Dear 343i, about your story writing...

I’ll just get to the point, YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG! You inherited a cash cow franchise from Bungie. The franchise was known for its story. You didn’t seem to get the memo that Karen Traviss screw over any fluff in any universe she writes, Star Wars, Gears are examples of this. Now I’ve been a fan of this franchise for many years now and I have to say, I’m quite disappointed with your decisions in story making. You also tend to ignore older fluff completely about Why the SPARTAN-II program was made, why it was so desperatly needed, why Halsey even stayed on the project even though she knew it was wrong, It was that ONI did have replacements for her, the replacements however would be more brutal towards the candidates. Ackerson didn’t object to the ethics of the program, heck he made one even worse just because the S-II were taking funding meant for him but diverted to S-II. The Forerunners? Don’t even get me started on the stupidity of making everything part of a grand scheme and not simple human ingenuity. TBH and be frank, You really need to reconsider what you are even writing nowadays, because frankly you suck at writing.

'. -A Concerned Halo Fan

Why does everyone think that throwing insults is preferable to a legitimately constructive thread?

I think “The forerunners planned it all along” is way more plausible than “He’s just that lucky”. Luck is called bad writing by most professionals, and the original trilogy reeked of it. I’ll take forerunner planning any day over it.

Also, Halsey is a monster. She didn’t create the Spartans to fight the Covenant, she created the Spartans to oppress other humans, and said Spartans were created by cruel experiments and augmentations on children. Regardless of her sympathy for her subjects/victims, she has no regrets in her actions. That’s the mark of a psychopath.

The story of Halo 4 makes sense. The only thing I frown upon is the Didact’s motives… What were they?

Apart from that, he was pretty damn BA.

I feel that 343i is doing everything it can right, the story I felt was amazing. Halo 4 seemed just as in depth and amazing as any of the other Halos IMO. Of course I must say I also felt like there were some bad parts, but really it is hard to make a game that has absolutely no flaws.

> I think “The forerunners planned it all along” is way more plausible than “He’s just that lucky”. Luck is called bad writing by most professionals, and the original trilogy reeked of it. I’ll take forerunner planning any day over it.
>
> Also, Halsey is a monster. She didn’t create the Spartans to fight the Covenant, she created the Spartans to oppress other humans, and said Spartans were created by cruel experiments and augmentations on children. Regardless of her empathy for her subjects/victims, she has no regrets in her actions. That’s the mark of a psychopath.

I think having the librarian be the guide of humanity is great and provides some interesting story telling chances.

Ultimately I would defend Dr. Halsey at least in the halo universe. The spartan II program was authorized by ONI. Humanity needed the spartans. Whether it was against insurrectionists or the Covenant. The rebels were on the verge of starting a terrible civil war. Killing millions. To a person of logic, like halsey, they would accept being looked at as a monster if it saved untold amounts of people. Ethically, to us, the requirements of the spartan II program are immoral but I must ask. Would real life humanity now, if we were in the same situation as in halo, choose to go to massive interstellar war with each or indoctrine 75 children to stamp out those attempts?

In the end I believe it to be unfair to call her a monster or a psychopath…she is a scapegoat. A sacrifice herself. She was used until she was deemed unnecessary. She should pay what she did and so should ONI but that’s not going to happen so guess what. Halsey will get the full blame. She does feel for what she has done…or so we’ve read. If not she wouldn’t have kidnapped kelly and shown concern and anger for the knowledge of knowing that master chief was actually alive.

My ending statement is that she should somehow be punished for what she did…but praised as well. If not for her, humanity may not have survived in the halo universe.

I disagree with you on all counts.
And what do you mean by ‘you also tend to ignore older fluff completely about Why the SPARTAN-II program was made, why it was so desperately needed’. They addressed these issues in the opening cutscene.

Edited by Moderator - Please do not post inappropriate comments or make constructive posts.

*Original post, click at your own discretion.

i agree the new story at least to me is very uninteresting its just blah! couple of my buddy’s were some what of die hard fans and agree its -Yoink-! just because its halo dosent mean we have to like it there are parts of the story i really enjoy and i almost fill like they tell you that you must enjoy it because it is halo and what they wright is official and thats the way they want things to go i understand money talks in these situations because eventually the books and games have to meet and they need to sell thats why halo 4 and all the new content suck there challenges suck the story sucking -Yoink- because halo is a -Yoink!- now

maybe -Yoink!- mobile and ford could wright the next novels

and maybe mtn dew and dittos can pay for our insulin

ban me

well, im glad you’re not writing the story.

> I think “The forerunners planned it all along” is way more plausible than “He’s just that lucky”. Luck is called bad writing by most professionals, and the original trilogy reeked of it. I’ll take forerunner planning any day over it.
>
> Also, Halsey is a monster. She didn’t create the Spartans to fight the Covenant, she created the Spartans to oppress other humans, and said Spartans were created by cruel experiments and augmentations on children. Regardless of her sympathy for her subjects/victims, she has no regrets in her actions. That’s the mark of a psychopath.

Yes because some random women somehow planned for every little thing to happen eons in advanced is a very good idea.

First off halsey followed up on the ORION program which originally used adults but they didn’t take. They weren’t “experiments” because they weren’t constantly doing it to others, they were created as a last resort against a terrorist group that threatened the stability of our race.

Um if sticking by your decisions regardless of the outcome is a sign of a psychopath then I am one and I am sure you did think (while you didn’t like) you stuck by them. That is called owning up to what you did and not being sorry just because other people didn’t like your actions. You do understand that a few dozen children needed to save all of humanity is probably the least cost in any sc-fi universe right? In the Enders universe they were training thousands of kids in hopes at least a few of them would be good.

May i mention that Everything that happened was the work of the assembly? They started the rebellion, they called for the spartan project to be started, they called for the war to be postponed for human advantage, they did everything. The only thing the assembly didn’t do was give up humanites navel stronghold for a stupid plan in which got 700,000,000 people killed.

So you are seriously trying to argue that halsey should be persecuted for being used as a pawn in the grand scheme created to protect us? That a few dozen children used and stopped a massive civil war is somehow more important than the millions of lives already lost before them and after? Ar the lives of 75 children more important than the lives of the millions of others that died because the innies were nuking completely random planets? Are the lives of 75 child more important than the children that were killed when the covenant attacked worlds and when maggie let reach fall?

If they aren’t more important then stop making it seem like they were some angel children that deserved pampering while others wondered what would happen to them in the next day. Because of the sacrifices and actions of those children which were spartan IIs humanity was saved by two threats. How about we just go back in time and stop the spartan II project from happening. That way instead of a few dozen children not having normal lives millions will have been killed due to a civil war and the fighting there after. Lets have others be raised to avenge them and lets promote humanity fighting among themselves world to world.

Lets have an alien threat arrive that will pick off human colonies world by world with nothing to stop them because the innies won the war and each planet fights for itself. Lets have all those innocent children be stabbed with energy swords,swallowed by brutes, stomped on by hunters, gnarled at by jackals and grunts; Have them boiled to atoms by plasma bombardment, ripped apart by drones, and smacked around by elites.

That is better. Having billions of children killed because the sacrifice of a few lives is too great is better than not making any kind of sacrifice. You think you are doing a good job by trying to go against halsey’s actions? Well you aren’t, you are disrespecting and tarnishing the sacrifices that the children made in being so selfish that you wouldn’t be the needs of a few dozen over the entire human race. Because of the spartan II program no child has to ever make such a sacrifice ever again. because of the spartan II program humanity is still at whole and still united. BECAUSE of the spartan II program humanity now has the technology to ensure they they will not have to live in fear of destabilizing from within or being annihilated from above.

Not a single spartan II in service would approve of all this politician talk about “ethics” and how things could have been. Halsey has more stone than majority of you for being able to make a pragmatic decision and stick with it even if she has her own demons about it. Making a decision is far better and more respectable than not making one because you are afraid it isn’t the “right” one.

> You also tend to ignore older fluff completely about Why the SPARTAN-II program was made, why it was so desperatly needed, why Halsey even stayed on the project even though she knew it was wrong, It was that ONI did have replacements for her, the replacements however would be more brutal towards the candidates. Ackerson didn’t object to the ethics of the program, heck he made one even worse just because the S-II were taking funding meant for him but diverted to S-II.

They didn’t ignore it. Halsey is a scapegoat.

scape·goat
— n

  1. a person made to bear the blame for others

There are plenty of reasons why the Spartan Project was necessary but there are just as many reasons for why the Spartan Project was immoral. A lot of people could be in major trouble for what happened during the Project so the best way to sweep it under the rug is to blame it all on one person: Halsey.

> The Forerunners? Don’t even get me started on the stupidity of making everything part of a grand scheme and not simple human ingenuity.

They’re not doing that. The Librarian did not give us the knowledge or technology to do anything. If she did then we probably wouldd have found Forerunner structures on Earth or even Mars. Humans evolved and advanced on their own and they didn’t encounter their first Forerunner anything until they reached the Stars.

She may have planted the desire to advance and evolve but how we got there was entirely up to us. Humans had already achieved such things but it was the Forerunner who took it away. She gave us the push to relearn and take it back.

343’s treatment of Halsey is a major issue, but I have to disagree with your assessment of Karen Traviss’ pre-Halo endevours. Her books have been very well received, as have her Gears of War novels (I personally loved these). From what I understand (and I am reluctant to address this, as I am not a Star Wars fan), the issue with her Star Wars books stem from her “anti-force” point of view, and of course her books have been completely over-writen by “The Clone Wars” series. I know a few Star Wars fan who loved her books. Bringing her in wasn’t that bad of an idea, especially given that she was a defense journalist and actually served in the military for a time.

However, I cannot ignore that The Thursday War was a major disappointment for me, especially as a fan of hers.

> The Forerunners? Don’t even get me started on the stupidity of making everything part of a grand scheme and not simple human ingenuity.

Were did you get this idea? The Librarian had a lot of plans in place, but Halo 4, if anything, shows that her plans were not 100% on the spot. For example, she intended for Humanity to be immune to the Composer, but it had to be unlocked for some reason. I would wager that the Covenant probably put a major wrench in the Librarian’s plans for Humanity.

I believe they did a good job with Halo 4. The only problem I have with the story is Spartan Ops. Thanks to it, most of the story in Halo 4 lost its charm. Sarah Palmer is now a main character. Apparently, the title of Captain means “the guy who will wash your dishes” in the future, 'cause that’s all Lasky did. And what about Halsey? You have a room filled with writers, and that’s the best they can do with her character?

Also, everyone in Majestic is boring and cliche, I hate them with passion, I hope this is the last time we get to see them, because they made the story even worse. I just can’t root for them. I think you’re doing a bad job when the audience roots for the bad guys, because I was praying for some Elite or Promethean Knight to stab Majestic and Palmer 'till the screen was red enough to make Django Unchained look like a children’s movie.

Overall, Spartan Ops was an extremely disappointing experience. It took away all the charm from the Campaign and turned it into something that barely made sense. It feels like something written by George Lucas and directed by Michael Bay, 'cause it made as much sense as the Star Wars prequels, and the explosions were the only thing they did right.

I am slightly disappointed with some of the loose ends not coming full circle but it is the first game…the story is not over. That being said, the Halsey thing kind of irks me.

Thanks to Traviss, Elites and Jackals now have glass bones, seeing how Spartan III’s had no issues with snapping their necks during combat but they can barely give an elderly woman a bleeding nose with a punch to the face…

> the issue with her Star Wars books stem from her “anti-force” point of view, and of course her books have been completely over-writen by “The Clone Wars” series.

I have several big starwars fans on my site and i even go to class with one. They all say she changed the jedi’s into N@zi’s and she re-wrote a race’s character, “The mandalorians?” Not to mention she skimped on technological aspects which she did with halo. Ah, i know people that hate her gears novels too but from what i’ve seen what she did seems to fit the universe. Can’t say much on starwars but i know cobra’s dad seriously hates her and he can explain more as can Anton,Fin,Moa,etc

I was reading an interview about how Karen personally have pro-conservative military views which you can see all in her writing. Her bragging about how she doesn’t do research before she writes isn’t really a good thing.

> > the issue with her Star Wars books stem from her “anti-force” point of view, and of course her books have been completely over-writen by “The Clone Wars” series.
>
> I have several big starwars fans on my site and i even go to class with one. They all say she changed the jedi’s into N@zi’s and she re-wrote a race’s character, “The mandalorians?” Not to mention she skimped on technological aspects which she did with halo. Ah, i know people that hate her gears novels too but from what i’ve seen what she did seems to fit the universe. Can’t say much on starwars but i know cobra’s dad seriously hates her and he can explain more as can Anton,Fin,Moa,etc
>
>
> I was reading an interview about how Karen personally have pro-conservative military views which you can see all in her writing. Her bragging about how she doesn’t do research before she writes isn’t really a good thing.

Well, I did say I was reluctant to talk about her star-wars stuff, as I am completely unfamiliar with it.

Still, I stand by my assessment with her Gears books. People are always going to take issue, but from my experience, they were very well-received. I remember Halo fans taking issue with GoO and many of the non-Nylund Halo books long before Traviss.

I can honestly say that no halo book received flak like karens novels. The books “contact harvest” and “cole protocol” got the most flak but it wasn’t anything severe. mainly people just found them rather boring.

Ghosts of Onyx was written by Nylund…

Sounds like you just finished Glasslands, op. Understandable anger is understandable. I was fumed about it as well.

However, I consider Glasslands to be more “Traviss’s novel” than “343’s novel”.

“But 343 approved it, so they had a hand in it.” Maybe, but here’s how I think 343 handles the novels; 343 writes a very basic overview of what happens in the novel (Jul captured, Halsey arrested, Onyx brought into real world, etc.), the author is given this overview, and they get to fill in the gaps of the book however they like.

Problem is, Traviss seemed to have had too much fun with the little she was given. Add to that she apparently doesn’t do too much research (probably read the Halopedian articles on relevant characters/books/games/etc,), and you got a pretty big pile of… stuff.

However, Halo 4 was incredible, and the other novels were as well (Forerunner Saga especially, and Thursday War was much better than Glasslands to be sure), so I’m not too worried.