The Halo story started with the Fall.of Reach, quickly followed by the first Halo game which picks up right after the book.
I wasn’t even aware of the book until years later, so my journey in Halo began with jumping out of the cryo pod.
In that game we go from being a ship in danger of annihilation to saving a part of the galaxy. Progressing forward from there we see humanity on the brink of destruction and after that the entire galaxy. Both due to the flood and then due to the rings almost being used.
Halo Wars did almost the same thing, start of focusing on something small and then expand the threat.
ODST on the other hand focused more on the personel than the overlaying threat.
Reach again started out small and ended up mounting the entire success of saving the galaxy of the chronologically subseqeuent games, on Noble-6’s shoulders.
Having this in mind one of the reasons I dislike the path the Halo story has taken recently surfaced, something I didn’t know was one of the reasons.
Pre-Halo 4 humanity is at risk due to the covenant, this is a constant threat, the stakes are raised at a few points.
So, as Peter Parker asked himself at the Conclusion of Spider Verse, how do you go back to normal after an event like that?
Well in my opinion you don’t follow up with an even larger event.
In my opinion Halo 4 never reached the “distress” humanity had faced against the Covenant. We were rebuilding and getting stronger.
Move to Halo 5 and we’re stamped into the ground so hard, you could almost see the hurt in Lord Hood’s eyes during the Halo 2 medal ceremony.
The threat level seems to have been raised by atleast a multiplier of 2 and the sense of ever overcoming it is even smaller than that of pre-Halo 4.
The issue here I feel lie in the fact that it feels forced. Earlier events need to be dwarfed for the sake of having bigger and badder stuff. Well, not an issue in on itself but perhaps the time wasn’t the best? I mean, sure this event could be used, but it doesn’t feel like it should be now.
What intrigued me with Halo 5, before release, was that it seemed to focus more on individuals than a large event.
I think having the stort focus more on personal levels for Halo 5 and 6 would have ensured that a larger threat like that we actually see in Halo 5, would have been a lot better recieved by the community.
Perhaps the term “Powercreep” is appropriate to use in this case? Look up extra credit and powercreep if you don’t know what it is.
It could have helped the story if the threat level was normalized around smaller entities than the entirety of humanity, especially when the threat level would be increased again.
Next upcoming Halo title is Halo Wars 2. I love the idea of going back to the SoF, I love that Atriox at this point seems to be a more fleshed out character, right off the bat, than we’ve seen with some previously. It’s also exciting that we’re back at the Ark, so many questions.
However I started doubting the story, and perhaps that’s good.
See, apparently the Warden theme exists in the Halo Wars 2 soundtrack.
I don’t recall who, but one of the characters in one of the Story teaser segments state that we can’t leave the galaxy at the hands of such a monster, probably speaking of Atriox.
Additionally, we’re at The Ark.
My alarms are going off.
And here are my predictions.
We start off with focus on a small scale, SoF and Atriox, this will blow out of proportion with a possible reveal of the Warden and perhaps Cortana working with The Banished. The entire galaxy is yet again at risk and its up to us as the player to stop that risk.
Cortana showed the Banished to the Ark incase they need to activate the rings. SoF is also taken there in order to have someone to activate the rings with as wr know non-humans have some issues with more serious forerunner stuff such as rings and fleet ships, unless probably given access, Jul Mdama.