Osiris and Noble Team

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

Both often regarded as Halo’s most bland teams of protagonists, Fireteam Osiris and Noble Team don’t get a whole bunch of love round these parts. While I agree that both needed more development, I think there was (and still is) potential in both.

Noble Team

I personally prefer Noble Team because they give off an air of “coolness” and uniqueness that Osiris just doesn’t have on the surface IMO. Many people in the community are attached to them just because of how they look; they are each an interesting archetype and it’s clear that they each serve different purposes and have different attitudes toward their work that make them instantly likable and distinctive. Jorge, the lone Spartan-II giant with a heart of gold; Emile, the sarcastic, hard-edged killing machine; Kat, the strong-willed one-armed genius; Jun, the reclusive sniper, etc.

This was one of Bungie’s strong suits IMO, even with Destiny. They make characters that are cool on the surface, put them in an interesting world and give them a plight that makes you care about them. Then, through EU writings and media, they become strong, deep and beloved characters. Unfortunately, Noble Team never got the second part of that development, and in-game they were killed off far too quickly to even care about it.

If 343 could stop being so scared of touching the Reach section of Halo’s timeline and make stories about/featuring Noble before or even during Reach, they could be amazing characters.

Fireteam Osiris

With Osiris, pretty much the exact opposite is happening. Each character has a fairly interesting backstory: Tanaka, coming up rough on a glassed planet; Vale, living with Sangheili and learning their culture; Buck, well…he’s Buck, the ex-ODST leader; Locke, a shadowy agent and assassin of ONI.

The problem with them for me is that none of them have any defining traits in terms of personality or even roles in combat. There are moments, but really the only person on Osiris that stands out is Buck as the comic relief guy. They come off as a bunch of bland “goody-two-shoes” clones of one another and they’re pretty far removed from the conflict of the game to me.

It’d be more interesting if we could tell them apart more often, say if Vale was a bit cold and detached from her team but was more at home with the Sangheili or something, or if Locke was respectful and clean-cut during conversation but manipulative and violent on a mission, I dunno. Make them different, make their styles compliment one another, make them not perfect soldiers and I think people would like them more.

Anyway, that’s my two cents. What do you think?

2

Not much happens with Osiris (rescue halsey, go after chief). Nothing dramatic happens at all. Noble Team has the backstory of Thom (previous Noble Six) and the team continually loses people and need to adapt. Osiris just asks where the next location is. If you ask me, Halo 5 (and overall outlook on Osiris) would have been 10 times better if the game were from a one (in H5’s case) or two man perspective (chief and locke) like in Halo 2 (chief and arbiter). I get why they made the whole squad playable but I think it ultimately killed there ability to tell a story with character development.

Noble wins because we got to see each character for who they were instead of walking in their boots. Thats what makes some characters unique in my opinion, that you watch them be them and not “be” them. Instead of potentially awesome dramatic moments (like Jorge’s sacrifice) we get the “he needs to live throughout the whole game, be available for every mission, cant do any risky actions that take him out of a mission” because Osiris (including Blue Team) need to be intact as a squad because of the multiplayer mechanic.

Osiris could and hopefully will get better and more fleshed out in the future titles. My suggestions:

  • Campaign needs a central character to focus on during missions (Like Halo CE, and 4)
  • If there are multiple character points of view they should be limited to one on the screen at a time (Halo 2 was fantastic from 2 points of view. Halo 5 should have been like this IMO)
  • If the main man is in a squad it should be done similar to Reach (squad helps at locations, disappears for some, not even in some missions sometimes.)

Thats what I think.

3

> 2533274839015543;2:
> Not much happens with Osiris (rescue halsey, go after chief). Nothing dramatic happens at all. Noble Team has the backstory of Thom (previous Noble Six) and the team continually loses people and need to adapt. Osiris just asks where the next location is. If you ask me, Halo 5 (and overall outlook on Osiris) would have been 10 times better if the game were from a one (in H5’s case) or two man perspective (chief and locke) like in Halo 2 (chief and arbiter). I get why they made the whole squad playable but I think it ultimately killed there ability to tell a story with character development.
>
> Noble wins because we got to see each character for who they were instead of walking in their boots. Thats what makes some characters unique in my opinion, that you watch them be them and not “be” them. Instead of potentially awesome dramatic moments (like Jorge’s sacrifice) we get the “he needs to live throughout the whole game, be available for every mission, cant do any risky actions that take him out of a mission” because Osiris (including Blue Team) need to be intact as a squad because of the multiplayer mechanic.
>
> Osiris could and hopefully will get better and more fleshed out in the future titles. My suggestions:
> - Campaign needs a central character to focus on during missions (Like Halo CE, and 4)
> - If there are multiple character points of view they should be limited to one on the screen at a time (Halo 2 was fantastic from 2 points of view. Halo 5 should have been like this IMO)
> - If the main man is in a squad it should be done similar to Reach (squad helps at locations, disappears for some, not even in some missions sometimes.)
>
> Thats what I think.

I pretty much agree with this. I was pretty bummed when they announced that Chief and Locke wouldn’t be alone because it seemed like they just shoehorned in other characters and wrecked the “Hunter vs. Hunted” dynamic they had.

Having multiple characters can still lead to a dire situation though; one of the stronger beliefs about 5’s campaign before release was that half of Osiris or Blue would die and the teams would end up mixed. That was far more interesting that what ACTUALLY happened though.

4

Rip Noble only if they survived