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MASTER CHIEF: A SPARTAN PERSONALITY by Mr Biffo

24/9/2015

7 Comments

 
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So, according to Xbox boss Phil Spencer, Halo could have the same sort of longevity as Star Wars or Spider-Man - and it's all due to its players' connection with the characters.

"Halo is somewhat unique in that it has such a heavy character and story base to it. I think it's one of the real strengths," he told Gamespot.
 

"People know the characters' names in the franchise."

They might know the characters names, but is that the same thing as actually caring about them, and being emotionally invested in them? People know Pac-Man's name, and Q*Bert's name, and Super Meat Boy's name too.

Spencer continues: "They know who Master Chief is. They know who Cortana is. It's not always true of other shooting franchises that you have that same connection to the characters in the story, and that there's a consistency and a connective tissue between the games.


"It's a franchise and an IP I expect to be around 20 years from now, much the same way Star Wars and Spider-Man and other things are."

Shoot me down if you must, but if Halo is around for decades to come, it won't be because of any richly-realised cast of characters...

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I don't play Halo for the characters. I play it because it offers decent shooty stuff, and does it in a way that feels unique. The universe is really the main character there - the setting and gameplay has a feel to it that's completely different to any other first person shooter. Except, perhaps, Destiny. For obvious reasons.

Does anyone seriously play Halo for the characters or story? Isn't Master Chief just a cypher, a characterless, deliberately faceless, avatar. He could be anyone under that helmet - black, white, asian... even female.
 Master Chief is useful because he's an iconic character design - not an iconic personality.

THE FUTURE IS STERILE

In fact, I've always found the Halo universe to be weirdly sterile. It has felt constistent and believable within its own rules and aesthetics, but there's a coldness to it. Any emotion I've ever felt while playing the game was more to do with, say, the breathtaking landscape vistas the game offers, never in the ongoing story, or my investment in it.

Admittedly, it's rare for me to feel connected to any games character. The Last of Us - and Left Behind - both managed it, and Life is Strange had a few moments where I found myself wanting to know where the story was going (although it'd be a lie if I said I actually gave a fig about the characters' fates). But beyond that? Hardly ever.


Clearly Microsoft - and Bungie before it - is protective over the Halo brand. They've been famously controlling when it comes to the use of Master Chief in movies, and TV shows. Unfortunately, if there's something they're seeing in the character, something more beyond him being a Type-A, battle-ravaged, shoot 'em up man, then I don't feel it comes across in the game. 

The storytelling might strive to be original, but it's rote, full of cliches and stereotypes, with achingly generic alien adversaries. What's more... I felt a connection with The Last of Us because the relationships, the characters, had humanity and soul. The relationship between Master Chief and his holographic assistant Cortana is - in the most literal sense - lacking humanity. 

I can't see a road in there for me to connect in the way that Spencer seems to think players do. Master Chief is a gaming icon, but I've never got a sense of who he is. Or who his holographic girlfriend Cortana might be beyond being a needlessly large-breasted search engine (imagine Google's branding team sitting around and deciding to put lady nipples in the O's of their new logo - and then try to argue that the video game industry isn't still mired in misogyny).

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AND SO ARE YOU
I'm not saying the lack of character in Halo is a bad thing necessarily.

I mean, I do feel that they place more emphasis on the story than it deserves - it isn't anywhere near as interesting as Spencer and company seem to think, and is almost embarrassing in its efforts to show us how epic everything is - but that's ok, because Master Chief works inspite of it.

It's often the case in popular fiction that the main character is blander than those he's surrounded by (arguably, in Halo everyone's bland). Harry Potter, Luke Skywalk... they're not as interesting as, say, Han Solo, or Chewbacca, or Ron or Hermione. Their personalities are dialled down, which makes them our avatar, our vehicle to live out our fantasy.

And maybe that's what Master Chief needs - a Ron or a Chewbacca. Someone whose fate I can learn to care about, so I'm not just sighing at abstract and impersonal threats to the universe. 

DOCTOR WHO CARES?
Actually, I watched the first ep of the new run of Doctor Who at the weekend, and came away - as I have done with the last few series  - feeling something was lacking. I love Capaldi's interpretation of the character, and I love Moffat's wealth of ideas and storytelling, so it took me a while to realise what wasn't sitting right. 

And then it hit me. The way Stephen Moffat writes all women - typically, the Doctor's assistant is a young woman, our audience identification figure - is identical. Good, bad, evil, misguided... they're all snarky, and sarcastic, and spout one-liners, and flirt relentlessly. They don't come across as real. They're super-heroes, all acid and steel.

His predecessor, Russell T Davies, knew the importance of grounding stories in the real world of chips, telly, and family dinners. The destruction of the universe is a threat that's utterly impersonal and abstract. I need a Rose Tyler or Donna Noble to ground the action in the familiar. And that - if you're going to make us care about Master Chief and Cortana - is what Halo needs too. If it even matters in an action game.

Who knows though... maybe things will be different in Halo: Guardians. Maybe we'll finally get a sense of what drives Master Chief, what haunts him, who he is, how he'd react in any given situation, and see him sitting down with a bowl of soup to watch Strictly Come Dancing.

Or maybe we won't - and that's fine. But don't delude yourself, Microsoft, that we care about him.


What do you think about Halo's characters? Do you play games for the characters? Contribute your opinion in the comments below!

FROM THE ARCHIVE:
  • AN EMBARRASSMENT OF RICHES by Mr Biffo
  • EVERYBODY'S CHANGED THEIR MIND by Mr Biffo
  • IT PEGGLES THE MIND by Mr Biffo
7 Comments
CJ
24/9/2015 12:49:34 pm

Hiya!

Really enjoyed the read, and fancied having a nerd out to share a different viewpoint to the Halo Universe.

At first it felt like being in Star Wars, I felt very small in this huge universe that felt new, cold, exciting & brilliant. I played Combat Evolved to pieces.

I wanted to know more & dived into the books, finding something which reminded me a lot of Ender’s Game, a novel I have great affection for. I discovered the tragedy of children torn from their parents [in John/Master Chief’s instance replaced with a clone, which slowly died], bones broken, bodies extended, pumped full of drugs – the horror of the creation of these fighting machines. I had a little humanity in my Halo.

Halo 2 was a strange one. At this point we were all Master Chief, so replacing him for half of the game with The Arbiter may have been the right choice story wise, but gameplay wise not. Much like with Halo 3, a bit of a mish-mash, but I was still having fun, still fascinated with the novels, artbooks, universe.

What changed for me was ODST. Here I played a regular guy, surrounded by the sort of characters I’d see in a cop show. A group of people who fought together, had banter, were thrown down from the skies in coffins to infiltrate and destroy, not as green nuclear supertanks, but as .. blokes. I loved the more intimate surroundings, the sheer loneliness of streets kissed by a now distant storm, the Kurasawa-like storytelling, contrast of the big halo bluster and that pull back to loneliness again. And oh my that wonderfully sad, gorgeous soundtrack!

Reach took this on again. A new set of characters and a world doomed from the start. Watching each one of the characters struggle and fall was heartbreaking, the ending – a bookend to the beginning of the game where you saw your broken helmet [schnarf!] on the floor, was sublime. The tie-in to the original Halo was bombastic, and once again the soundtrack was flat out wonderful.

Halo 4 leaned into the lore and characterization a little more. John had been more or less raised by two women, the sinister Dr Katherine Halsey and her AI Cortana, the latter as much mother as girlfriend as sister as friend. The ‘don’t make a girl a promise you can’t keep’ moment as well as final moments in the game reduced me to tears.

Story wise Halo 4 brought the Spartan Ops side story, in many ways Destiny gameplay before Destiny arrived, but on a weekly basis. New characters, a fun, engaging side story, it was an ace complement to the main story, not to mention the first time this sort of thing has been attempted. Loved it to pieces, and watched the ‘movie’ of all the cutscenes stitched together only last night.

Oh aye, and the Forward Unto Dawn live action stuff I really enjoyed, again tying into Halo 4’s story!

I became excited for Halo 5 at the point where Linda, Fred & Kelly were named. Seeing Buck from ODST involved was ace too, but the appearance of the other kids from the Eric Nylund novels turned Spartans harkens back to the point where my heart was all over Halo, beyond guns and funs and giggles.

Regarding the series itself, one of my favourite aspects is it using the full paintbox. Not going for Nolan-esque greys and browns and blacks and blands, but affording giggles with the Grunts to complement the bigger, darker stuff. I like the contrast a fair bit.

So, I reckon its ace folks can go through the games and pure enjoy them for combat, design, atmosphere – much like the bloody ace Souls games – but for others there’s the opportunity to look a bit deeper & make a further connection. I reckon that’s what Phil Spencer might have been referring to.

Luff you Biffo, byeee

Reply
Fiery Biscuits
24/9/2015 12:54:32 pm

Totally agree, I haven't ever played Halo because of the plot. It's just a fun game to play. The plot makes zero sense to me, and it takes itself, seemingly, very seriously. I can't remember a single interesting character from any of the games, even Reach which was meant to have a squad of mates...

Another game that did characters well, I think, is Witcher 3. OH! Also Wolfenstein: The New Order. That was a real surprise

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Ben
24/9/2015 04:38:18 pm

Hmm, I agree about the utter indifference I feel towards the storyline of the Halo games, but I'm not even sure that the Master Chief is an iconic character design or if it even matters; he still looks like a motor cross dude to me.

Besides the obvious point that great games make great, iconic characters, not vice versa (Mario?!) I guess it's really Halo's heritage that is the draw; arguably the first game to really nail PC style, epic FPS action on a console and the game that almost singlehandedly built the Xbox brand. On character and story alone, Halo is paper thin, sterile as you say and pretty unappealing.

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ChorltonWheelie
24/9/2015 09:46:18 pm

The thing is Biffo..... we're old.
Young 'uns can invest the flimsiest of things with great importance. From a shoe box to Star Wars. I've seen a kid in tears because "one of the greatest characters ever...EVER" was killed. It was Ghost in CoD!

We can laugh but a young imagination won't listen to us when it comes to what should light up its universe. I could try and persuade my boy about the joy of Proust whilst he's a Minecrafting but we both know the result.

Successful entertainment Industry bods know this. Think George Lucas, Spielberg maybe Philius Spencer. They exploit it for all it's worth 'cos it's true. Our younger selves were awestruck by Elite even though we can happily declare "Old Games were pants" now. Remember though...loads of people do invest in these paper thin characters and it's not because they're daft. They make it magical because that is more fun.

By the by, you're not getting away with this "He could be anyone under that helmet - black, white, asian... even female" You're one of those Feminazis aren't you? Admit it!

Reply
Mr Biffo
25/9/2015 09:17:10 am

Is it an age thing, though? I agree to a point, but I think kids can respond to good storytelling and characters on a gut level. Kids are smart - even if they can't articulate something, they can still respond to it on a gut level. Elite isn't part of the same argument, really, because it was a game without characters. I played it because I was amazed by the graphics, but... I never really enjoyed it. That's me though - everyone's different, and needs different things from their games. That said, I actually think - oddly - that Destiny's Ghost sort of works as a character, in the same way that Master Chief does; he's R2D2... blank, and able to be easily anthropomorphised. You're right - kids do project onto things, and are able to connect with inanimate objects in the way we can't. That's why they have imaginary friends, and a bin can become a Dalek. I dunno. It's interesting. You've got me thinking about doing another article now...

Reply
ChorltonWheelie
25/9/2015 05:16:23 pm

"No..no...no...actually...yes!".

I'm always right, I get on my own nerves.

Andrew Gillett
25/9/2015 10:30:12 am

The next Halo game should definitely include Ron and Chewbacca fighting alongside the player.

Reply



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