Support NeoGAF

[Torrent of Pork]

Just a thought here, but in virtually every Halo game the SPARTANs are all, "Rah rah rah supersoldiers doing supersoldier shit, humanity fuck yeah," but what you find in the novels is dark as hell. All of the SPARTAN ll's are child soldiers who were kidnapped from their parents long before the Covenant War started for the purpose of staving off a human civil war. All of the SPARTAN lll's were war orphans who were emotionally manipulated into "volunteering" to become child soldiers, and quite a few got their aggression brain centers enhanced before being sent off to suicide missions.

This is not new information to me, I read most of the Halo books years ago. I just happened to think about how different the action FPS games are from the novels which are about as grimdark as it gets unless we're talking about 40k wackiness.


Edit- This is in no way a criticism of Halo lore or the games, I just think there's an interesting disconnect between the tone of the games and the novels.

 

[Grumpy Toe Nail]

You don't even see Spartans other than Master Chief until Halo 4. No in game Spartans are child soldiers like the Chief iirc.

Battlefield games are worse imo lol.

 

[ZehDon]

I kind of enjoy it - the disconnect creates an interesting juxtaposition that feels pretty unique in most fiction. The Halo games invoke a feeling of "hope", no small part due to the legendary musical scores. Yet, if you dig into the lore, the saviours of humankind were originally created to subjugate it - I believe the original intention of the SPARTAN II project was to put down human rebellions. It's been a while since I went down the lore rabbit hole, but if I remember rightly, Halsey's super soldiers were re-purposed into the defenders of humanity when the Covenant began glassing humanity's worlds; until then, they were intended to keep everyone in line.

As you've pointed out, go deep enough, and it gets pretty damn dark. For example, the early Project Mjolnir armour prototypes are the stuff of nightmares. It was linked into a recruit's nervous system, and was dramatically more powerful than originally planned. When the tester basically twitched, the suit picked up on the movement and enhanced it way more than expecting, breaking a bone or tearing muscles; the pain spasms caused a chain effect and basically tore them apart inside the suit. Not the way I wanna go, that's for sure.

I think part of the disconnect is that much of Halo's lore wasn't actually fleshed out until after the first game came out. The first game set a tone that the other games matched, but the lore behind it was free to do whatever.

 

[01011001]

Just a thought here, but in virtually every Halo game the SPARTANs are all, "Rah rah rah supersoldiers doing supersoldier shit, humanity fuck yeah," but what you find in the novels is dark as hell. All of the SPARTAN ll's are child soldiers who were kidnapped from their parents long before the Covenant War started for the purpose of staving off a human civil war. All of the SPARTAN lll's were war orphans who were emotionally manipulated into "volunteering" to become child soldiers, and quite a few got their aggression brain centers enhanced before being sent off to suicide missions.

This is not new information to me, I read most of the Halo books years ago. I just happened to think about how different the action FPS games are from the novels which are about as grimdark as it gets unless we're talking about 40k wackiness.

I think it works. the games put you in the shoes of these manipulated super soldiers. in a sense it is like the difference in Haze between the early game when you are the Nectar using drugged up soldier under government propaganda and the books are like Haze after your suit is damaged and your Nectar is running out so you see the real horror of the war.

I kinda like that tbh... and who would have thought that failed "Halo killer" Haze will be brought up in a discussion about the story of Halo in 2021?

 

[Grumpy Toe Nail]

I kind of enjoy it - the disconnect creates an interesting juxtaposition that feels pretty unique in most fiction. The Halo games invoke a feeling of "hope", no small part due to the legendary musical scores. Yet, if you dig into the lore, the saviours of humankind were originally created to subjugate it - I believe the original intention of the SPARTAN II project was to put down human rebellions. It's been a while since I went down the lore rabbit hole, but if I remember rightly, Halsey's super soldiers were re-purposed into the defenders of humanity when the Covenant began glassing humanity's worlds; until then, they were intended to keep everyone in line.

As you've pointed out, go deep enough, and it gets pretty damn dark. For example, the early Project Mjolnir armour prototypes are the stuff of nightmares. It was linked into a recruit's nervous system, and was dramatically more powerful than originally planned. When the tester basically twitched, the suit picked up on the movement and enhanced it way more than expecting, breaking a bone or tearing muscles; the pain spasms caused a chain effect and basically tore them apart inside the suit. Not the way I wanna go, that's for sure.

I think part of the disconnect is that much of Halo's lore wasn't actually fleshed out until after the first game came out. The first game set a tone that the other games matched, but the lore behind it was free to do whatever.

I think a lot of it is the audience too. That said the flood is a bit dark.

 

[Torrent of Pork]

Also note that I'm not criticising anything, I love all of the Halo lore. I just think it's interesting how much darker the novels are.

 

[Cert.in.Death]

Books are for nerds.

Videogames are for winners.

/s

 

[Torrent of Pork]

I think a lot of it is the audience too. That said the flood is a bit dark.

Holy shit the Flood is dark. Take all the body horror of The Thing, Tyranids, the Borg, etc, and make them unbelievably fucking intelligent.

 

[Torrent of Pork]

I think it works. the games put you in the shoes of these manipulated super soldiers. in a sense it is like the difference in Haze between the early game when you are the Nectar using drugged up soldier under government propaganda and the books are like Haze after your suit is damaged and your Nectar is running out so you see the real horror of the war.

I kinda like that tbh... and who would have thought that failed "Halo killer" Haze will be brought up in a discussion about the story of Halo in 2021?

In the Kilo 5 trilogy you actually dive into that topic when the two ODST members of the team (I think they were ODSTs, they might be regular marines) get read into the SPARTAN ll program after meeting Naomi-010. They react in horror upon realising what was done to the SPARTAN lls, and this occurs just after Halo 3.

Two special forces combat vets of a war of extermination still react in horror over what was done to these kids. It's just a little more than you get from the games.

 

[01011001]

In the Kilo 5 trilogy you actually dive into that topic when the two ODST members of the team (I think they were ODSTs, they might be regular marines) get read into the SPARTAN ll program after meeting Naomi-010. They react in horror upon realising what was done to the SPARTAN lls, and this occurs just after Halo 3.

Two special forces combat vets of a war of extermination still react in horror over what was done to these kids. It's just a little more than you get from the games.

in the games you have little interaction with spartans usually. it is usually just you running by some ODSTs or Marines while in battle. so it makes sense that none of these interactions happen in the game much.
in Reach you see Spartan III soldiers interacting with eachother and they know what happened to them, maybe they don't want to think about it too much either. so it makes sense there as well.

which is why I'm saying it is like the beginning of Haze whenever you are in the game running across the battlefield, while in the books it is like the later half of Haze when you look behind it all (although in a different way of course. since in Haze you are the bad guy turning a new leaf and helping the rebels)

 

[Fbh]

Honestly I always thought Halo had this weird disconnect between the tone of the trailers and of the game itself.
The trailers always seemed way more serious and dramatic. The you get to the game and it feels more like this fun space adventure.

On topic though, Killzone has this really interesting back story of how the conflict in the games came to be, full of political intrigue between various morally grey parties..
In many ways the Helgast got screwed over, and the side you play as did some pretty nasty shit which makes them just as responsible for things escalating to war.

But the games never really get into it. They basically just come across as "good guys vs evil space nazis"

 

[Torrent of Pork]

in the games you have little interaction with spartans usually. it is usually just you running by some ODSTs or Marines while in battle. so it makes sense that none of these interactions happen in the game much.
in Reach you see Spartan III soldiers interacting with eachother and they know what happened to them, maybe they don't want to think about it too much either. so it makes sense there as well.

which is why I'm saying it is like the beginning of Haze whenever you are in the game running across the battlefield, while in the books it is like the later half of Haze when you look behind it all (although in a different way of course. since in Haze you are the bad guy turning a new leaf and helping the rebels)

Oh I agree entirely. It's a little sad that videogames have such problems with storytelling.

It feels like videogames start with the worst aspects of both film and novels when it comes to telling a specific story.

 

[Shubh_C63]

Are spartans still kinda mad about what was done to them ? It feels like they understood it as necessary evil and keeping villians at bay is more important.
Haven't read any books.

 

[01011001]

Oh I agree entirely. It's a little sad that videogames have such problems with storytelling.

It feels like videogames start with the worst aspects of both film and novels when it comes to telling a specific story.

the issue is that it is interactive. you can't tell a story the same way you can in a movie or a book, and if you do you end up with barely interactive, super linear, super scriped AAA wannaby hollywood movies that barely have and gameplay idea at all and hold your hand to no end because the game needs to feel serious at all times, so jumps are scripted, interaction with the enviroment are highly context sensitive and controls are floaty because the animations have to, of course, also seem film like at all times. (yes I'm describing Uncharted and games like it)

the best way to tell a story in a game is through lore and atmosphere. games that actually try to mimic movies will never be successful in being both a game and a movie. that is why Metal Gear is so weird in it's style, it has to be you can't take it too seriously or else the gameplay and the cutscenes wouldn't really fit. so the games are super wacky all the time because the gameplay is as well, and the gameplay has to be the way it is because it wants to be fun and interesting... like how you can fly in and drop stuff on top of enemies in MGS5, which is even the intended fast kill tech to knock out Quiet when you fight her... you drop a piece of equipment on top of her! xD or how you have to switch controller ports to kill Psycho Mantis in MGS1 everything is super waky because if the game took itself too serious it would be way weirder than if it just says fuck it and has fun with itself. that's also why in MGS4 there's a guy who constantly shits himself which ties into the story as well xD

you can't tell a super serious story in a game the way a movie does it without completely fucking up the gameplay, because if you do not do that the disconnect between gameplay and cutscenes will simply be too much.

like I said, imo games should focus on telling the story as much as possible through the environment, the background lore and in game interactions that fit the game. and Halo mostly does that, cutscenes aren't that elaborate in most Halo games and simply tie each of the levels together.

 

[TheMay30thMan]

Destiny also had a massive disconnect. At least at first... I never played the later DLC of 1, nor have I even touched 2. I remember vocalizing my disappointment at how nothing made
sense while playing the first game, and a party member I was with told me I had to read the lore cards that unlocked as we played. Fuck off, that’s so stupid.

Hilariously enough, same developer. Although, the disconnect with Halo startEd with Halo 4 for me. The first 3 games did fine on their own. Starting with the 4th game, it was almost necessary to read to books to stay in the loop. Horrible way to write a game.