Note: Adapting this from an article I wrote in my blog.
1. Installation 07 would be the first Halo ring we step onto in a main series game after Halo 3
Let me start by saying that nostalgia often gets a bad rap. Yes, rose-colored glasses can make dealing with nostalgia a mess. Oftentimes we look back on the past favorably while forgetting very real problems. Halo 3 is a great personal example for myself. The time it came out was nigh-magical with the idea of finishing the fight being drilled into my head. It was a time where Game Fuel flowed freely and nights were consumed by multiplayer sessions. That has for a long time colored how I look back on the campaign. Make no mistake, I still enjoy Halo 3, but it does have real narrative problems.
Returning to a Halo ring, however, is not necessarily bad nostalgia. While we did go to a new Halo in Halo Wars 2, we have yet to step foot on a Halo in a main Halo campaign for over 6 years at the time I write this. We got teased with a Halo in Halo 4 before going to Ivanoff Station instead (a decision I actually liked because it conveyed that there was yet something more dangerous than the Halo in that unassuming space station). Halo 5 also teased a Halo after the end credits, but outside of multiplayer maps we haven’t walked or driven on the surface of the famous ringworlds in a long time.
Given what we’ve been told about the game, it’s obviously the right kind of nostalgia to capitalize on. According to Frank O’Connor on NeoGAF:
> “It will continue the story from Halo 5: Guardians but will be built in a way that makes it a good place to start your first halo adventure.
> It will take place after the events of Halo 5 but feel new to new players. Remember how Halo CE woke you up in the middle of a war you had apparently been fighting?”
Perhaps I’m reading a bit too much into what O’Connor is saying here, but 343 does seem to be trying to go for a more Combat Evolved-like experience. It’s still a sequel to Halo 5 but appears to be a great jumping on point for first-time players. Maybe it is the nostalgia talking, but if that is the goal then a Halo ring is the best place to recapture that magic. We will always have fond memories of Requiem, Sanghelios, and other locations, but a Halo is hard to beat.
2. Installation 07 opens up avenues to explore Halo’s lore
I have to be honest with you fine folks, this is the point I’m most excited about. Installation 07 is a very important place in the Halo universe and is the setting of one of my favorite Halo books, Primordium. Those of you booing and hissing after reading that can float and sputter, it’s a damn fine book. Anyway, this ring, in particular, had a fascinating history as the last remaining member of the original 12 Halo rings. Yes, there were 12 other Halo rings. There were also two Arks. Don’t worry too much about that information because 11 of the original 12 rings were destroyed as was the other Ark. The Ark we have been to, Installation 00 (the Lesser Ark), spawned 6 of the 7 Halo rings we have by the time Halo: Combat Evolved. The only thing you might want to keep in mind is that Installation 07 was once 30,000kms in size but catastrophic damage during the events of Primordium forced portions of the ring to be jettisoned and so it became the same 10,000km size of the other Halos. Moving on.
No, the events that transpire during the story of Primordium are the real things to watch. Ancient humans named Chakas, Riser, Vinnevra, and Gamelpar (Vinnevra’s grandfather) find themselves at the mercy of malevolent forces while trapped on Installation 07. Throughout their journey, they encounter abandoned remnants of human habitations, sadistic experiments with the Flood, Forerunners righting Forerunners, and eventually a race against the clock to save the ring from a collision course with a planet. And yes, there is a lot of walking done by our cast but they come across and remark on significant things during this journey. You will not convince me this is a bad book.
My point is that all these things happened 100,000 years ago in Halo’s past and yet they can be unearthed and explored in Halo Infinite. I’m not saying the story needs to stop and pile on exposition awkwardly to the player. A lot of what happened in Primordium could easily come naturally in our exploration of Installation 07 during missions or while going off the beaten path. Need to journey through a Flood research facility? Congratulations, you will have gone through one of the Palaces of Pain used by the Primordial and Mendicant Bias to experiment on the humans kept on the ring. Encounter a primitive (by our standards) village by a lake where massive cages lay empty? You’ve found one of the Tudejsa settlements and those cages once held Graveminds. Need to journey deep into the interior of Installation 07 for a plot-specific reason? Mendicant Bias’ core is a prime candidate for a location in which to do that. The great thing is these places can come organically with no prior warning. For lore fans, these will be familiar locals brought to life. For casual audiences, these would be new places echoing new mysteries. Speaking of which…
3. Installation 07 could reignite an element of mystery some feel Halo has lost
For a couple years now there has been a claim by fans that Halo has lost a crucial element of mystery to it. Usually, this is traced back to 343 Industries shedding more light on the Forerunners and making the lost civilization a bit less lost. Personally, I’ve felt that the Forerunners mystery would be one of diminishing returns. Bungie already got the ball rolling with records of their war against the Flood being discoverable in Halo 3’s terminals and if they made Halo 4 I feel this would only have increased. However, I understand people wanting something to speculate about and while I enjoy 343’s efforts with the Forerunners I do think there should be something in the background that remains elusive.
I think Installation 07 offers that with ancient humanity. Granted, the Forerunner Trilogy explains a bit about ancient humanity during the time of the Forerunners and it’s not the most original idea, but I think it could work. After all, most people aren’t going to read the books or venture over to Halopedia, so it’d be fresh territory for a lot of people.
Think about it. One of the big things about Halo’s story is that humanity was chosen by the Forerunners to be their Reclaimers. This brings with it access to their technology and the assumption they would bear the Mantle of Responsibility to be the peacekeepers of the galaxy. However, the Didact’s revival and what his mindset say about that idea throws everything out of whack. Furthermore, Cortana’s claiming of the Mantle shows that upholding the Mantle may not be as innocent as previously believed. It involves guardianship, sure, but can easily fall into violence in order to dominate others in pursuit of that guardianship. Is the Mantle something humanity should truly strive for or is there another option? Humanity does have a past that has mostly be destroyed and hints at glory to rival that of even the Forerunners after all. But that past doesn’t need to be revealed all at once and exploring Installation 07 can at least plant that seed.
So yeah, nothing too groundbreaking, but if Installation 07 is a destination or THE destination for Halo Infinite, I’m excited.