After looking at the new box art, I’m now nearly certain that an old theory of mine is going to be true. Not sure if its been discussed here before, but I figured I’ll put it out there just in case I get it right!
Anyways, the new box art shows the ring broken/separated into several segments; some large, some small, some seeming to be floating freely. This segmented ring was also in the old key art from E3 with Chief standing in the back of a pelican, but given that was essentially concept art I took it with a grain of salt. But now we have near-concrete evidence that this segmentation will be a feature of the ring in the game, and I think it makes perfect sense if they are going open world. Let me explain…
Ever since open world was teased we’ve heard predictions like “What if they WHOLE RING is explorable!?”, and while that would be awesome, quite frankly that’s just not gonna happen. A Halo ring has the surface area comparable to a small planet; waaay too large for a game with this type of gameplay/graphics/engine. BUT, what is more likely is having several open world environments that the missions take place within, much like Destiny.
…see where I’m going with this?
The broken segments of the ring represent the different open-world areas we can travel to. It’s a genius idea really. You can create the feeling if traversing the entire Halo without having to make the entire thing playable, and to have the different areas visible in the skybox entices players to progress further to reach the new segments of the ring (probably transported via Brohammer’s pelican, also shown on the box art). This also creates a perfect way to blend the various environments of the ring: one large area with a traditional Halo environment (forest, trees, mountains, etc.), then a snowy environment (i.e. Assault on the Control Room), then a desert one, a beach one, and so on. And like Destiny, I’m guessing the campaing will only be semi-open-world, meaning that we will have a large open environment to explore while being directed on a more linear path through the mission.
So what do you all think? I know we’ll probably find out tomorrow and this post may be pointless, but I’m just trying to keep myself busy for the next 24 hours! Anyways, let me know what you think about my theory or about any of your own theories you may have.
