Halo has always been a game of well strung together canon since the birth of Combat Evolved but over the years things have taken slight downturns.
I believe the first minor lapses in consistency began with Reach, refer to thread for more details:
Frankly being a huge fan of the books i noticed these niggling issues crop up and saw as 343 tried to patch it all up pre Halo 4. But Halo 4 produced one error at the very start of the game that raised my eyebrow and still to this day upsets me due to the game over book canon order.
Why did the Spartan II’s wear the latest Mark VI that Cortana upgraded in the opening cut scene that was clearly set before Halo 4? These type of errors completely disregard the large amount of story behind the creation of Mjolnir armor.
Am i overreacting? I feel that 343 should keep future Halo games in line with the novels to keep fans of just the games and the extended universe happy.
I’ve always thought that it was because 343i wanted to show to players who didn’t know about the expanded canon outside of the games that there were more Spartans just like Master Chief. If they put them in the same armour then it ties them together. Canonically, they weren’t actually wearing that armour.
The images of the Covenant War we see in Halo 4’s prologue are not necessarily canon. Their function is to serve as a string of images symbolic of the Covenant War and SPARTAN-II program without creating a cutscene that lasts 10-15mn.
> 1. Noble Team can and does exist.
>
> The A and B in their SPARTAN-III tags indicate which company they were apart of.
>
> Alpha Company began training in 2531 making Jun, Emile, and Carter within the acceptable age range.
>
> 2. Halo Reach is canon and does work for the most partt with the existing lore.
>
> 3. The images of the Covenant War we see in Halo 4’s prologue are not necessarily canon. Their function is to serve as a string of images symbolic of the Covenant War and SPARTAN-II program without creating a cutscene that lasts 10-15mn.
As i said 343 did a good job patching things up and some of the things listed we’re incorrect. The reason i take the Halo 4 cinematic as canon was because Bungie and 343 seem to follow this hierarchy that says game canon comes before books.
> > 1. Noble Team can and does exist.
> >
> > The A and B in their SPARTAN-III tags indicate which company they were apart of.
> >
> > Alpha Company began training in 2531 making Jun, Emile, and Carter within the acceptable age range.
> >
> > 2. Halo Reach is canon and does work for the most partt with the existing lore.
> >
> > 3. The images of the Covenant War we see in Halo 4’s prologue are not necessarily canon. Their function is to serve as a string of images symbolic of the Covenant War and SPARTAN-II program without creating a cutscene that lasts 10-15mn.
>
> As i said 343 did a good job patching things up and some of the things listed we’re incorrect. The reason i take the Halo 4 cinematic as canon was because Bungie and 343 seem to follow this hierarchy that says game canon comes before books.
343i has stated that all canon matters and is equal.
Bungie did keep advertising Chief as the “last Spartan” … which I thought was in fact the case until I heard otherwise from book enthusiasts and I’ve since read most of them myself.
The reason I heard as to why the Halo 4 prologue doesn’t feature Spartans in Mark IV or V armor but in the one-of-a-kind custom Mark VI was that the company that produced all of the Halo 4 CG were only given that 3D character model (so it was either a cost issue or an oversight or laziness, I don’t know) but then again, that’s just what I heard, so it’s possibly a bunch of BS.
Canon or not, the Halo 4 prologue is very impressive.
I have to agree with Martini that people at 343I we’re most likely just too lazy to re-create the older MARK-variants so they just used the current MARK-variant in the prologue.
> 343i considers the games and EU equal on the canon hierarchy.
I’ve seen this said, but I have never seen it sourced.
> I have to agree with Martini that people at 343I we’re most likely just too lazy to re-create the older MARK-variants so they just used the current MARK-variant in the prologue.
343i did not animate the CGI cut scenes, a 3rd party did, and they would have only had access to Halo 4 Mark VI renders for reference.
Really that is the only thing that bothered me. I’m pretty sure that the 3rd party studio tasked with the Epilouge only had the Mk.VI ‘Cortana’ Special armor to work with.
I actually prefer the ‘non-canon’ idea. It would help lay to rest to a lot of the complaints regarding that issue. I’d be happy if they simply said “The prologue cutscene is a mere non-canon overview of the covenant war and how Dr Halsey, and her spartans factor into it. Essentially, it is a brief summary for the newcomers”.
BOOM! There’s your explanation right there.
> I’ve seen this said, but I have never seen it sourced.
Neither have i. I also consider it far-fetched because the kilo-5 novels are inconsistent with the Nylund novels in certain plot points. This would mean that they do have a policy, which is, ‘new canon overrides old canon’.
To me, the intro wasn’t so much an accurate depiction of what occurred in the Human-Covenant War as it was a flashback to emphasize Halsey’s talk with the Anonymous ONI Agent. It is canon, but only as a “flashback” I hope that makes sense.
Due to being a pre-rendered cinematic, the opening had to recycle as many CG assets as possible to reduce on production time and costs. A model for Halo 4’s version of Master Chief was needed for the ending cutscene, so it would be easy to make a copy of that model before adding the battle damage unique to the Chief.
This is also why we see 'Mdama-Covenant armored Sangheili in the opening instead of the versions we are used to from the Bungie game, why we see marines in post-war gear, or why in Spartan Ops we only see Storm Elites (as opposed to a variety of ranks).
I do hope this helps.
P.S. Think of the opening like Halo Legends: The general series of events are canon, but the visual depictions are 100% accurate.