Should the Promethians been kept a secret?

Games Other Halo
1

I ask this question because I remember the moment in Halo CE when you finally encounter the flood. It was the enemy you didn’t know was there, all along you thought you were fighting the Covenant, you weren’t sure what the Covenant were after, and then BLAM flood in your face! It was an epic moment, and something I feel could have been recreated in Halo 4 had the PR stuff kept it quiet. That possibility was either unrecognized or disregarded.

Please share your thoughts on this.

Like I said I thought an epic opportunity for another moment like that was missed by all the publicity done on the Promethians. The suspense of a new unknown enemy could have been exploited more than it was, in my opinion.

2

If its the first game, you can introduce anything.

When you are like 4 games into it, I don’t really think you can hide much from the player.

3

This is exactly what I’ve been saying all along prior to the release of Halo 4. Honestly, the only part of the Halo 4 campaign that was surprising was that we got to see the Librarian and that we saw Installation 03, but those aren’t nearly as big as the surprises that we had in store for us in past Halo games.

So yes, I agree that 343i should have kept quiet about the Prometheans before Halo 4 came out. That scene at the end of the second level where all the Knights appear before John and Cortana would have been a lot more shocking if I didn’t know exactly what I was looking at.

And some of you might say “well you could have just gone dark on the game”. Trust me, I tried. I didn’t watch any of the vidocs or anything following E3, but they were still shoving everything in our face. The only way to not know who the Prometheans were would have been to not go on the internet at all.

4

That would have put more suspense into an enemy that (except for 343) no one really knew much about. That would have been nice.

5

It would be impossible to “stay dark” considering tv commercials were everywhere and hackers would have spoiled the game for everyone on the internet.

6

> It would be impossible to “stay dark” considering tv commercials were everywhere and hackers would have spoiled the game for everyone on the internet.

Unfortunately this would have happened.

People spoiling stuff infuriates me as the developers will often freak out about it and ship the game early or go paranoid about it.

ME3 had that problem and looked what happened!

7

i full heartedly agree with this

in fact i was so convinced that 343 would conceal the new enemy we are fighting that even after they revealed the promethians i was positive there would be another unveiled enemy we would fight

but alas, it was not meant to be…i was a little disappointed, but life goes on

8

Yeah, sometimes I think they revealed too much. The Prometheans would have been an awesome surprise. Then there was the idiots spoiling things all over the internet. I mean, it was my fault for looking sometimes, but seriously, it’s like waving beer in front of an alcoholic; what do you think’s gonna happen?

Hopefully, Halo 5 will have a bunch of surprises. I really hope they go all out on the story.

9

> I ask this question because I remember the moment in Halo CE when you finally encounter the flood. It was the enemy you didn’t know was there, all along you thought you were fighting the Covenant, you weren’t sure what the Covenant were after, and then BLAM flood in your face! It was an epic moment, and something I feel could have been recreated in Halo 4 had the PR stuff kept it quiet. That possibility was either unrecognized or disregarded.

But CE was a new game that had virtually no expectations put on it. Even encountering the covenant or the sentinels for the first time was a moment because we (generally) knew nothing about Halo nor did we know what to expect besides new shooter.

Halo 4 had to contend with our expectations, a whole decade’s worth and if they kept silent about a new enemy faction 343 would have been left with a game that looked quite like it was only going to revist the same ol’ covenant massacres that we spent the last 5 games slogging through (and some of us have become quite bored with.)

And besides, if you put that much value in plot twists there’s a pretty simple solution: don’t watch the trailers, read the previews, or engage in any way with the pre-launch material. You don’t need a marketing department to go dark when you can take your own steps to avoid spoilers.

10

[\quote Duncan Idaho 11]

But CE was a new game that had virtually no expectations put on it. Halo 4 did, a whole decade’s worth and if they kept silent about a new enemy faction they would have been left with a game that looked like it was only going to revist the same ol’ covenant massacres that we spent the last 5 games slogging through.

And besides, if you put that much value in plot twists there’s a pretty simple solution: don’t watch the trailers, read the previews, or engage in any way with the pre-launch material. You don’t need a marketing department to go dark when you can take your own steps to not read/watch/listen to spoilers.
[/quote]
I understand it was not a new title, something I think could have been exploited a bit to actually conceal the prometheans, IMHO. In this instance it is most likely weighed which is more valuable to the game, pre game hype over a new enemy or the post launch hype after it is discovered. I feel the ladder is more important in the long run and can pay off bigger in the end. The bar doesn’t have to be set low, but hiding something major can be beneficial to the game, the player, and publicity which all translate to a more post launch sales.

So your solution to my issue with having known about a major plot point before release was to avoid the vast majority of all media leading up to it? Does this sound reasonable let alone feasible to anyone else? It sounds ludicrous to me…here were commercials and pictures of the promethians prelaunch plastered a lot of places.

The marketing dept. doesn’t need to go dark, but teasing at something to be revealed, a new enemy, with maybe sound bytes, flashes of orange light, etc. There are other ways to sell the game and the “newness” without spilling the whole bucket. But yes perhaps in the future I will avoid any and all pre launch vid docs, etc. to a game I highly anticipate. Avoiding that extra content is possible. Avoiding everyone I know spilling it…not as much.

11

> [\quote]
> I understand it was not a new title, something I think could have been exploited a bit to actually conceal the prometheans, IMHO. In this instance it is most likely weighed which is more valuable to the game, pre game hype over a new enemy or the post launch hype after it is discovered. I feel the ladder is more important in the long run and can pay off bigger in the end. The bar doesn’t have to be set low, but hiding something major can be beneficial to the game, the player, and publicity which all translate to a more post launch sales.

That’s nonsense. If you haven’t enticed people to play your game with new content then you haven’t made any case for them to buy your game. Maybe you pick something up on the back end with those people who change their minds about that other Halo game but in that you’re having to fight expectations, rather tahn feeding off of them

> So your solution to my issue with having known about a major plot point before release was to avoid the vast majority of all media leading up to it? Does this sound reasonable let alone feasible to anyone else? It sounds ludicrous to me…here were commercials and pictures of the promethians prelaunch plastered a lot of places.

I did. It wasn’t that hard at all. Well actually I did pick up on a picture of the knight and the word “promethean” but those hardly spoiled the twist for me (which IMO focused around finding the Didact, rather than fighting more advanced forerunner AI’s. Despite the comparison the end of mission 2 wasn’t a flood moment, nor was it intended to be considering the space (end of 2, start of 3) there was between reveal and opening fight.)

> The marketing dept. doesn’t need to go dark, but teasing at something to be revealed, a new enemy, with maybe sound bytes, flashes of orange light, etc. There are other ways to sell the game and the “newness” without spilling the whole bucket. But yes perhaps in the future I will avoid any and all pre launch vid docs, etc. to a game I highly anticipate. Avoiding that extra content is possible. Avoiding everyone I know spilling it…not as much.

There are other ways but are those going to be as lucrative as the major point of “what this game is ultimately going to be about”? Is forge 3.0 going to entice as many people as new -Yoink- to shoot for the first time since Halo 3? For that matter if you hide the things we kill most in this game you’re selling people a view of Halo 4 which doesn’t actually hold true. Rather than be elated some people might actaully be disappointed that the grand grunt killing action that they expected and 343 gave little hint wasn’t going to be the main feature was side-showed by the distinctly less comical prometheans. The best comparison I could make here is the game Brink which tried to sell it’s story when in truth the devs were holding back a Team Fortress wannabe. And as you can find for yourself that wasn’t well recieved, apart from the game being -Yoink- generally, because it was fighting expectations.

So there’s that issue to consider as well as your total pitch being less powerful than if you make the best, and most representative, case for Halo 4 and let people who don’t want to be spoiled take things into their own hands.