I really liked this story but what the hell is with that ending man? I was left with so many unanswered questions. Where’s Lasky? Where’s Blue Team? Where’s Team Osiris? How did Cortana die? Speaking of Cortana, the fact that she was killed off screen was extremely lame. Also can someone explain to me why she suddenly just apologizes to Chief after killing so many people? Finally I didn’t like that Chief just replaced Cortana with the Weapon, he even let her take her name!
Why 343, just why…
A lot of questions are answered in audio logs, but I assume some questions are left purposefully unanswered to set up future stories.
Cortana deleted herself so that the Banished couldn’t use her to take control of Zeta Halo. Even though she went a bit mental with rampancy, her vision was to create peace by force so she didn’t necessarily want to hurt people as much as she wanted people to end all conflict. She was just going about it the wrong way.
In her final moments she realised that the best thing she can do to help conflict be ended is to help Chief because despite everything that has happened, he is the best of humanity and him pairing up with new Cortana is the Universe’s best hope of peace now that she has to delete herself. If the decision was to survive or save humanity she was always going to pick humanity, that’s how she was designed and her attacking the humans was just done so she could save more of them in the long run.
I like Weapon taking Cortana’s name, she is Cortana after all.
The story was great, I think I just liked how alone Chief was throughout all of it. Huge Halo CE vibes where it was just Chief left to save the day and no-one to back him up. I loved it.
Where did it say in game she’s taking cortanas name???
It was heavily implied as she asked for Chief’s permission which wouldn’t make sense unless she was planning on using Cortana.
I saw many of the audio logs and while they were interesting, it’s lazy to just have that be the only thing to hear about these characters. We should’ve seen them in cutscenes.
But why would Chief just allow the Weapon to take that name? Especially after he just saw Cortana’s last message saying goodbye. Also correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t the REAL Cortana actually die in Halo 4? Just in Halo 5 the evil version was one of her corrupted fragments?
And to add, Halo Infinites story isn’t about blue team, osiris, etc. It’s a story about the Chief, Echo 216, the weapon and the Banished. Throwing in every single character just because they were in previous games would only hinder the story, not add to it.
Im sure they will be added in future dlc
The whole campaign felt more like an apology from 343i for Halo 4 (which was still okay) and Halo 5 by going almost fully back to the roots. I think they threw all of the new characters and even the new Spartan IV out to start their Halo journey fresh, end what Bungie started instead of continueing it and then do their own thing wuth the new species, AI and characters. As much as I dislike the new AI’s that - even tho its an exact copy, doesn’t behave or talk like Cortana at all - talking in the long run , the pilot and the story, it actually felt like an Halo again (and -Yoink!- grappling trough the map with almost no ceiling is fun as hell, especially with no cooldown)
She asked for chiefs permission to name herself. She asked “is that ok?” And he said “you get to name yourself”
The way I see it, Cortana was envisioning a scenario where she would go down to Zeta, and await Chief to come with the deletion protocol with the Weapon, and prepared all her messages as she awaited her “execution”
What was a huge surprise was that it wasn’t Chief that came with the Weapon, it was Atriox. Cortana in her folly much earlier, threatened and destroyed the Banish homeworld and Atriox was not too happy about it. Atriox somehow knew the UNSC has a countermeasure to Cortana, launched an assault, took the Weapon, and went down to the Ring’s surface to confront her.
Cortana’s little plan was in ruins, and she couldn’t even die at the hands of her longtime partner the Chief, and even worse, Zeta wasn’t a normal Halo, it held more terrible secrets than the Flood, and the Banished intended to take over the Ring for their own uses.
So Cortana did one thing before she was deleted by Atriox : she shattered the Ring to stop or at least delay the Banished. And as a final farewell to John, wished him well with the Weapon.
And I don’t like Weapon taking Cortana’s name. Cheapens the entire ordeal and sequence of events leading up to it. Why build her up to clearly be NOT CORTANA but then decide to pick her name up again for whatever dumb reason. It would be much better if Weapon picked her own name, not the name of her predecessor.
NGL, I feel more for Griffin’s team than Osiris.
Osiris felt like a bunch of hotshots who just go “Yeaaaa we coool” but Griffin’s team seemed more grounded, knew the risks, were a little proud but they understood their risks and made their choices.
Listening to all the Rubico Protocol Spartan logs let you in on their thought process and how they came to die trying to stop the Banished over the last six months, and when you finally do meet Griffin, he was just so full of regret and told Chief to finish the fight, that only he could do it.
These S-IVs knew their place, they knew their limits and they knew the costs.
I salute Sorel the Screwdriver bro, he died swinging. Or stabbing.
The weapon is a 1:1 copy of Cortana as it pertains to raw data. What separates Cortana and the weapon for US is the memories Cortana forged with us vs the ones with the weapon.
Marvel Super Hero Song plays
I think the whole theme of this story is supposed to be about letting go of the past and rebuilding. If you dont like it, its time to let go.
the sprinkling of cortanas last few words throughout the story did a pretty good job explaining why she turned so wildly. the banished had her cornered, and her likely imminent destruction if she did not hand over the ring made her think. in effect she wasnt killed off screen, you got to see it happen through the dust and echoes in the last mission. it came together really well for me. the weapon taking her name is very appropriate as well. the weapon is cortana. cortana is an AI after all, the weapon is a direct copy, what better name to take. the old cortana will never properly atone for what she did, and I dont actually think she was trying to, personally. her deletion and handling of atriox was her way to try to protect everyone from a banished held ring. as for lasky, blue team, and osiris, its not super clear. lasky is probably dead, or if not dead then hiding out somewhere on the ring. blue team may not have been on the infinity, I dont have every log yet so Im not completely sure, and osiris was basically disbanded as far as Im aware. at the least buck is back with alpha nine. its implied locke was on the infinity, but other than that, its not super clear. I think making it unclear was a good choice. chief was out for a long time, what happened between atriox dropping him into space and waking up in the pelican is stuff for us to learn and experience in the future.
chiefs silence after griffin spent what he had left to tell chief of the dig site almost got me tearing up. you can really tell throughout the game that chief feels heavily for the other Spartans.
Strongly disagree. Where’s Lasky? Where’s Palmer? Where’s Halsey? Where’s Blue Team? Where’s Osiris? Where are the Guardians? Where’s the Spirit of Fire? Where’s Red Team? Where’s Anders? What’s the state of Earth? What’s the state of the UNSC? How did the Banished beat the Guardians? How did the Banished leave the Ark? What happened on the Ark? Where’s Lord Hood? Where’s Arbiter? What’s the state on the rest of the Halo? What’s the deal with this Halo? Who was the Harbinger? Who are The Endless? Why does Atriox want them? Since when has he wanted them? What did he learn on the Ark, as it was never said in Halo Wars 2 that he was searching for some Forerunner enemy?
None of these are answered. The game is vapid of detail, and barely explains anything newly added. I was fooled into paying £55 for a prologue.
She didn’t delete herself, she self destructed part of the ring sacrificing herself to kill Atriox.
What many are having issues with is that Cortana is dead and that Atriox may still be alive based on the post credit scene. Which means, Cortana literally died for nothing. Her death was just pointless and happened all off screen.
The banish couldn’t use her, Cortana was too OP and literally could of summoned the Warden and millions of copies, along with deploying a ton of Guardians to the ring and end the banish conflict.
BAD WRITING LEAVES ROOM FOR A TON OF QUESTIONS AND A BAD STORY.
343 Industries rushed the story or rewrote the story, The story and audio logs prove this point only for maybe DLC’s to answer SOME questions.
We’re looking at another Destiny 1 - Destiny 2 scenario here.
So again, there is alot of bad story telling going in here that has people question what is going on? What was the point of the story? Why did so much happen off screen and not even get addressed in audio logs.
Some good questions for sure.
But nothing that’s a burning imperative. And certainly nothing to hang the game out to dry for.
Plenty of time for the rest to unfold.