This is the first part in the two-part series on Halo.
Microsoft’s most formidable task of the year has to be living up to the hype of the third installment in the Halo series. After viewing the recent Vidoc released by Bungie studios I have come to the conclusion that I desperately need to arrange for funds for my personal 360 before everybody jumps on the bandwagon to ‘Finish the fight.’ The Halo series has captured the imagination of the entire globe; the game was the next big thing to hit the FPS scenario, post the era dominated by ‘Half life.’ It gave the genre a few new rules to abide with, like the two weapon theory, in game vehicles, vast landscapes and deadly enemy A.I. in addition to all of the above. The game single handedly saved Microsoft’s Big black box from the onslaught of the Playstation 2.
The Halo Series has a deep storyline which runs in conjunction to the game and otherwise, the entire series begins with something called ‘The Covenant War’ where the aliens we love to hate invade our galaxy in the year 2525 A.D. and begin the destruction of the human race by obliterating a peaceful human colony called ‘Harvest.’ John 117 (take a wild guess who am I referring to) along with the other Spartans are called upon to deal with the situation which goes by the name of ‘The Covenant.’ These aliens are of a different kind; they are intelligent, they have an ancient civilization ,worship an extinct alien race called the ‘The Forerunners,’ rely on the powerful technology created by them, are ugly, mean and say their Gods want the human race to be extinct (this vaguely reminds me of the ideology of the notorious Al Qaeda). This fight follows till they have defeated the brave but weak UNSC warriors on earth’s last defense called “The Reach”.
This is where HALO: COMBAT EVOLVED begins, the Covenant discover the sacred ring called ‘HALO’ and try to capture it but are unsuccessful all thanks to our dear player called ‘Master Chief.’ The war continues in the novel called ‘First Strike’ and audio drama ilovebees.com, by the end of this the Covenant has discovered the location of our planet and are preparing a massive assault, which serves as the beginning for HALO 2. The game broke all box office entertainment records worldwide garnering a hefty sum of $125 million on its first day. The game introduced a new playable character called ‘The Arbiter,’ the game had 2 plotlines running simultaneously and convene at the point where a creature called ‘The Gravemind’ comes across, explaining the true nature of ‘The Flood,’ and the index required to activate “the rings” spread across the galaxy which is stolen by the Brute Chieftain ‘Tartarus’ on the orders of the ‘High Ranking Prophets,’ he then attempts to kill The Arbiter which goes in vain. Halo 2 ends with the full scale invasion of earth by the Covenant fleet, a civil war erupting within the various factions of the Covenant army and the quest for activating the remaining rings of destruction by the so called wise ‘Prophets’ setting the stage for the grand finale of HALO 3.
The E3 trailer clearly showcased one thing; the human race is on the verge of extinction and this was it, there is no turning back. It showcased Master Chief Walking along a dusty plain in Africa (Zimbabwe) called ‘New Mombasa’ that was destroyed by the Covenant fleet in Halo 2. There are flashes of Cortona in the background giving Master Chief Philosophical advice, which according to fans is Gravemind speaking through Cortona. Master Chief is seen holding a new gun, which is said to be an upgrade of the standard assault rifle along with new shiny armor. This rifle was horrible in Halo 2 with a short burst rate which made it almost useless against some powerful Elites, this new assault rifle is supposed to be an upgrade to the one from the original HALO (that’s a relief), the new armor shows has a few dents over it signifying that Master Chief has emerged fresh from a battle. Overhead there is a massive Covenant fleet flying past Master Chief, heading towards a crater which is apparently 3 miles in diameter (pretty huge huh!). The Covenant is so engrossed with their new find that they completely ignore their arch Nemesis Master Chief. The cameras then pans towards the edge of the crater with Master Chief overlooking the crater and part of the cliff falls off due to the enormous Ark opening up at the centre of the crater. The camera zooms into Master Chief’s Visor and shows the Ark opening up and launching a powerful beam into the sky. The camera shifts again showing the humongous size of the Ark and the intensity of the particle beam lighting up the whole sky and Cortana speaks these final words “This is the way the world ends.”
The trailer was shown entirely in real time and created quite a buzz in the media, Microsoft made the impact they wanted with the trailer and had tongues wagging for quite some time, even before the dust could settle down they announced a prequel to the HALO series which would be a RTS game for the 360, titled HALO WARS and is currently under development by the creators of the Age of Empire Series ‘Ensemble studios.’
–Neelesh Mukherjee
Keep watching this space for Everything You Wanted To Know About Halo – Part 2.