So in the latest Co-op preview the campaign Devs are watching a cutscene at the Excavation Site and one of the Devs mentions “God I love Cortana.” in reference to the Weapon. He then blunders to calling her Newtana to then asking one of the other individuals “oh what are we calling her now?”. At which point one of the Devs says it’s the Weapon. His excuse being that they went through many names during development.
What did you guys make of that? Also this is not the first time 343 have done this in their videos.
It was really strange. I’ve never seen anybody make that slip up apart from 343 Campaign Devs in these videos. I don’t see how anyone could play the game and not make a distinction between both characters. This is a really major part of the story and not something that could easily be missed. Especially since it’s right there on the subtitles that she’s called The Weapon.
Remember the Game of Thrones, and the actor that played Varys, he was watching an episode of Game of Thrones and had no clue what was happening, because he only knew his part, he didn’t know what any of the other actors had done and had no idea how the story was put together, so it was like watching a new show for the first time, that’s halo infinite, many of the people that worked on the game have no idea what anybody was doing or how it was going to fit together.
Its just them trying to nickname. They already hinted a new name on her at the end of the campaign, and calling her “The weapon” every time in a conversation is just weird. Newtana is just a joke.
Everybody else calls her the Weapon no issue, regardless of how long the review or livestream is. You just never see people fail to make this distinction when referring to the Weapon.
Plus it’s not the first time they’ve referred to her as Cortana offhand and in other cases it’s not been banter.
So they wouldn’t play through the campaign themselves and would be the ones chosen to do a campaign playthrough? That’s odd. You’re presumably there to offer insight into the game but know less than most.
If he hasn’t played the game how can he say he loves the Weapon? If you were totally ignorant of what was going on in the campaign it just seems weird to offer commentary on the narrative or any strong opinion of a character. The other guy throwing the fusion coils I could understand, because that’s just enjoying playing the game. But it’s like, “I really like this character” but don’t know her name and I am going to conflate her with another dead character.
It’s that big a deal I am just not sure how you could be oblivious to that. You say you’re a fan of Cortana but aren’t aware that you guys killed her off again? Presumably it would be brought up in the studio that “we’re killing Cortana again this game”. That would be floating around in the ether even if you were just making textures for boxes.
And I have no issue if they call her Cortana or Newtana. The weapon was just her name for the sake of campaign. They already hinted her new name and its most likely Cortana anyways.
I wouldn’t be a fan of that. You’d be conflating the two when the Weapon hasn’t:
Saved the Galaxy a few times
Opposed the Gravemind
Spent half her life watching over the Chief
Isn’t the AI Chief promised to save in Halo 4
The AI you died many, many times on High Charity to get back
Keyes and Johnson telling you to make sure she’s okay.
Pretty much all the quotes and scenes between them
Been in the story for 22 years.
That doesn’t transfer over onto this random AI Chief just met.
Whose only contribution has been directing Chief to the next mission. It’s very presumptive to assume all that transfers over to a different character voiced by the same VA. Plus it undermines the notion that Cortana has died and the Chiefs meant to be getting back up from that. You would basically just have given him back Cortana and that’s not an interesting premise when you could just have easily rebooted the series.
Plus it’s just weird. Why would either character be okay with that? I am not on board for that and I am not sure how on board everyone else is either. I think people assume that killing Cortana off is the story moving away from the Love Story angle; not continuing it with a clone.
Like I knew this would be an issue when the Weapon says “I am her” and I was like “No, that’s just dumb. Stop being ridiculous.” To me it was just a laughable notion. A clone with no memories isn’t Cortana. You can have the Chief, Weapon and the Ghost of Cortana say whatever they want.
I think it was more along the lines of a slip-up as were never given the name The Weapon choose for herself. He probably realized that he messed up by confirming it and tried to play it off. Honestly yall looking way to deep into little things.
You see “Cortana” like some copyrighted ownership name. Though see it as an “inheritance”. Though old Cortana has done far more, that doesn’t mean new Cortana won’t have any achievements in her future as well. Kind of like “Spiderman”. Not all Spiderman done the same thing. They just achieve it differently. Naming something similar to the original doesn’t take ownership of all its responsibilities. Only knowing that the name has a lot to live up for.
I don’t understand how naming her anything different effect the story better or at least, at all? Its all just a name. You just see her name something too personal.
Overall, why does naming her similar to the exact copy disgusts you to a point you likely will quit Halo if you find it to be true? To be honest I feel like you made a forum about this half a year ago and I used to respond to it.
Yeah, she’s still not Cortana. That character died. I don’t see why the Weapon would be anything other than a reminder of what’s been lost. Which is how it’s played until the end of the game. Calling her Cortana undermines that entirely. Suggesting that 343 really just wants the character to be “Newtana” and for you to just forget they’re different.
Explain to me why y’all spent years complaining about them undermining the integrity of Cortanas death in Halo 4, but have no problem with them introducing a clone, with the same name and the expectation that things will go back to being as they were? That’s a bit hypocritical.
That is the sentiment being put across. That 343 don’t view these as two different characters but just as a vehicle to write themselves out of dealing with any consequences of Chief getting Cortana back. Are we going to play Halo The Endless in 2025 and it’s just business as usual again? I don’t think that’s remotely been earned and it’s a non starter in any case.
Because it fits a narrative direction way back in Halo 4, 2012. “They will pair you with another AI. Maybe another Cortana model if Halsey lets them. It won’t be me, you know that right?” Which, by the way still, Cortana Model. Literally Cortana even called herself a “Cortana model”
This was also constantly hindered all throughout the Infinite campaign. Everything the UNSC did and Master chief done was to make sure the Weapon did not become Cortana. Though even after finding the truth, the Weapon still wanted to be deleted. As if the fear of “It won’t be her” now worries the Master Chief, but seeing “It was not her” is was the relief Chief needs.
Your post reminds me of a Bungie live stream from Destiny 1 to where a dev was trying to equip 2 exotics that the host had to tell him you can’t do that.
It’s actually bothersome knowing some of the devs working on games today don’t even play the game they are working on, that it actually explains why there are a hell of a lot of issues just with Infinite.
Plus that wasn’t my take at all of that scene in Halo 4. It describes what failure is. That you could never replace Cortana. That if he was given a replacement AI that’s not a second chance and that she would be gone. You aren’t trying to save Cortana in Halo 4 because Chief needs a sidekick to kill Xenos. Which is, you know, why she pleads to know it won’t be her. Whereas Halo Infinite is like “well we’re basically the same so don’t be too fussed about it”. So it’s not at all consistent with Halo 4.
Well actually the UNSC wanted to delete the Weapon and that was the Chiefs mission. Not some grand way of getting a clean AI for him. Which he’s kind of ignoring and presumably will be addressed around 2025. A whole other can of worms because at that point you’re doing a redemption arc by proxy.
The Chief has no reason not to trust the Weapon. He should be fully aware that Cortana went mad because of rampancy and that she’s only 6 months old. That was all very false drama. Plus, if you’ve retconned evil Cortana then she’s not suddenly going to turn bad. Suspension of disbelief has its limits.
Or how about when they ran up to an FOB and they said, “let’s all get in the warthog…” and then they were slightly surprised to find out that only three of them could fit in the Warthog so the fourth player said “I’ll call in a Ghost…” oops… did you mean Mongoose? Cause we can’t call in Banished vehicles(or was this a foreshadowing?)… You’d think a developer with hands on experience of the product they are creating would know basic information like this lol Ohh yeah… that’s why they don’t know because they were hired specifically because they “do not play” Halo.
That Co-Op stream was really just four noobs running around like it was the first Halo game they have ever played. Maybe if Infinite was the first game 343 ever created this would be excusable but this is ten years into the franchise and four games deep… these people should be better acclimated to the product they supposedly represent.
I don’t see how anyone could play the game and not make a distinction between both characters. This is a really major part of the story and not something that could easily be missed. Especially since it’s right there on the subtitles that she’s called The Weapon.
