You’ve stated time and time again that gore - defined as blood shed as a result of violence - is or was a “key feature” of Halo. With emphasis and sentiment that it’s a necessary feature to preserve some “atmosphere” that’s never been. This round-about “I didn’t say those words exactly” game is going to get tiring pretty quick, so do me a solid and let me know if it’s going to be a constant so I can just check out before wasting too much time.
Then explain it better. That would be the whole reason for the “seemingly” bit. I’ve asked more than once exactly how blood and gore is a key feature, staple, necessity, or central atmospheric element - whatever term you want to use - for Halo, and as of yet the best provided is “It’s realistic. Halo’s a shooter.” That’s not an incredibly moving argument.
Horror is a broad genre, and not one that necessitates blood and gore. The horror in the Flood is what they are, not how they look. The knowledge that there is no true defeating the Flood, and they are likely the end-result that will consume all biological life in the Galaxy. Blood and gore does not present a threat Greater than the Covenant, spores that alter biology, environment, and atmosphere in the short span of hours do. Blood and gore does not explain the existence of the Halo Array, an enemy for which there is no cure, abatement, truce, treaty, alliance, or conquering does.
Because there’s just no need. I don’t really understand why Halo players are utterly obsessed with blood, but I guess that’s my beef with western society as a whole anyway.
Point is, we just don’t… Need it. Blood and gore doesn’t do anything but satisfy some knee jerk, “Ough so real” need. IDK if this is obvious but most wounds and blood in war are, pretty isolated to the individual. You aren’t gonna’ see wet splatter absolutely everywhere in a combat zone it doesn’t… work like that.
I am a bit confused as to how anyone actually found Halo to ever be a “gory” game. Halo wars 2 is rated T and has the flood in it. And this all revolves around 343 aiming to get a T rating so it’s multiplayer can do well. So as long as they find a method around the rating to get the flood in like in Infinite I dont really care about the lack of blood
I remember Turok: Evolution had a violence toggle. Whether you had it toggled on or off, there was always plenty of blood, but with it enabled, you’d get to watch your poison arrows take full effect: your enemies suffocating and falling dead in their own vomit as well as the bodies of your enemies being blown into pieces by the rocket launcher, explosive arrow or cerebral bore!
and I explained why I thought so. This has got to the point where I’m having to quote myself…
Gore obviously doesn’t mean what I thought it did, as I thought it was an encompassing term to mean grotesque, repulsive, mutilated, disfigured, etc. Body horror.
Beings bleeding when injured is realistic, and that elicits a response from us because of empathy. Blood outside of the body has connotations – connotations that can be so strong, that some people feel faint when they see blood. When blood is added to a game, those connotations still happen. How much the connotations affect you will be based on how empathetic you are to digital characters. Of course seeing blood in a game isn’t akin to seeing blood in real-life…That’s so obvious that it should have gone without saying, but you’ve demanded clarity. Blood being present in games – particularly as a feedback to violence – elicits those connotations. Some mild blood-lust, perhaps, that goes back to prehistoric times when we would have to hurt for food in order to survive. It’s why people enjoy the Glory Kills in Doom, or the Fatalities in Mortal Kombat, despite the gory nature of them.
To once again have clarity, blood and mutilation aren’t as important to Halo as they are in Doom and Mortal Kombat, which is because Halo has incredible story-telling. Halo CE and Halo 2 have great stories, and Halo 3’s definitely has great highs. Environmental story-telling is part of that, and when it comes to the Flood, mutilation is a key part of that because it’s horrific. The idea of a parasite taking control of your body, and disfiguring it beyond recognition is very disturbing, and that intrinsically adds to their threat as an enemy.
To have another example from outside of Halo, I turn to Doctor Who, and its Cybermen. For those that don’t know, Cybermen are one of the many badies in Doctor Who that The Doctor has had to stop on numerous occasions. They use technology to improve themselves, and it’s been to the point that they’ve stripped individuality from themselves, by inhibiting their emotions. They have no feelings. No soul. The twist? Cybermen are humans. Depending on which group it is, they’re either from a twin planet to Earth named Mondas, or from a parallel universe version of Earth itself. A lot of the time, you forget that, and they’re just walking steel soldiers. But their best episodes are the ones where that thought of them being us, but disfigured by technology, is in the back of your mind. It’s chilling, and our increasing reliance on technology, combined with our innate laziness, makes them more likely than ever. It didn’t just happen overnight. I mean, look at Elon Musk wanting to let you be able to put a chip in your brain. Where does it stop, if you’re going in a direction centimetre by centimetre? It’s easy to forget to look at the bigger picture, and before you know it, you’ve travelled metres.
The Flood being us, but consumed by this parasite that’s only purpose is to consume you too, is daunting, and their body horror makes them even more so. This is why I think the Flood are handled best in Halo CE, because when you play Halo 2 and Halo 3, it can more easily slip from your mind that these were beings – people – that have now had all of their identity stolen and repurposed. For Halo 2, it is more forgivable, as it was made with an infamous development. Halo 3 could have done more, for certain, by having Miranda being infected – for example. Something to bring that human element present in Halo CE through Keyes, home.
No: horror doesn’t require blood, gore, or mutilation. Psychology is the greatest part of horror. Well, horror is psychology. But blood will always carry connotations of injury – major or minor – and gore and mutilation will always be horrific. Mutilation doesn’t make the Flood, but it is a key part of the terror they cause as an enemy, because we’d never want to experience that personally, or have someone we know experience it.
…Okay, that’s the best I’ve got. If that doesn’t answer your question, then it’ll take someone more articulate than me to do so.
Gore was the wrong word for me to use, as I thought it had a different meaning. I believed it to be an encompassing term to mean grotesque, disfigurement, mutilation, etc. Body horror is the term I should have used exclusively.
An RTS doesn’t have much opportunity to create horror tension, as by its nature, it isn’t personal. The player is removed from the world, and controlling it remotely. An FPS, on the other hand, allows for it, because it puts you in the world. However, the cutscenes in Halo Wars 2 did very well to instill the sense of fear of the Flood that I personally haven’t really felt since Halo CE. The order and reaction of Atriox certainly played a part in this, as he treats them as a serious threat – seemingly more serious than either the Covenant or the UNSC. I didn’t get that from Halo 2 and Halo 3. The other part is the aforementioned body horror, which looks suitable grotesque in the Blur cinematics.
There are no decals, having carefully watched the footage frame by frame as well. The Pulse Carbine is leaving a decal on the walls that looks like classic Halo CE Grunt blood, but it’s a weapons-fire decal. Same thing from a plasma grenade on the floor.
Go back and watch the 8 min 2020 demo and checkout the initial Grunt the player encounters. The blood in that was toned back compared to Halo CE, but even then it was significantly more visible than what it is now. I have no idea why they changed it.
Reminds me of how it was used in CE to introduce the flood. I personally think 343 missed out big on using it for environmental story telling and building tension.
And when that blood is blue, indigo, green, or ichor white that empathetic reaction (as well as the “realism”) is completely lost and it serves nothing but a gore -Yoink!-. And realistically, if this reaction to blood is making people faint, or causing a number of other negative reactions, it’s just not a smart move to include blood to that degree, if at all, and the simplest solution is to just leave it out. And yes, some people do have that strong of a reaction to even digital and fake blood.
Games like DOOM and Mortal Kombat carry the expectation of gruesome violence and excessive blood and gore. That’s their bread and butter, and what they’ve become known for. Halo has not; it’s B&B is sci-fi exploration and heroics in the face of galaxy-spanning threats. And to that reputation, blood is not a necessity, and it’s removal or tone-down is not so negatively impacting that it warrants outcry.
And the Flood does this without rending and tearing biology. When a form is converted to a Flood Combat Form it is invasive and transforming, yet we know that it is a process that utilizes all biological material of that lifeform to create new things. Spilling blood is thus - from the Flood’s perspective - wasteful. The body horror of the Flood is, in great majority, the hijacking and reconfiguring of what the body is; barely recognizable as it’s prior appearance, giving a sense of familiarity that belies the hostility of the Flood. We don’t need them to look like George Romero zombies, as that’s not really what they are anyways.
I absolutely disagree, as it’s in these games that we see their bodies being converted into Combat Forms. Halo 3 added live corruption, even. Halo 2 showed us Regret, taken by the Flood and a mere puppet of who he was, and deepened this conglomerate of body and mind. Halo: CE did not, and the closest we ever get to it is Captain Keyes clinging to life moments before we see him assimilated into a Proto-Gravemind.
Mutilation is not a key part of anything about the Flood. They don’t mutilate, they repurpose. It is a theft of everything that you are, right down to thoughts and memories. That is the horror of the Flood, and it’s one that can be graphically depicted without the shock-value of blood.
And with standard combat, this is less necessary. It does nothing for immersion, and for the levels of blood that people are wanting it requires a suspension of rationality, as that much blood is just unrealistic. If you’re getting shot with a bullet there’s not going to be this huge anime spray of blood, painting the ground all around you with meter-wide splatters, and if you’re getting shot with plasma there’s going to be none at all.
There was a scene in the 11 minute IGN video, where Chief shot at a Jackal, and you can see purple blood splatter on the ground. It’s not a lot, but it is there.
I mean yes. When you shoot something with a high-powered weapon you expect to see some blood spray and for it to stick to things in the environment. You aren’t shooting bb’s having blood decals can also sell the power behind a weapon since you can’t feel the actual kick of it, yet seeing an enemy get thrown back and blood on the wall behind them sells that power. I don’t feel that you can really argue whether it is an immersion feature or not.
Stating your opinion as fact. Also, disagree, but my previous answer covered that already (I said it depended on how much people feel empathy for digital characters).
…That’s one of the most ridiculous arguments I’ve ever read. It misses the point entirely, and also holds absolutely no water either, because blood is present in Infinite.
…Huh. I wonder why they have combat forms then…
The Flood are intelligent enough to understand fear, and how to instill it. They didn’t consume the biomass in the corridor, so it isn’t unreasonable to assume it was done as terror tactic. Scaring lifeforms makes them an easier prey.
Nobody cares about a random marine or worker. Nobody cares about Regret. We were encouraged to care about Keyes. And before you say it, I don’t mean that he was meant to became our bestest friend in the universe. We’d seen him throughout the game, which makes it far more likely that the player has built a connection. A lot more personal than some random NPC without a name. We didn’t need to see the transformation to imagine the transformation. Horror is psychological. As it is, the terminal in Anniversary greatly shows the psychological side of the transformation, and there isn’t a better example of the loss of identity due to the Flood.
…They mutilate the bodies. Go load up any Halo game with them in, and tell me the last time you saw someone walking down the street looking like the Flood.
Also, nice job completely contradicting your previous point. The theft of identity is the whole reason as to why I mention Keyes. We came to learn his identity better, to only see it stripped away as he became part of an unrecognised mass. We can’t empathise as much for the loss of an identity we didn’t know. That’s why CE focuses on the marines, prior to that mission, and during it with the video footage. We’re encouraged to keep them safe – literally in Halo, and the Captain and marines in The Truth and Reconciliation. It’s intended to give the loss of relatively generic NPCs more weight.
You’re stating your opinion as fact, so, no.
So? We’re playing as a super-solider, fighting aliens on a big space hula hoop. You’re not explaining why unrealistic is bad. See, two people can play the game of emphasising words in a sentence to make it sound more like a legitimate argument.
Please direct me to where I said anything akin to wanting anime-levels of blood from individual bullet shots. And please don’t go with the corridor, because there’s absolutely no evidence that was done by a single bullet, needle, strike, or blast. There’s also no evidence to say it was one body in the corridor either. Other bodies may have been removed, as their biomass was consumed. There may not have been enough infection forms present to make use of all the bodies, or the arrival of Master Chief caused them to flee for a time – waiting to strike at the opportune moment.
I don’t know how many NSFW images/footage of serious crime scenes or “public attacks” you’ve seen, but blood can go surprisingly far. Considering the size of Brutes, Elites, Hunters, and the Covenant members overall – and their weapons – major injuries seem very plausible.
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I’ve just replayed through 343 Guily Spark, as I wanted to complete the Skullduggery weekly PVE challenge, and thought it’d be a good opportunity. A large amount of blood is definitely not restricted to one corridor. The small room off from the corridor is full of blood, and still has bodies. The next hall has a large pool of blood. The next room with the terrified marine has blood all over the floor. The marine body as Chief makes his way into the “weapon cache” is surrounded by blood, which goes down most of the ramp and its walls. The “weapon cache” room is filled with blood. When you shoot the Flood forms, they leave green blood everywhere. When you make your way out of the “weapon cache” area, the end of the previous hall is now filled with even more blood on the ground floor. There’s a lot of blood scattered throughout the level after the reveal. One of the lift shafts is covered in blood.
Do you want to keep telling me Bungie put all of that there for no reason? That it has no importance or relevance? If you do, then I won’t bother to respond again. There’s no greater evidence than the empirical evidence in the game itself, and if you can’t accept that, then there’s nothing more to say.
This thread over blood decals is getting pretty intense for something so simple.
It’s off for a Teen rating, so far as I can see, which is about sales and accessibility. It’s a shame, it shouldn’t even be a problem in video games, but it is.
Oh, completely. Although, only the part that’s turned into a wider discussion about blood and the Flood. Infinite has blood in the game. Seemingly not as much as CE or 3, but it’s there.
I completely understand the decision though, from the business standpoint.
Yeah. I’ve just read through the whole thing myself and it’s interesting that such a simple feature has caused so much response. I think it goes to show that it isn’t just a pointless addition though and really does add to the experience.
It’s been present since the beginning and has been used for environmental story telling for just as long like @DigitalVanquish and @brimastaLIVE said. It’s not as present in the other games as it was in CE but the amount in CE added to the atmosphere of the Flood for me. Everyone will have at least slightly different opinions though.
Although, only the part that’s turned into a wider discussion about blood and the Flood. Infinite has blood in the game. Seemingly not as much as CE or 3, but it’s there.