It’s been a week since Halo 5: Guardians was released to the public. Negative reviews and hater comments, however, were already swarming the web before Day 1 was over. Sure, most of said “negative comments” praised the multiplayer aspect of the game, BUT they also criticized the campaign–big time–claiming that it was was ‘mediocre’, ‘absurd’, ‘disappointing’, ‘the worst in the history of Halo’, and whatnot. Their main argument to defend their stance is that the story is incomprehensible unless you have a deeper knowledge of the lore outside the games–which makes H5G ‘unfriendly to newcomers’. (I won’t even mention haters’ and trolls’ comments because they will always have something to complain about.)
One week later, people keep giving H5G hell, and you know what? I’m done with it. I usually don’t get involved in this sort of discussions because it’s time-consuming, but I feel like it’s time I speak up to defend the game I love so much. So, this is a message to critics and haters, because they need to understand one thing: Halo 5 was meant to be a sequel to a bigger story, not a stand-alone game that would ensnare newcomers. (The Master Chief Collection was meant to do that; that’s why it launched first!)
A sequel implies the existence of previous installments in a franchise. It requires at least a basic knowledge of them in order to be enjoyable. If people don’t understand the campaign, why don’t they buy TMCC and get up-to-date with the story? Sure, it means to spend and additional $50, but that’s a steal considering that it includes FOUR GAMES in one single disc! Sales strategies aside, there’s no way a newcomer can understand Halo 5 without playing the first four games.
There are some who will argue that the games aren’t enough, that it is also necessary to read/watch every single book/comic/series that has been created to expand the universe. And it’s true. All of that stuff is what makes the Halo universe so rich and wonderful! Most fans of Star Wars never complained when the universe kept expanding beyond the film saga. (In fact, one of the main concerns they have about The Force Awakens is that it will negate every single piece of fiction that helped build up the story for the past 30+ years.) Why is that any different from the Halo universe?
Others will also complain about the marketing campaign selling something different to the public than they actually got, or–especially with HTT–that none of it actually tied to the campaign proper. Well, I found a comment that basically sums up why at least HTT is linked to the campaign (credits to ‘Matthew Hajducky’):
> The Mantle, which is brought up in the game, is a responsibility that has been passed down to different species for millenia. First, the Precursors (brought up in the novel Cryptum) and then the Forerunner. It was then going to be passed down to whichever species was more evolutionary complete (humans). In Halo 4, Chief’s evolutionary process is pushed farther, making him essentially no longer -Yoink!- sapien. This would set Chief’s lineage as the beginning of a new species.
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> The Mantle was left to humanity by the Precursors (basically the species that created everything else, including the Forerunner), but the Forerunner revolted against their creators, as they believed themselves to be evolutionary superior (Didact in Halo 4 fully believed in this premise, as he viewed humans as weaker than him). The Forerunners wiped out the Precursors, only to have them return in a last ditch effort as the mutated Flood. I shouldn’t have to explain that if you’ve played the games.
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> Now, with the Forerunners gone, humanity should have evolved at a faster rate and attained The Mantle, but they didn’t as they were busy slaughtering each other for no good reason. That was until humanity met the Covenant. The threat of a common enemy of humanity pulled people out of galactic civil war and combined forces. Since the Covenant were defeated (and no one outside of the military knew of the Flood), humanity went back to killing each other and not trusting the Covenant races.
> The first season of HTT focuses on the atrocities by ONI as they calculate human casualties rather than try to save everyone, and the second season focuses on the rebellions lack of civilian casualities as they have a “win at all costs” mentality.
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> You should have probably read at least Halo: The Fall of Reach as it gives you a huge backstory to Halo 5 (Blue Team’s upbringing). I’ve read every Halo book/comic and love the lore. True fan of it. As for Hunt The Truth, it was an amazing series that showcased the atrocities ONI did in the Spartan-II program, as well as the lack of human empathy throughout the known galaxy. The entire franchise is based upon human evolution and our place in the galaxy. The series was deidcated to how we are SO bent on killing each other that we forget (or don’t care) that there are much worse things out there. That speaks on a real-world level. The whole series focuses on how humanity gets in its own way of evolution. It relates to the game because:
> Cortana has now merged with the Forerunner Domain, a Forerunner collection of knowledge and records, saving her from rampancy, but turning her ideas of the Mantle against bilogical creatures. Like the Forerunner, she turned against her creators, believing her and other artificial beings to be superior to her predacessors.This is the basis for the newer games as the saga is called “The Reclaimor Saga” as humanity works to “reclaim” the Mantle.
I rest my case.
