GS/Keyes/etc are telling him to do.
In H4 he finally is choosing sides, doing the thing he think is right and not what Del Rio wants. This cutscene was one of the most epic moments in the Halo series. Like the one in planet of the apes where Caesar finally speaks, just unbelievable John just did that. He still isnt an emotional whiny Episode 2 Anakin, just because his indoctrinated opinion is in question through the end of Halo 4.
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Aye, he was. Much like Harry Potter was one of the most boring characters in that series, Frodo in LotR, Luke Skywalker in Star Wars. The Master Chief wasn't meant to be an edgy caricature. The core strength of his character was the simplicity in which he operated, the actions he carried out and the power of silence. Humanising a character who literally isn't human, and then similarly completely neglecting the supporting cast has not been a good move for the series.

What's funnier, is that Halo 4 MC is no less boring than how he is portrayed in 1-3, 343i did a really poor of characterising his relationship with Cortana, despite trying to do so.

Final Verdict said:
Narrative disaster?? Whaaa?

If you don't like the more mature tone I understand, but I think that a lot of us that grew up with Halo have been wanting a darker more complex plot that's not as cut and dry as MC being an flat character that you play to save the universe over and over again until all the halos are destroyed, and the covanent/alien bad guys are exterminated.
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Complex to what cost? Barely understandable? There was a lot of obfuscation in Halo 4, notably surrounding the Didact (who wasn't even named in Halo 4). Not to mention the deliberate vagueness in the re-instigation of the Humano-Covenant conflict, as well as the over reliance of terminals in order to just make the plot functional.

It was hardly dark either, unless you mean in the literal sense. I advise playing the incredibly colourful Majora's Mask to get a real feel of how to master symbolic, emotional darkness within an actual storyline.
 
wesleyshark said:
There's a trident here:

- UrDidact (original)

- IsoDidact (formerly Bornstellar. He, Chant-to-Green (the subsequent Librarian) and the remaining Forerunners departed the Galaxy before the Halos were fired. No one has seen or heard from them since.)

- John-117 (the audio epilogue to the Forerunner Trilogy, among other clues, points to the genesong of IsoDidact that was imprinted on Riser has been passed down to MC)



There are two known Arks... the Greater Ark (which was destroyed), and the Lesser Ark (which was heavily damaged at the close of Halo 3. Whether or not it is still habitable/explorable is TBA, and dare I assume, part of Halo 5's plot perhaps.)
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Whoa, where did that detail about
Didact and remaining forerunners fleeing the Galaxy prior to firing the rings come from? I assumed they died when they were fired.

Is that from the final Greg Bear book? I mean, that changes everything...
 
If you take a look at all the pictures we have of Halo 5 from 343 you will see a triangle in the bottom right corner. This signifies the importance of ONI and the huge part it will play in Halo 5. Within the triangle are the letters YJHG. These letters stand for Yiander Japlin Hanger Grid. The YJHG can be found within various Halo novels and it is known as the main ONI headquarters that controls all of it's air trafficking grid. This leads me to believe that various parts of Halo 5's campaign and possibly even multiplayer will take place at ONI's universal headquarters responsible for air trafficking control. This setting will also ultimately reveal Locke's origin and why he is of importance in the Halo universe. This changes everything.
 
Compsiox said:
If you take a look at all the pictures we have of Halo 5 from 343 you will see a triangle in the bottom right corner. This signifies the importance of ONI and the huge part it will play in Halo 5. Within the triangle are the letters YJHG. These letters stand for Yiander Japlin Hanger Grid. The YJHG can be found within various Halo novels and it is known as the main ONI headquarters that controls all of it's air trafficking grid. This leads me to believe that various parts of Halo 5's campaign and possibly even multiplayer will take place at ONI's universal headquarters responsible for air trafficking control. This setting will also ultimately reveal Locke's origin and why he is of importance in the Halo universe. This changes everything.
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Wut

I need pics.
 
GringoSuave89 said:
Wut

I need pics.
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cX9gdp6.jpg
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whoa
 
Compsiox said:
If you take a look at all the pictures we have of Halo 5 from 343 you will see a triangle in the bottom right corner. This signifies the importance of ONI and the huge part it will play in Halo 5. Within the triangle are the letters YJHG. These letters stand for Yiander Japlin Hanger Grid. The YJHG can be found within various Halo novels and it is known as the main ONI headquarters that controls all of it's air trafficking grid. This leads me to believe that various parts of Halo 5's campaign and possibly even multiplayer will take place at ONI's universal headquarters responsible for air trafficking control. This setting will also ultimately reveal Locke's origin and why he is of importance in the Halo universe. This changes everything.
Click to expand...
Nq6ogcU.gif


IFgmuvT.gif
 
Akai__ said:
.
I'm more interested in Halo 5's gameplay, than the story this time, though. Halo 4 did underperform in terms of gameplay, in my opinion.
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What? Seriously? Of all the things 343 dud wrong with Halo 4, gameplay was definitely not one of them. The game plays better than any Halo before it.

Chief has weight without being sluggish. He's not floaty, and the gunplay is almost perfect. Only Titanfall is better and that's not a fair comparison anyway given how different they are.

Unless you're referring to a different part of the gameplay?
 
Collingwood said:
What? Seriously? Of all the things 343 dud wrong with Halo 4, gameplay was definitely not one of them. The game plays better than any Halo before it.

Chief has weight without being sluggish. He's not floaty, and the gunplay is almost perfect. Only Titanfall is better and that's not a fair comparison anyway given how different they are.

Unless you're referring to a different part of the gameplay?
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Gunplay perfect? HELL NO!
 
Stinkles said:
This man just won a random collection of whatever is on my desk tomorrow.

http://i.imgur.com/MFYC937.jpg[/img

The soundcloud file above is nothing to do with us.[/QUOTE]

[quote="Thursday War, post: 157021015"]is that keegan michael key doing the vo?[/QUOTE]

i would like something too :(
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Chemical Rampancy said:
Complex to what cost? Barely understandable? There was a lot of obfuscation in Halo 4, notably surrounding the Didact (who wasn't even named in Halo 4). Not to mention the deliberate vagueness in the re-instigation of the Humano-Covenant conflict, as well as the over reliance of terminals in order to just make the plot functional.

It was hardly dark either, unless you mean in the literal sense. I advise playing the incredibly colourful Majora's Mask to get a real feel of how to master symbolic, emotional darkness within an actual storyline.
Click to expand...
I'm not talking about the complexity of the lore, but the maturity of the overarching plot, which is not that hard to understand, yet impactfull.

You point out the Diadact not being formally named, but neither was the Arbiter in Halo 2/3, and knowing his true name is an irrelevant detail as we simply refer to him as the Diadact anyways.

I do agree that the covanent human conflict stuff could, and should have been done better, and I do wish they could have had the terminal videos loaded on disc rather than put on waypoint which was immersion breaking, but putting that info in terminal s WAS in my opinion the best way to present it as it was background information, that couldn't have been presented in story cutscenes without bogging down the story/action.
 
Final Verdict said:
I'm not talking about the complexity of the lore, but the maturity of the overarching plot, which is not that hard to understand, yet impactfull.

You point out the Diadact not being formally named, but neither was the Arbiter in Halo 2/3, and knowing his true name is an irrelevant detail as we simply refer to him as the Diadact anyways.

I do agree that the covanent human conflict stuff could, and should have been done better, and I do wish they could have had the terminal videos loaded on disc rather than put on waypoint which was immersion breaking, but putting that info in terminal s WAS in my opinion the best way to present it as it was background information, that couldn't have been presented in story cutscenes without bogging down the story/action.
Click to expand...

If they needed to rely on terminals then they should have told a different story, IMO.

On a side note, the arbiter was named by a prophet, whereas the didactic was somehow known to be 'the didact' by cortana.
 
Chemical Rampancy said:
On a side note, the arbiter was named by a prophet, whereas the didactic was somehow known to be 'the didact' by cortana.
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Cortana's been consistently interacting with Forerunner systems since the first game. I feel like the name of one of basically four major political/military figures at the time of the original array being fired could have popped up.

I do wish that connection was made clearer, but it didn't seem out of place coming into it with information from the Greg Bear novels and the previous games. I mean, even in gameplay terms, he was repeatedly brought up in the Halo 3 terminals.
 
Oh man, catching up on those hype posts and come down.. mmmm.

A serial-esc podcast is a great idea. The short episodes.. are probably going to end up being a limiting factor, and that wasn't the best debut either.
The unfortunate thing is, that as a fan, this all feels like worn ground. We've known or at least assumed the traitor angle was coming since the reveal last year. Our headspace has had a year in that context.
So how much are we really going to learn?

It's why the idea of a story trailer doesn't exit really either.

Man, I desperately want Halo 5 to be good.
 
Zeouterlimits said:
Oh man, catching up on those hype posts and come down.. mmmm.

A serial-esc podcast is a great idea. The short episodes.. are probably going to end up being a limiting factor, and that wasn't the best debut either.
The unfortunate thing is, that as a fan, this all feels like worn ground. We've known or at least assumed the traitor angle was coming since the reveal last year. Our headspace has had a year in that context.
So how much are we really going to learn?

It's why the idea of a story trailer doesn't exit really either.

Man, I desperately want Halo 5 to be good.
Click to expand...

Who said the podcasts will be short? The first one is more of an intro. I'm sure they'll be longer.
 
DesertFox said:
Whoa, where did that detail about
Didact and remaining forerunners fleeing the Galaxy prior to firing the rings come from? I assumed they died when they were fired.

Is that from the final Greg Bear book? I mean, that changes everything...
Click to expand...

There are two epilogues that were released in audio format. One covers the burial of a shard of Mendicant Bias on the Lesser Ark, and the other covers a final conversation between IsoDidact, Chakas and Riser before IsoDidact and Chant-to-Green and the rest depart before the firing of the Halos. Let me try and find the transcript for ya.
 
GringoSuave89 said:
Who said the podcasts will be short? The first one is more of an intro. I'm sure they'll be longer.
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Who said it would be longer?
I have my doubts they'll be much longer than 10 minutes.
A 3 minute debut episode? Normally hit hard and strong when you debut something.

To continue the serial comparison, look at that first episode, it's 55 minutes.
 
Chemical Rampancy said:
If they needed to rely on terminals then they should have told a different story, IMO.

On a side note, the arbiter was named by a prophet, whereas the didactic was somehow known to be 'the didact' by cortana.
Click to expand...

Like I said, the main story arc was easily understandable, even without the terminals.

Chief awoke this ancient forerunner that didn't like the humans, and tried to destroy them with the composer. Meanwhile, Cortana is going rampant, and in the end sacrifices herself to save John....not hard to understand, and that is all the story that most people want/need.
the terminals is just extra backstory on the Diadact so we can know who he was in his society, and his motives for fighting humanity.
But that stuff is not necessary to know, just icing on the cake for us halo nerds.

A well told story doesn't get caught up in details...it just covers the meat of things, and that is what H4 did, put us right in the action.
 
DesertFox said:
Whoa, where did that detail about
Didact and remaining forerunners fleeing the Galaxy prior to firing the rings come from? I assumed they died when they were fired.

Is that from the final Greg Bear book? I mean, that changes everything...
Click to expand...

Halo: Silentium: Epilogue

1. Rebirth - [transcript]
2. The Trial of Mendicant Bias - [transcript]

LINK (too long to info dump here lol)

I had it a bit off- IsoDidact and company leave after the Halos are fired, but were kept safe from their destructive pulse because they were on the Lesser Ark. After the Halos were fired, they returned Riser, Vinnevra, and the rest of their kind to Erde-Tyrene, did a few other things, then departed the galaxy for places unknown.
 
wesleyshark said:
Halo: Silentium: Epilogue

1. Rebirth - [transcript]
2. The Trial of Mendicant Bias - [transcript]

LINK (too long to info dump here lol)

I had it a bit off- IsoDidact and company leave after the Halos are fired, but were kept safe from their destructive pulse because they were on the Lesser Ark. After the Halos were fired, they returned Riser, Vinnevra, and the rest of their kind to Erde-Tyrene, did a few other things, then departed the galaxy for places unknown.
Click to expand...

Wait, so IsoDidact, and a few others are still alive??
 
Final Verdict said:
Like I said, the main story arc was easily understandable, even without the terminals.

Chief awoke this ancient forerunner that didn't like the humans, and tried to destroy them with the composer. Meanwhile, Cortana is going rampant, and in the end sacrifices herself to save John....not hard to understand, and that is all the story that most people want/need.
the terminals is just extra backstory on the Diadact so we can know who he was in his society, and his motives for fighting humanity.
But that stuff is not necessary to know, just icing on the cake for us halo nerds.

A well told story doesn't get caught up in details...it just covers the meat of things, and that is what H4 did, put us right in the action.
Click to expand...

Breaking the story down to that is still an issue, as it then has no ties to the previous Halo game fiction whatsoever aside from Chief and Cortana. People that don't read the extended fiction want some Halo story, but not something super deep that you need to have read a ton to get.

Opinions and all.
 
wesleyshark said:
Halo: Silentium: Epilogue

1. Rebirth - [transcript]
2. The Trial of Mendicant Bias - [transcript]

LINK (too long to info dump here lol)

I had it a bit off- IsoDidact and company leave after the Halos are fired, but were kept safe from their destructive pulse because they were on the Lesser Ark. After the Halos were fired, they returned Riser, Vinnevra, and the rest of their kind to Erde-Tyrene, did a few other things, then departed the galaxy for places unknown.
Click to expand...
Awesome - thanks!

The possibilities that this poses for the future of the story are pretty exciting. Maybe they were somehow able to restore their civilization and population in another galaxy.
 
Final Verdict said:
Like I said, the main story arc was easily understandable, even without the terminals.

Chief awoke this ancient forerunner that didn't like the humans, and tried to destroy them with the composer. Meanwhile, Cortana is going rampant, and in the end sacrifices herself to save John....not hard to understand, and that is all the story that most people want/need.
the terminals is just extra backstory on the Diadact so we can know who he was in his society, and his motives for fighting humanity.
But that stuff is not necessary to know, just icing on the cake for us halo nerds.

A well told story doesn't get caught up in details...it just covers the meat of things, and that is what H4 did, put us right in the action.
Click to expand...

How can people pride Halo 4's storyline as dark and mature, but then go on to dismiss a villains motivations and characterisation like they're a luxuries which have no place in the narrative? It is downright atrocious storytelling, there is no two ways about it.

Halo Wars had a better story than Halo 4 and I really mean that.
 
DesertFox said:
Awesome - thanks!

The possibilities that this poses for the future of the story is pretty exciting. Maybe they were somehow able to restore their civilization and population in another galaxy.
Click to expand...

Yeah, there's just so much possibility with how open ended the epilogue is. It's partly why I think maybe we'll see MC on the Lesser Ark again, trying to find that shard of Medicant Bias.
 
I'll chime in and say that while I don't think Halo 4's story is some masterpiece, I'm a guy that has only played the main games in the series and hasn't read any books, comics, or watched any terminals whatsoever. I was able to follow and comprehend Halo 4's story just fine, although I did seek out extra story details after the fact to enrich my experience.
 
Mesonak said:
I'll chime in and say that while I don't think Halo 4's story is some masterpiece, I'm a guy that has only played the main games in the series and hasn't read any books, comics, or watched any terminals whatsoever. I was able to follow and comprehend Halo 4's story just fine, although I did seek out extra story details after the fact to enrich my experience.
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That sounds entirely reasonable and I applaud you, sir!
 
From Halo Waypoint today:

Mendicant Bias was finally defeated during a final battle against the Forerunners’ last remaining fleets, led by another AI known as Offensive Bias. This battle came to an end as the Halo Array was fired, eliminating any previous advantage that Mendicant Bias held. Subsequently, Mendicant was sentenced and locked away on the Ark installation. This would not be permanent however, as sometime after the activation of Halo, a shard of the AI managed to escape into a Forerunner dreadnought, attempting to make amends for the crimes against its makers by aiding humanity. The ancilla’s efforts were cut short when the dreadnought crashed onto Janjur Qom, the nascent homeworld of the San’Shyuum.
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I'm thinking we're going to see the buried remnant of Medicant Bias show up in Halo 5, or at the latest, Halo 6.
 
According to a user from HaloArchive.com (CIA391 to be exact), a picture from the HuntTheTruth.Tumblr.com blog hides a couple words. I can't find the original picture on the site anymore to verify it's provenance, but it could have been taken down when the site got updated Sunday night. Here is the original picture:

Ta0YTbo.png


Inverting the colors and pulling some other monkey business reveals this (and you can confirm this with your image editor of choice if you're so inclined):

lFNFeyl.jpg


The two words are "Demons" and "Gods." If you're thinking "that sounds familiar," pat yourself on the back. You are an astute Halo fan! They come from the very first sentence we hear in the Halo 3 Announce Trailer from E3 2006, which is Cortana (possibly affected by the Gravemind) stating, "I have defied gods and demons." Here's the full transcript of the trailer:

I have defied gods and demons.
I am your shield. I am your sword.
I know you. Your past. Your future.

This is the way the world ends.

That last line references the Cortana Letters, a series of emails sent in 1999, before Halo had even been formally announced, to a Marathon fan site. From the first Cortana Letter:

I have walked the edge of the Abyss.
I have governed the unwilling.
I have witnessed countless empires break before me.
I have seen the most courageous soldiers fall away in fear.
[I was there with the Angel at the tomb.]

I have seen your future.
And I have learned.

There will be no more Sadness. No more Anger. No more Envy.

I HAVE WON.

Oh, and your poet Eliot had it all wrong,
THIS is the way the world ends.

A friend of a friend.
Click to expand...

The end is referencing the T.S. Eliot poem The Hollow Men which concludes:

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
 
Poodlestrike said:
Hnn. New soundcloud? At work, so I can't check.

Interesting direction, though.
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nah, it's still Episode 00, it just keeps showing on my feed cause Xbox chose to pay for sponsorship. But if they're using it as a kind of tagline, then it seems they want people to know they're going to observe the Master Chief through different points of view. I suspect we'll get the full spectrum of opinion on Chief through these podcasts.

On that note, are we expecting each podcast to be released at the same time? Or just Sunday in general?
 
Steverulez said:
Thats a Thursday... Halo comes out Tuesday worldwide(?), usually. Not sure about Spain as MCC was staggered in some places but I doubt it. I'd expect mid-late September if it does happen anyway
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Thursday is an unlikely day of the week, but I certainly would not complain about a September release.

October 2nd - The Thursday War
November 6th - Halo 4

November 4th - Halo: Broken Circle
November 11th - MCC

September 15th - Halo: Last Light
Sept/Oct/Nov? - Halo 5
 
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