I’m a big fan of the Halo universe, not only the game but also the book. Unfortunately, I’m really disappointed by the Halo story that 343i show us (to be fair, I also dislike Halo Reach history made by Bungie, but let’s not talk about this here). I summarized the biggest problem in the story in my opinion :
The Prometheans :
The Prometheans are a bad enemy. They look like robot, but they are ancient life form. Cool, because I find that fighting just robot is boring. At the beginning, they were forerunners soldiers recomposed to fight the flood. But in Halo 4, they aren’t forerunner soldiers, they are ancient humans. But why ancient humans would follow the Didact : because they are programming to. So they are ancient human with no will. They are just like robot who obeys.
So why recomposed organic life form in them, just copy a soldier program in this robotic body would have be enough. Look at the Arminger, they are robot, not ancient human, and there is no difference in their way to fight or in their importance in the story, they are just stupid robot who obey.
If the Prometheans were ancient forerunner with real conscious and will, they would be more interesting to fight.
Jul Mdama :
The character is well develop in Spartan Ops and comics, and then get sacrifice at the first mission of Halo 5 just to shoe as Osiris is badass. This character should have deserved a better end, like for example dying in Sunaion by the hand of the Arbiter.
Blue team :
Blue team have a big importance in Halo universe, they are Spartan II like Master Chief, they are trained with him since they are 6 years old, they are his family. Their relationship is well stronger than with Cortana. Bring Master Chief with his family is exactly what Cortana ask him in Halo 4 by “being more human”.
However, they appear totally useless in Halo 5 and even aren’t present in Infinite. It’s a total waste. The Halo 5 prologue should have shown Master Chief meet them after all this time and the game should have focus on their relation instead of this stupid purchase with Osiris.
Osiris chasing Blue team :
Master Chief is the heroes, if you want to turn other good character against him, you need to have solid reasons for that. The reason were too ambiguous to convince anyone. This was so non sense than even Buck, Vale and Tanaka don’t try to stop Master Chief.
Cortana :
Cortana died in Halo 4, it was beautiful, she get a cool end. Rebring her to life to turn her evil was a huge mistake. She wasn’t even the Cortana we known and loved, she was just a fragment corrupted by the Domain who didn’t deserved to be called Cortana.
The worst, off course, was to kill her off screen. Despite her omnipotence, she was killed easily and quickly. A so important character deserved a better end. 343 try to give her a sort of redemption by her sacrifice, but there was nothing heroic in her last moment because she already knew she was convicted. Worst, her sacrifice don’t change anything since Atriox has survived.
The created : Same than Cortana, but in worst. They became the ultimate threat at the end of Halo 5, then disappear like if they never existed. We can even see the wreck of a Guardian on Zeta Halo, a symbol of their absence in the story. It’s been six month than Cortana died, however never a Guardian arrive to retake Halo Zeta. The created are composed of multiple AI independent, the death of Cortana shouldn’t have kill them.
Will the created story have an end one day, it’s not sure with 343.
The Infinity :
The biggest ship of all humanity was defeated in a short cinematic ! It’s too fast, too unexpected. The campaign should have started with a fight to defend the Infinity against the Banished boarding, this way we would have lost the battle ourself, we would have fell the lost instead off see it quickly in a cinematic.
The Harbinger and the Skimmer :
A new species is cool, but they weren’t enough presented. They appear like a secondary faction and there is still a lot of thing we don’t know about them. Some people still thin the Harbinger and the skimmer aren’t the same species.
I hope the next Halo Infinite story will present us the skimmer, with 343 I’m afraid they just pass to another thing without boring.
Tell a story :
At each game, 343 start something new and don’t end the story :
- Halo 4 is about the Didact (who survive just to reappear in comics)
- Halo Spartan Ops is about Jul Mdama (who die quickly in Halo 5 first mission)
- Halo 5 is about Cortana and the AI getting evil (all of that just for kill her of screen before Infinite campaign start)
- Halo Infinite is about the Banished and the Harbinger
A story need a beginning, a middle and a end. Maybe one day 343 will give us that ? Unfortunately, the damage are done.
What do think of all that ?
For all we know the Cortana we saw die was just A Cortana split of from her to control Zeta Halo; whilst she’s still chilling in the Domain.