In Halo why does everybody speak English, even if they hate humans, examples: Prophets speak English together, Gravemind speaks English to Chief, Didact speaks English to Chief and Covenant. They hate humanity but still have learned to speak English? Is it just gameplay thing? Just for the reason that Chief would understand them?
And is English still humanitys lingua franca in 2500 and after?
Player/narrative convenience.
Same reason the aliens speak English in Doctor Who even when the TARDIS isn’t around to translate.
I know from an save source that by an guy with scarab profile pic all speak italian.
Its Halo and not Wolfenstein where it made sense that everyone speak an diffrent language.
Yeah, it’s just for the sake of plot convenience.
Whenever there aren’t any humans around but we hear English, it is strictly for our benefit. Translation software is lore explanation for MC understanding what most of the enemies are speaking, but some Covies did learn English so that they could interrogate and/or insult humans. I think that the reason why we couldn’t understand the Covenant in H4 was that they were speaking a different dialect and our translator chips couldn’t figure it out just yet. Also according to the Mythos, the Prophets speak Sangheli as it was considered a way to solidify the Elite culture within the Covenant.
English does appear to be the main language for the UNSC but you do occasionally get Spanish slang in the original trilogy from the marines, as well as colonists on Reach that speak a European language…forget which. As for the DIdact, Forerunner tech is able to figure out new languages pretty quickly as seen in Ghosts of Onyx. He was aware of his surroundings before being released and probably had his own armor/tech translate for him after hearing Chief and Cortana speak.
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> Whenever there aren’t any humans around but we hear English, it is strictly for our benefit. Translation software is lore explanation for MC understanding what most of the enemies are speaking, but some Covies did learn English so that they could interrogate and/or insult humans. I think that the reason why we couldn’t understand the Covenant in H4 was that they were speaking a different dialect and our translator chips couldn’t figure it out just yet. Also according to the Mythos, the Prophets speak Sangheli as it was considered a way to solidify the Elite culture within the Covenant.
>
> English does appear to be the main language for the UNSC but you do occasionally get Spanish slang in the original trilogy from the marines, as well as colonists on Reach that speak a European language…forget which. As for the DIdact, Forerunner tech is able to figure out new languages pretty quickly as seen in Ghosts of Onyx. He was aware of his surroundings before being released and probably had his own armor/tech translate for him after hearing Chief and Cortana speak.
Ok, this helped.
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> Whenever there aren’t any humans around but we hear English, it is strictly for our benefit. Translation software is lore explanation for MC understanding what most of the enemies are speaking, but some Covies did learn English so that they could interrogate and/or insult humans. I think that the reason why we couldn’t understand the Covenant in H4 was that they were speaking a different dialect and our translator chips couldn’t figure it out just yet. Also according to the Mythos, the Prophets speak Sangheli as it was considered a way to solidify the Elite culture within the Covenant.
>
> English does appear to be the main language for the UNSC but you do occasionally get Spanish slang in the original trilogy from the marines, as well as colonists on Reach that speak a European language…forget which. As for the DIdact, Forerunner tech is able to figure out new languages pretty quickly as seen in Ghosts of Onyx. He was aware of his surroundings before being released and probably had his own armor/tech translate for him after hearing Chief and Cortana speak.
The colonists on Reach (and Jorge) speak Hungarian.
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> Whenever there aren’t any humans around but we hear English, it is strictly for our benefit. Translation software is lore explanation for MC understanding what most of the enemies are speaking, but some Covies did learn English so that they could interrogate and/or insult humans. I think that the reason why we couldn’t understand the Covenant in H4 was that they were speaking a different dialect and our translator chips couldn’t figure it out just yet. Also according to the Mythos, the Prophets speak Sangheli as it was considered a way to solidify the Elite culture within the Covenant.
>
> English does appear to be the main language for the UNSC but you do occasionally get Spanish slang in the original trilogy from the marines, as well as colonists on Reach that speak a European language…forget which. As for the DIdact, Forerunner tech is able to figure out new languages pretty quickly as seen in Ghosts of Onyx. He was aware of his surroundings before being released and probably had his own armor/tech translate for him after hearing Chief and Cortana speak.
It’s a matter of entertainment. 343i made the Covenant speak Sangheili (not an isolated dialect of it but the most common language in the galaxy) in halo 4 and people complained that they couldn’t understand the aliens (which is funny because they didn’t complain when the Covenant spoke gibberish in reach) and because the Unggoy weren’t funny (which is funny for the same reason). According to Canon fodder late in halo 5’s development a top down order was given to make the Unggoy funny again and make the Covies speak English. Up until that point the team didn’t know if the Covenant would have spoken Sangheili or English. Cortana in halo 4 could understand the language. She translates audio logs for the player and the phrase “slay the librarian’s pet”. Roland also translates other verses in spartan ops and Halsey understands Jul.
The terminal Cortana translates:
Sangheili: Nnkahchee kahnohmohkeenoh ruh-ehnahsheewah cheeruh-eh tayruh-ah. Wahsheetahteh rohneeahkeh nohkoh wahnahkohroh neeoh-yohnoh sahgahkay. Tahgee wahkeetoh ruhnehdah-ee nnkah-ee tahgee tahruh-yah. Promethean wahzeguhkah kahjeemah.
English: Non-believers walk the sacred ground. Purge the heretics, so they do not foul the air of Paradise. The time has come to enter the Great Light. The Promethean awakening is nigh, our reward is at hand.
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> It’s a matter of entertainment. 343i made the Covenant speak Sangheili (not an isolated dialect of it but the most common language in the galaxy) in halo 4 and people complained that they couldn’t understand the aliens (which is funny because they didn’t complain when the Covenant spoke gibberish in reach) and because the Unggoy weren’t funny (which is funny for the same reason). According to Canon fodder late in halo 5’s development a top down order was given to make the Unggoy funny again and make the Covies speak English. Up until that point the team didn’t know if the Covenant would have spoken Sangheili or English. Cortana in halo 4 could understand the language. She translates audio logs for the player and the phrase “slay the librarian’s pet”. Roland also translates other verses in spartan ops and Halsey understands Jul.
>
> The terminal Cortana translates:
> Sangheili: Nnkahchee kahnohmohkeenoh ruh-ehnahsheewah cheeruh-eh tayruh-ah. Wahsheetahteh rohneeahkeh nohkoh wahnahkohroh neeoh-yohnoh sahgahkay. Tahgee wahkeetoh ruhnehdah-ee nnkah-ee tahgee tahruh-yah. Promethean wahzeguhkah kahjeemah.
>
> English: Non-believers walk the sacred ground. Purge the heretics, so they do not foul the air of Paradise. The time has come to enter the Great Light. The Promethean awakening is nigh, our reward is at hand.
I know that we could say that “343 wanted it to be different” but I like to view it from a lore perspective and for some reason translation software has been stuck in my head canon as the answer.
I always went with the assumption that if the players couldn’t understand it, it was a technical issue with translation software but someone as advanced as Cortana or Halsey could understand it simply because they bothered to learn the language. Lots of people complained about the covies not speaking English in Reach but I figured that Noble Team didn’t have the most advanced software suite yet and Chief couldn’t understand the covies in H1 because of the same issue. The new armor in H2 did have an upgraded system that was adapting. Plus after Cortana got into their Bnet I can see her being able to adjust the software to translate instantly like when she snaps her fingers and the terminal is translated in real time during Regret’s sermon in H2. The elites do speak in English around humans, but I doubt they’d be writing with it in their personal data pads like in H5.
If they weren’t using a different dialect in H4 then I guess 343 using Sangheli speech and subtitles for translation in H4 cutscenes was a good attempt at being a tad more realistic. I guess it could be said that Cortana was under too much pressure to have the instant translation active during gameplay and that the subtitles in spartan ops cutscenes rather than English was a thematic choice.
As others have said it’s mostly four our convenience, plus they would have to create entire languages for the different Covenant species unless they were lazy about it and just slapped in gibberish.
Canonical reason is that translator technology is higly developed in the halo universe. Remember how Cortana translated Prophet of Regret in real time?Also many members of the covenant have learned english to understand humans better. Especially grunts are skilled in human languages. In cutscenes where there are no humans around alien languages are coveniently still translated to english.
Äidinkielenäänhän avaruusoliot siis puhuvat suomea. Savolaisittain murtaen tietysti.
i think the reason is because they are making a game for people which most of them speak english, and they don’t want people to have to read subtitles. but from a lore standpoint i have no idea.
another question is, why does every UNSC member speaks with either an american accent or a british accent in the games ?
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> Canonical reason is that translator technology is higly developed in the halo universe. Remember how Cortana translated Prophet of Regret in real time?Also many members of the covenant have learned english to understand humans better. Especially grunts are skilled in human languages. In cutscenes where there are no humans around alien languages are coveniently still translated to english.
>
> Äidinkielenäänhän avaruusoliot siis puhuvat suomea. Savolaisittain murtaen tietysti.
En taida sitten ymmärtää sitä murretta 
> 2533274824409174;11:
> Canonical reason is that translator technology is higly developed in the halo universe. Remember how Cortana translated Prophet of Regret in real time?Also many members of the covenant have learned english to understand humans better. Especially grunts are skilled in human languages. In cutscenes where there are no humans around alien languages are coveniently still translated to english.
>
> Äidinkielenäänhän avaruusoliot siis puhuvat suomea. Savolaisittain murtaen tietysti.
This
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> another question is, why does every UNSC member speaks with either an american accent or a british accent in the games ?
In Halo Wars I heard some Australian accents. People should stop looking for lore reasons for things like this. I saw a video about the lore reason for the sangheili design change when 343i took over and I found myself annoyed. They changed designs. There is no lore explanation. They speak english if your game is english. They speak German in Germany, and Spanish in Spain.
I had remembered reading that early in the human covenant war, The Prophets ordered everyone to learn some human languages (English being the most common) for tactical purposes. I think its in the Halo Timeline in Halo Wars if someone wants to go check. Grunts also being very intelligent were able to learn up to 3 languages. The first message sent to the UNSC by the covenant was in English. Therefore I assumed that the covenant in Halo 2 had learned at least English by 2552. I also assumed most of the covenant troops on Reach didn’t learn any languages or didn’t bother speaking them during battle. Funnily enough there’s an Easter egg where a sleeping grunt sleeptalks in English on Nightfall. By Halo 4 I assumed the Storm Covenant either never wanted to speak human tongues due to hatred or never bothered learning English. Then there’s Halo 5 and Jul speaks English and I dont even want to bother with that. All I’m saying is that some covies learned English and some didn’t. The forerunners, gravemimd, sentinels etc use Latin as a base to learn romantic languages like English. Ghosts of Onyx is a good example of this.
edit: Yup 8th timeline entry
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> Player/narrative convenience.
>
> Same reason the aliens speak English in Doctor Who even when the TARDIS isn’t around to translate.
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
I’m pretty sure other versions of the game have them speaking in different languages
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> > Player/narrative convenience.
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> > Same reason the aliens speak English in Doctor Who even when the TARDIS isn’t around to translate.
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> Couldn’t have said it better myself.
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> I’m pretty sure other versions of the game have them speaking in different languages
To be fair, in Halo: Reach, Jorge and some of the Civilians also speak Hungarian (I think, anyways). So there are other languages, its just easier to have people speaking English.
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> > > Player/narrative convenience.
> > >
> > > Same reason the aliens speak English in Doctor Who even when the TARDIS isn’t around to translate.
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> > Couldn’t have said it better myself.
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> > I’m pretty sure other versions of the game have them speaking in different languages
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> To be fair, in Halo: Reach, Jorge and some of the Civilians also speak Hungarian (I think, anyways). So there are other languages, its just easier to have people speaking English.
This is true. English is the 3rd Most Common Language in the WORLD behind Spanish and Chinese (Mandarin) so it would make sense that everything is in English