In Halo 3 and Contact Harvest, it seemed that Bungie was leading towards the idea that the Forerunners were us, Humans. Do you think this was a cool concept, or do you prefer that Forerunners are a separate species?
I would have liked it if humans were directly related to forerunners but I’m really enjoying what 343 have done with the ancient humans.
I’m also not 100% sure on this but I think I read somewhere that ancient humans and forerunners were very similar at one point and then they sort of split off and grew into individual species.
Events in Contact Harvest (I mean Monitor behavior), just like dialogs in CE are great source of speculations. I know that original idea was that humans are Forerunners, but it was later dropped by Bungie themselves. Halo 3 terminals indicates, that Forerunners (like Librarian) and humans (who are about to be saved) aren’t the same thing at all.
Do I like idea that humans are ancient Forerunners? Meh. When that idea came to my mind 12 years ago (when I have played CE for the first time) I felt disappointment. It felt like Bungie wanted to cater to all these insecured kids with message: “you’re descendant of the greatest people in the universe!”
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> Do I like idea that humans are ancient Forerunners? Meh. When that idea came to my mind 12 years ago (when I have played CE for the first time) I felt disappointment. It felt like Bungie wanted to cater to all these insecured kids with message: “you’re descendant of the greatest people in the universe!”
To be fair, humans still end up really special with the story shift.
h3 terminals did seem to contradict the rest of the direction though.
I’m mostly neutral on the shift, leaning towards the new. I would have liked if the depiction of forerunners as even closer to humans. The ears really kill it for me. But I kind of dug the ‘brother species’ vibe the forerunner saga gave us.
I have written extensively on this subject. We have actual confirmation from Paul Russel that this was just another part of Halo’s worldbuilding that was “loosely written in the beginning and embellished or changed over time”.
Never cared for that to be honest. If 9 year old me could come to that conclusion 12 years ago, then I wouldn’t call that a great story. The best thing about the original trilogy was the sense of mystery, but that mystery was kind of destroyed for a while by the prospect that Humans were Forerunners. That’s just way too obvious and I ended up really liking the route Bungie, and later 343i, took instead.
I’m actually enjoying the direction 343i is taking the story regarding humans and Forerunners.
Since we also got the pre-humans, I would find it kind of disturbing if the forerunners were also related to the humans.
It would have been incredibly generic of them to have the humans be forerunners. I’m glad they didn’t go that route.
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> I have written extensively on this subject. We have actual confirmation from Paul Russel that this was just another part of Halo’s worldbuilding that was “loosely written in the beginning and embellished or changed over time”.
Interesting stuff you’ve written. A very good read, thank you.
Thought Contact harvest said humans were classified as reclaimers and the covenant misunderstood them as Forerunner descendants?
Also in Halo 3 you could rationalize that Guilty Spark told Chief “you are Forerunner” because of his Iso-Didact geas inside him.
Then how does one get a Geas. That I’ve never fully understood how Chief had the Iso-Didact’s Geas in him. Is it in his DNA? I still need to read the Forerunner trilogy but for me I’m confused as to if all humans are reclaimers. Or if only those with Geas’ and how does one get a Geas? Forerunner lore is confusing for me.
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> Then how does one get a Geas. That I’ve never fully understood how Chief had the Iso-Didact’s Geas in him. Is it in his DNA? I still need to read the Forerunner trilogy but for me I’m confused as to if all humans are reclaimers. Or if only those with Geas’ and how does one get a Geas? Forerunner lore is confusing for me.
Happy to help. Yes the Forerunner trilogy explains it all. The Librarian can implant a geas that can lay dormant in a host, even become passed down to their children, throughout thousands of years. This is an ability Lifeshapers have among the Forerunners. It can be triggered by set events or words. Chief had a dormant geas that was perhaps triggered when he met the Librarian in Halo 4.
In Halo 1, 343 Spark tells Chief about a conversation that he had with The Iso Didact…before the Halo’s fired 100 000 years ago. He spoke to Chief as if continuing the conversation where they left off. Halo Primordium introduces the concept of a once dormant geas being active within a living host, and acts like a voice inside their head.
All humans are reclaimers by default. The Forerunners made all their technology compatible with human touch before they were wiped out/exiled from the galaxy. Any human can technically “reclaim” a forerunner object by merely touching their palm onto it.
Actually, Halo 3 was where they changed from humans being forerunners to a different species. Just read the terminals. The Librarian wouldn’t be refer to us as such if we were the same species.
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> > Then how does one get a Geas. That I’ve never fully understood how Chief had the Iso-Didact’s Geas in him. Is it in his DNA? I still need to read the Forerunner trilogy but for me I’m confused as to if all humans are reclaimers. Or if only those with Geas’ and how does one get a Geas? Forerunner lore is confusing for me.
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> Happy to help. Yes the Forerunner trilogy explains it all. The Librarian can implant a geas that can lay dormant in a host, even become passed down to their children, throughout thousands of years. This is an ability Lifeshapers have among the Forerunners. It can be triggered by set events or words. Chief had a dormant geas that was perhaps triggered when he met the Librarian in Halo 4.
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> In Halo 1, 343 Spark tells Chief about a conversation that he had with The Iso Didact…before the Halo’s fired 100 000 years ago. He spoke to Chief as if continuing the conversation where they left off. Halo Primordium introduces the concept of a once dormant geas being active within a living host, and acts like a voice inside their head.
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> All humans are reclaimers by default. The Forerunners made all their technology compatible with human touch before they were wiped out/exiled from the galaxy. Any human can technically “reclaim” a forerunner object by merely touching their palm onto it.
Thank you so very very much
I liked how 343 expanded that the Forerunners were a completely different species, but I also wish they would expand on the Ancient Humans a bit.
I like that the Forerunners are a complete separate species. It makes their character that much more compeling and deeper.
I would have liked if the Forerunners were Humans. But the way it is right now is even better
Bungie’s original idea that Humans might be distant descendants from the Forerunners appealed to me more than 343i’s idea of a separate species. Bungie left it up to the imagination of the player of what the Forerunners could’ve been or what they looked like and what the connections with Human might have been. That was all part of the great mystery of the original series.
343 ruined that mystery with Halo 4. Besides, the idea of an ancient advanced human empire existing alongside the Forerunners is lazy (not to mention, dismally anticlimactic) storytelling.
Truth is, I did very much enjoy the idea of Humans being Forerunners, because it is a severe reversal of fortune; from one one day ruling the whole galaxy, to starting all over again and then being preyed upon by alien races who have taken you’re tech and built a religion around it, and then going to war against descendants of their Gods. I’ve always enjoyed the irony of that concept.
Also, when Halo Cryptum came out, I was one of those people who pissed and moaned about how 343i screwed up the Human-Forerunner connection, but now I’m more open minded and curious to see where they’re taking whole Ancient Humanity, Forerunner and Precursor/Flood concept.