Halo (video game series)
Encyclopedia
Halo is a multi-million dollar science fiction
video game franchise created by Bungie
and now managed by 343 Industries
and owned by Microsoft Studios. The series centers on an interstellar war between humanity and a theocratic alliance of aliens known as the Covenant
. The Covenant worship an ancient civilization known as the Forerunners, who perished in combat with the parasitic Flood. Many of the games center on the experiences of Master Chief
John-117, a cybernetically
-enhanced human super-soldier, and his artificial intelligence
(AI) companion, Cortana
. The term "Halo" refers to Halo megastructures
: large, habitable ringed structures, similar to the Orbitals in Iain M Banks' Culture
novels, or author Larry Niven
's Ringworld
.
The series has been praised as being among the best first-person shooter
s on a video game console
, and are considered the Microsoft Xbox
's "killer app". This has led to the term "Halo killer" being used to describe console games that aspire, or are considered, to be better than Halo. Fueled by the success of Halo: Combat Evolved
, and immense marketing campaigns from publisher Microsoft, its sequels went on to break various sales records. Halo 3
sold more than US$
170 million worth of copies in the first twenty-four hours of release, breaking the record set by Halo 2
three years prior. Halo: Reach
, in turn, broke the record set by Halo 3, selling $200 million USD worth of copies on its first day of release. The games have sold over 40 million copies worldwide, and all Halo merchandise has grossed more than $2 billion.
Strong sales of the games led to the franchise's expansion to other mediums; there are multiple bestselling novels, graphic novel
s, and other licensed products. Beyond the original trilogy, other "Halo" games have branched off into other video game genres, including Halo Wars
, a real-time strategy
game produced as developer Ensemble Studios
' last project. Bungie also contributed the expansion Halo 3: ODST and a prequel Halo: Reach
, their last project for the franchise. A new title, Halo 4
, is currently in development, as well as a high-definition remake of the first game entitled Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary
.
The cultural impact of the Halo series has been compared by writer Brian Bendis to that of Star Wars
. The collective group of fans of the series is referred to as the "Halo Nation".
. The Halo Array, when activated, would destroy all sentient life in the galaxy—depriving the Flood of their food. Delaying as long as they could, the Forerunners activated the rings and disappeared.
Tens of thousands of years later in the 26th century
, humanity—under the auspices of the United Nations Space Command or UNSC—colonize many worlds thanks to the development of faster-than-light "slipstream
" travel. Tensions escalate between the older and more stable "Inner Colonies" and the remote "Outer Colonies", leading to civil war. The UNSC creates an elite group of enhanced supersoldiers, known as Spartans, to suppress the rebellion covertly. In the year 2525 the human colony of Harvest falls under attack by a theocratic alliance of alien races known as the Covenant
. The Covenant leadership declares humanity heretics and an affront to their gods—the Forerunners—and begins to methodically exterminate human worlds. The Covenant's superior technology and numbers prove decisive advantages; though effective, the Spartans are too few in number to turn the tide of battle in humanity's favor.
In 2552, the Covenant arrive at Reach, the UNSC's last major stronghold, and launch an invasion of the planet. The last Spartans and UNSC military are unable to stop the Covenant from bombarding the surface with plasma. Following directives to avoid leading the Covenant to Earth, the artificial intelligence (AI) Cortana
aboard the fleeing UNSC ship Pillar of Autumn selects coordinates that lead the ship to a Halo installation. The Covenant follow, damaging the Autumn and leading its crew to take the fight to the ring's surface. The Covenant accidentally release Flood imprisoned on the ring; in order to nullify the threat, the ring's AI caretaker, 343 Guilty Spark, enlists the help of the Spartan, John-117
. Before the pair can activate Halo's defenses, however, Cortana reveals that Halo's activation would mean their own destruction. Master Chief and Cortana instead detonate the Autumns engines, destroying Halo and preventing the escape of the Flood. They and a few other human survivors return to Earth, warning of an impending Covenant attack.
Soon after, a Covenant fleet arrives at Earth. Most of the fleet is destroyed, but a single ship under the command of one of the Covenant's Hierarchs, the Prophet of Regret, breaks through the human defenses and invades the African city of New Mombasa. Before the humans can assault Regret's carrier, he retreats through a slipspace portal, pursued by the Master Chief aboard the human ship In Amber Clad. Regret travels to another Halo installation, where the Master Chief kills Regret. Inner turmoil in the Covenant leads to civil war between the various member races. Learning that the activation of the Halo Array (a central tenet of the Covenant religion) would lead to their extinction, the Covenant warrior Arbiter
and his brethren ally with humanity to stop the rings from being fired. The aborted activation of the ring puts all the Halo installations on standby: the remaining rings can be activated remotely from a location known as "The Ark".
The Covenant begin a full-scale invasion of Earth and excavate a Forerunner artifact in the African desert that creates a slipspace portal to the Ark. The Master Chief and Arbiter travel through the portal to kill the last High Prophet, Truth, and discover the installation is building a new Halo ring to replace the one destroyed previously. In order to destroy the spreading infestation led by the Flood intelligence Gravemind
, the Master Chief activates the incomplete ring—as the Ark lies outside the Milky Way Galaxy, the blast destroys the Flood but spares the galaxy at large. Because the ring's construction is incomplete, the resulting pulse destroys the ring and damages the Ark. The Arbiter escapes the explosion through a slipspace portal, but only half the ship makes it through before it closes. The Master Chief and Cortana are left drifting in space, trapped in the severed rear half of their ship. The Master Chief cryonically
freezes himself as he and Cortana wait for rescue while floating toward an unknown planet.
Originally developed as a real-time strategy
game for the Apple Macintosh platform, Halo: Combat Evolved went through several iterations before arriving at the console first person shooter for which it is recognized. When the developers, Bungie, were bought by Microsoft
in 2001, the game was rapidly finished and became an Xbox
launch title and platform exclusive. Released on November 15, 2001, the Xbox version of Halo: Combat Evolved
is the first Halo video game. The games of the main trilogy are first-person shooter
s, with the player experiencing most action from the protagonist's perspective. Combat Evolved introduced many gameplay and plot themes common to the whole trilogy. Players battle various aliens on foot and in vehicles to complete objectives, while attempting to uncover the secrets of the eponym
ous Halo. One concept introduced in Halo: Combat Evolved, is limiting the number of weapons players could carry to two, forcing them to carefully select their preferred armament. Players fight with ranged and melee attacks, as well as a limited number of grenades. Bungie refers to the "weapons-grenades-melee" format as the "Golden Triangle of Halo", which has remained fundamentally unchanged throughout the trilogy. In Halo: Combat Evolved, the player's health is measured in both hit points and a continually recharging energy shield. A Windows
and Mac OS X
port
was later developed by Gearbox Software
, and released on September 30 and November 11, 2003 respectively. A stand-alone expansion, entitled Halo: Custom Edition, was released as a Windows exclusive, and allowed players to create custom content for the game.
Its sequel, Halo 2
was released on the Xbox on November 9, 2004 and later for Windows Vista
on May 17, 2007. For the first time, the game was released in two different editions: a standard edition with just the game disc and traditional Xbox packaging, and the Collector's Edition with a specially designed aluminum case, along with an additional bonus DVD, extra booklet, and slightly different user manual. Halo 2 introduced new gameplay elements, chief among them the ability to hold and fire two weapons simultaneously, known as "dual wielding". Unlike its predecessor, Halo 2 fully supports online multiplayer via Xbox Live
. The game uses "matchmaking" to facilitate joining online matches by grouping players looking for certain types of games. This was a change from the more traditional "server list" approach which was used to find matches in online games at this time. Upon release, Halo 2 became the game played by the most people on the Xbox Live service that week; regaining this title every week for over two years — the longest streak any game has held the spot.
Halo 3
is the third and final game in the main Halo trilogy, ending the story arc
begun in Halo: Combat Evolved. The game was released on the Xbox 360
on September 25, 2007. It adds to the series new vehicles, new weapons, and a class of items called equipment. The game also includes a limited map-editing tool known as the Forge, which allows players to insert game objects, such as weapons and crates, into existing multiplayer map geometry. Players can also save a recording of their gameplay sessions, and view them as video, from any angle.
, as the first entry in a new Halo trilogy. This trilogy has been announced to be called the Reclaimer Trilogy.
is a real-time strategy
game developed by Ensemble Studios
for the Xbox 360
. Set in the year 2531, the game takes place 20 years prior to the events of Halo: Combat Evolved. According to Ensemble, much effort has been expended into developing a control scheme that is simple and does not have issues like those in other console strategy games. The game was announced at X06 and released in February and March 2009.
In a July 2008 interview with MTV
, Microsoft’s head of Xbox business, Don Mattrick, stated that Bungie
was working on a new Halo game for Microsoft
, independent of other Halo projects. An announcement of the new Halo project was expected at the 2008 E3 game exposition, which Bungie stated "has been building for several months", but was delayed by their publisher Microsoft
. The Halo announcement was to be part of Microsoft's 150-minute E3 presentation, and was cut to trim the presentation down to 90 minutes; Microsoft stated it wanted to give the game its own dedicated event. After the release of an ambiguous teaser trailer on September 25, the project was revealed as Halo 3: Recon, later changed to Halo 3: ODST. Set between the events of Halo 2 and Halo 3, players take control of elite human soldiers called Orbital Drop Shock Troopers (ODST). The game was released on September 22, 2009.
Announced at E3 2009, Halo: Reach
is a prequel to the main trilogy; it is Bungie's last Halo game, and was released September 14, 2010. Players control Noble 6, a "Hyper Lethal Vector" who is one of the members of the Spartan squad "Noble Team" as they defend Reach against the Covenant. The ending of the game leads directly into the events of Combat Evolved.
s were used to promote the release of the games in the main trilogy. The Cortana Letters, a series of cryptic email messages, were circulated by Bungie prior to Halo: Combat Evolveds release. I Love Bees, an alternate reality game, was used to promote the release of Halo 2. The game focused on a website created by 42 Entertainment
, commissioned by Microsoft and endorsed by Bungie. Over the course of the game, audio clips were released that eventually formed a complete five-hour story set on Earth between Halo and Halo 2. Similarly, Iris was used as a viral marketing
campaign for the release of Halo 3. It featured five web servers containing various media files related to the Halo universe.
Spin-off titles were planned for release on handheld systems, but proved to be either rumors or did not progress far in development. Rumors of a handheld Halo title for the Game Boy Advance
surfaced in 2004. Bungie denied the rumors and commented that such a project between Microsoft and Nintendo
would be "very unlikely". At a Las Vegas consumer technology convention in January 2005, rumors spread about a version of Halo for the handheld Gizmondo
system. Bungie denied the rumors stating they were not making a game for the system. A former Gizmondo employee later revealed development only extended to basic story and game structure concepts to obtain funding from investors. In 2006, a concept video for Microsoft's portable Ultra-Mobile PC
featured footage of Halo and caused speculation for a handheld title. Microsoft later stated the footage was for demonstration purposes only; Halo was included because it was a Microsoft-owned property. In January 2007, IGN
editor-in-chief Matt Casamassina
claimed he played a version of Halo for the Nintendo DS
. He later demonstrated on-camera, in-game footage of an early-development style version of Halo DS. The demonstrated work featured dual-wielding and a version of the Halo 2 map Zanzibar. On October 5, 2007, Bungie employee Brian Jarrard explained the Halo DS demo was in fact an unsolicited pitch that was never taken on.
In 2006, Microsoft announced an episodic video game to be developed by film director Peter Jackson
's Wingnut Interactive. The game, dubbed Halo: Chronicles, was confirmed to be in development in 2007, and by 2008 was still hiring for positions on the development team. Jackson told game blog Joystiq
in July 2009 that the project was no longer in development. Jackson's manager Ken Kamins explained that the project was cancelled as part of budget cuts tied to job layoffs in January 2009.
Before the company was shuttered, Ensemble Studios had been working on a Halo-themed massively multiplayer online game
. The project was cancelled internally in 2007, without a formal announcement from Microsoft.
Elements from the Halo universe have also appeared in other games. A Halo-based character, SPARTAN Nicole-458, appeared in Dead or Alive 4
, a product of the collaboration between Tecmo's Team Ninja and Microsoft
's Bungie Studios. The Halo themetune was also available DLC for Guitar Hero III Legends of Rock.
(formerly Bungie Software Products Corporation) was a Chicago, Illinois-based game development company started in 1991 by Alex Seropian
. Seropian partnered with programmer Jason Jones
to market and release Jones' game Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete
. Focusing on the Macintosh game market because it was smaller and easier to compete, Bungie became the biggest Mac developer with games including the shooters Pathways Into Darkness
and Marathon
. What became Halo was originally code-named Monkey Nuts and Blam!, and took place on a hollowed-out world called Solipsis. The planet eventually became a ringworld
, and an artist suggested the name "Halo", which became the game's title.
The first Halo game was announced on July 21, 1999, during the Macworld Conference & Expo
. It was originally planned to be a real-time strategy
game for the Mac
and Windows
operating systems, but later changed into a third-person action game. On June 19, 2000, Microsoft
acquired Bungie Studios and Halo: Combat Evolved became a launch title for the Xbox video game console
. After receiving Xbox development kits, Bungie Studios rewrote the game's engine, heavily altered its presentation, and turned it into a first-person shooter
. Though the first Halo was meant to include an online multiplayer mode, it was excluded because Xbox Live was not yet available.
Halo was not intended to be the Xbox's flagship game due to internal concerns and gaming press criticism, but Microsoft VP of game publishing Ed Fries
did not act on these concerns. The Xbox's marketing heavily featured Halo, whose green color palette meshed with the console's design scheme.
The success of the game led to a sequel, Halo 2, which was announced on August 8, 2002 at the Microsoft's New York X02
press event. It featured improved graphics, new weapons, and a multiplayer mode on Xbox Live. Halo 3 was announced at the 2006 Electronic Entertainment Expo. The initial conception for the third game was done before Halo 2 was released in 2004. It utilized a proprietary, in-house graphics engine
, and employed advanced graphics technologies.
They created two more Halo games before becoming independent as part of their deal with Microsoft: A side story Halo 3: ODST and a prequel Halo: Reach in 2009 and 2010 respectively. They have no plans for any more Halo games past 2011.
, serving as "stewards" for the franchise. Frank O'Connor, formerly a Bungie employee, now serves as 343's creative director.
In announcing the formation of 343 Industries, Microsoft also announced that Xbox Live would be home to a central hub for Halo content called Halo Waypoint. Waypoint is accessed from the Xbox 360 Dashboard and offers players access to multimedia content in addition to tracking their Halo game "career". O'Connor described Waypoint as intended to be the prime destination for Halo.
The company is currently working on Halo 4
s followed on from concepts featured in Larry Niven
's Ringworld
and Iain M. Banks
' Culture series (of which Consider Phlebas
and Excession
were said to be particularly influential). In a retrospective article in Edge
, Bungie's Jaime Griesemer commented, "The influence of something like Ringworld isn't necessarily in the design—it's in that feeling of being somewhere else. That sense of scale and an epic story going on out there." Griesemer also explained, "One of the main sources of inspiration was Armor
[by John Steakley
], in which a soldier has to constantly re-live the same war over and over again. That sense of hopelessness, a relentless battle, was influential." The Flood were influenced by the assimilating alien species in Christopher Rowley
's The Vang; it has also been speculated that the Master Chief's name "John 117" may have been a reference to a character named Jon 6725416 in Rowley's Starhammer, or to the John Spartan character of Demolition Man
. An IGN article exploring the literary influences present in the Halo franchise commented on similarities between Halo and Orson Scott Card
's Ender's Game
: aspects of the SPARTAN Project and the design of the Covenant Drones are perceived as reminiscent of the super soldier program and Buggers found in the novel. Bungie has also acknowledged James Cameron
's film Aliens
as a strong cinematic influence.
A report written by Roger Travis and published by The Escapist
compares Halo with the Latin epic Aeneid
, written by classical Roman poet Virgil
. Travis posits similarities between the plots of both works and compares the characters present in them, with the Flood and Covenant taking the role performed by the Carthaginians, and the Master Chief's role in the series to that of Aeneas
.
, have been released. The Halo Original Soundtrack
contains most of Combat Evolveds music. Due to the varying nature of gameplay, the music present was designed to use the game's dynamic audio playback engine. The engine allows for the mood, theme, and duration of music played to change according to gameplay. To afford a more enjoyable listening experience, O'Donnell rearranged portions of the music of Halo into standalone suites, which follow the narrative course of the game. The soundtrack also contains music not used in the game, including a variation on the Halo theme that was first played at Halos debut at Macworld
1999.
For Halo 2s soundtrack
, producer Nile Rodgers
and O’Donnell decided to split the music into two separate volumes. The first, Volume One, was released on November 9, 2004 and contained all the themes as well as the “inspired-by” music present in the game (featuring Steve Vai
, Incubus
, Hoobastank
, and Breaking Benjamin
). The second release, Volume 2, contained the rest of the music, much of which was incomplete or not included in the first soundtrack, as the first soundtrack was shipped before the game was released; the second volume was released on April 25, 2006. Halo 2, unlike its predecessor, was mixed to take full advantage of Dolby 5.1 Digital Surround Sound
.
The soundtrack for Halo 3
was released on November 20, 2007. O'Donnell noted he wanted to bring back the themes from the original game in order to help tie together the end of the trilogy. The tracks are presented, similarly to the previous soundtrack for Halo 2, in a suite
form. Unlike previous soundtracks, where much of the music had been synthesized on computer, the soundtrack for Halo 3 was recorded using a 60-piece orchestra, along with a 24-voice chorus. The final soundtrack was recorded by the Northwest Sinfonia at Studio X in Seattle, Washington. The soundtracks were bundled and released as a box set in December 2008. A soundtrack for Halo 3: ODST was released alongside the game and included many of the tracks from the game.
For Halo Wars, the task of creating the game's music fell to Stephen Rippy
. Rippy listened to O'Donnell's soundtracks for inspiration and incorporated the Halo theme into parts of his arrangements. In addition to synthesized and orchestral components, the composer focused on the choir and piano as essential elements, feeling these were important in creating the "Halo sound". Rather than use the Northwest Sinfonia, Rippy travelled to Prague and recorded with the FILMharmonic Orchestra before returning to the United States to complete the music. A standalone compact disc and digital download retail version of the soundtrack was announced in January 2009 for release on February 17.
. Numerous action figures and vehicles based on Halo have been produced. Joyride Studios created Halo and Halo 2 action figures, while Halo 3 poseable and collectible action figures, aimed at collectors, were produced by McFarlane Toys
and became some of the top-selling action figures of 2007 and 2008. MEGA Blocks
partnered with Microsoft to produce Halo Wars-themed toys.
There have been numerous printed adaptations based on the Halo canon
established by the video games. Larry Niven (author of Ringworld) was originally approached to write a Halo novelization, but declined due to unfamiliarity with the subject matter. The first novel was Halo: The Fall of Reach
, a prequel to Halo: Combat Evolved. It was written by Eric Nylund in seven weeks, and published in October 2001. William C. Dietz
wrote an adaptation of Halo: Combat Evolved called Halo: The Flood
, which was released in 2003. Eric Nylund returned to write the third novel, Halo: First Strike
, which takes place between Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, and was published in December 2003. Nylund also wrote the fourth adaptation, Halo: Ghosts of Onyx
, which was published on October 31, 2006. Bungie employee Joseph Staten
wrote the fifth book, Halo: Contact Harvest
, which was released on October 30, 2007, while Tobias S. Buckell
produced the sixth, Halo: The Cole Protocol
, published in November 2008. Bungie considers the Halo novels as additions to the Halo canon.
The Halo universe was first adapted into the graphic novel format in 2006, with the release of the Halo Graphic Novel
, a collection of four short stories
. It was written and illustrated by graphic novelists Lee Hammock, Jay Faerber
, Tsutomu Nihei
, Brett Lewis, Simon Bisley
, Ed Lee and Jean Giraud
. At the 2007 New York Comic Con, Marvel Comics
announced they would be working on an ongoing Halo series with Brian Michael Bendis
and Alex Maleev
. The limited series, titled Halo: Uprising
, bridges the gap between the events of Halo 2 and Halo 3; initially planned to conclude shortly before the release of Halo 3, the constant delays led to the final issue being published April 2009.
Marvel announced at the 2009 Comic Con that two new comics, a five-part series written by Peter David
and a second series written by Fred Van Lente
, would appear the coming summer and winter. David's series, Halo: Helljumper, is set prior to Halo: Combat Evolved and focuses on the elite Orbital Drop Shock Troopers. The five-part series was published between July and November 2009. Lente's series, originally titled Spartan Black, revolves around a black ops team of Spartan supersoldiers assigned to the UNSC Office of Naval Intelligence. The rebranded comic, Halo: Blood Line, debuted in December 2009. A comic-retelling of the novel Halo: The Fall of Reach was the most recent comic series entitled: Halo: Fall of Reach. Fall of Reach was split into 3 mini-stories: Boot Camp, Covenant, and Invasion.
A collection of Halo stories, Halo: Evolutions, was simultaneously released in print and audiobook formats in November 2009. Evolutions includes original material by Nylund, Buckell, Karen Traviss
and contributions from Bungie. Tor eventually re-released the first three Halo novels with new content and cover art.
Science fiction author Greg Bear
has been contracted to write a trilogy of books focusing on the Forerunners, the first titled Halo: Cryptum
released in January 2011 , while his second Halo: Primordium will be released January 2012. Traviss is writing a series of novels taking place after the events of Halo 3 and Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, the first entitled Halo: Glasslands comes out October 2011.
wrote the first script, which was then pitched to studios by couriers dressed as Master Chief. Microsoft's terms required $10 million against 15 percent of gross; most studios passed, citing the lack of risk for Microsoft compared to their large share of potential profits. 20th Century Fox and Universal Studios decided to partner to produce the film, paying Microsoft $5 million to option the film and 10 percent of grosses. Peter Jackson
was slated to be the executive producer
, with Neill Blomkamp
as director. Before Blomkamp signed on, Guillermo del Toro
was in negotiations to direct.
D. B. Weiss
and Josh Olson
rewrote Garland's script during 2006. The crew stopped and resumed preproduction of the film several times. Later that year, 20th Century Fox threatened to pull out of the project, leading Universal to issue an ultimatum to Jackson and Schlessel: either cut their large "first-dollar" deals, or the project was ended. Both refused, and the project stalled.
Blomkamp declared the project dead in late 2007, but Jackson replied that the film would still be made. Blomkamp and Jackson collaborated on District 9
, but the director told /Film
that he was no longer considering working on a Halo film if the opportunity arose, saying that after working on the film for five months before the project's collapse it would be difficult to return. The rights for the film have since reverted back to Microsoft. O'Connor has stated that the movie will be made at some point. At one point, filmmaker Steven Spielberg
had expressed interest in being involved in the making of a film adaptation of Halo. A fan-film, Halo: Faith is currently in development.
, Casio Entertainment, Production I.G.
, Studio 4°C
, and Toei Animation
. Shinji Aramaki
, creator and director of Appleseed and Appleseed Ex Machina
, serves as the project's creative director. Warner Bros.
distributed Legends on DVD and Blu-ray in February 2010. Six of the stories are officially part of the Halo canon, with the seventh, made by Toei, intended to be a parody of the universe.
GameSpot
reported 4.2 million units of Halo 3 were in retail outlets on September 24, 2007, a day before official release—a world record volume. Halo 3 broke the previous record for the highest grossing opening day in entertainment history, making US$
170 million in its first twenty-four hours. Worldwide, sales exceeded US$300 million the first week, helping to more than double the sales of the Xbox 360 when compared with the weekly average before the Halo 3 launch. At the end of 2007, Halo 2 and Halo: Combat Evolved were the number one and two best-selling Xbox titles, respectively, and Halo 3 was the best-selling Xbox 360 title. Halo Wars was the best-selling RTS console game, selling more than one million units. The Halo series went on to sell more than 27 million copies by August 2009, and more than 34 million copies by May 2010. Tor Books reported that sales of all franchise materials are greater than $1.7 billion, and Bungie's games before Reach accounted for $1.5 billion in sales. The soundtracks to Halo 2, Halo 3, ODST and Reach all appeared on the Billboard 200 charts for at least one week. By May 2011, total gross of Halo merchandise was $2 billion, with 40 million copies of the games sold. By July, the total amount climbed to $2.3 billion.
The Halo adaptations have been successful as well. Many of the novels have appeared on Publisher Weeklys bestseller charts and the Halo Graphic Novel sold more than 100,000 copies, a "rare hit" for the games-to-comics genre. Ghosts of Onyx, Contact Harvest, The Cole Protocol and the first volume of Cryptum appeared on The New York Times
bestseller lists, and The Cole Protocol also opened 50th overall on USA Today
bestsellers list. Tor's first three novels sold more than one million copies by April 2009.
Overall, the Halo series has been well received by critics. Halo: Combat Evolved has received numerous Game of the Year
awards. In March 2007, IGN
listed it as the top Xbox game of all time, while readers ranked it the fourteenth best game ever on "IGN Readers' Choice 2006 - The Top 100 Games Ever". Conversely, GameSpy
ranked Halo: Combat Evolved tenth on its list of "Top 25 Most Overrated Games of All Time", citing repetitive level design and the lack of an online multiplayer mode. Halo 2 also received numerous awards, with IGN listing it as the number two top Xbox game of all time in March 2007. From its initial release on the Xbox in November 2004 until the launch of Gears of War
on the Xbox 360 in November 2006 - two years later - Halo 2 was the most popular video game on Xbox Live. Halo 3 was nominated for and won multiple awards; it won Time magazine's
"Game of the Year" and IGN chose it as the Best Xbox 360 Online Multiplayer Game and Innovative Design of 2007. Most publications called the multiplayer aspect one of the best features; IGN said the multiplayer map lineup was the strongest of the series, and GameSpy added that the multiplayer offering will greatly please "Halo veterans". Complaints focused on the game's plot. The New York Times
said the game had a "throwaway" plot and Total Video Games judged the single-player aspect ultimately disappointing. The series' music and audio has received enthusiastic response from game reviewers.
in Las Vegas
, where Pete Wentz compared the character to notable characters from previous generations like Spider-Man
, Frodo
, and Luke Skywalker
. The Escapist author Roger Travis compared Halos story to Virgil's Aeneid
, saying the religious and political struggle described in the games relates to the modern epic tradition. GamesTM
stated Halo: Combat Evolved "changed videogame combat forever", and Halo 2 showcased Xbox Live as a tool for communities. GameDaily noted Halo 2s launch was "easily comparable to the biggest in other sectors of the entertainment industry", marking the first time a video game launch has become a major cultural event in America. Time
magazine included the franchise in the "2005 Time 100", highlighting that in the first ten weeks after the release of Halo 2, players spent 91 million combined hours playing the game online. A The New York Times report noted the success of Halo 3 was critical for Microsoft, persuading consumers to buy the Xbox 360 console which was experiencing waning sales compared with the Nintendo Wii
, as well as helping restore the console's image. On September 25, 2007, the release date for Halo 3, Microsoft's shares rose 1.7% based on sales expectations for the game. Halo has been described as a series that "has reinvented a genre that didn't know it needed to be reinvented", with aspects of the main trilogy being duplicated in other FPS games multiple times.
Variety called Halo "the equivalent of Star Wars".
. Virtually all machinima footage based around the Halo games is taken from the multiplayer modes of the main trilogy games. Most productions are set outside Halo canon
, while others are based on fan fiction
closely relating to the official story. Halo 3 includes a saved film function that allows camera angles not possible in previous games, and other features that simplify production. The game has become one of the most popular tools for generating machinima, and Microsoft updated its user license agreement
to allow noncommercial distribution of such films.
A notable machinima production is the comedy
series Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles
created by Rooster Teeth Productions
. It has achieved an unparalleled level of success in Halo machinima in specific, and machinima in general; it is credited with bringing attention to the genre. Red vs. Blue generated annual revenues of US$
200,000, and special promotional episodes were commissioned by Bungie. The series ended on June 28, 2007, after 100 regular episodes and numerous promotional videos. Sequels to the series include Reconstruction
, which contains more dramatic elements than its comedic predecessor, Relocated
, Recreation
, and Revelation
. Other machinima series include Fire Team Charlie
, The Codex
, and the in-game interview show This Spartan Life
.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
video game franchise created by Bungie
Bungie
Bungie, Inc is an American video game developer currently located in Bellevue, Washington, USA. The company was established in May 1991 by University of Chicago undergraduate student Alex Seropian, who later brought in programmer Jason Jones after publishing Jones' game Minotaur: The Labyrinths of...
and now managed by 343 Industries
343 Industries
343 Industries, usually shortened to 343i, is an American video game developer located in Kirkland, Washington. It was established in 2007 by Microsoft Game Studios to oversee development of the Halo science fiction media franchise, which includes video games, novels, comics, and other multimedia...
and owned by Microsoft Studios. The series centers on an interstellar war between humanity and a theocratic alliance of aliens known as the Covenant
Covenant (Halo)
The Covenant are a fictional theocratic military alliance of alien races who serve as the main antagonists in the Halo video game series. They are composed of a variety of diverse species, united under the religious worship of the enigmatic Forerunners and their belief that Forerunner ringworlds...
. The Covenant worship an ancient civilization known as the Forerunners, who perished in combat with the parasitic Flood. Many of the games center on the experiences of Master Chief
Master Chief (Halo)
Master Chief Petty Officer John-117 is a fictional character and protagonist of the Halo fictional universe, created by Bungie. Master Chief is a player character in the trilogy of science fiction first-person shooter video games Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, and Halo 3 and will appear in the...
John-117, a cybernetically
Cybernetics
Cybernetics is the interdisciplinary study of the structure of regulatory systems. Cybernetics is closely related to information theory, control theory and systems theory, at least in its first-order form...
-enhanced human super-soldier, and his artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...
(AI) companion, Cortana
Cortana
Cortana is a fictional artificially intelligent character in Bungie's Halo video game series. Voiced by Jen Taylor, she appears in Halo: Combat Evolved and its sequels, Halo 2 and Halo 3, in the prequel and epilogue of Halo: Reach, as well the novels Halo: The Flood, Halo: The Fall of Reach, ...
. The term "Halo" refers to Halo megastructures
Halo (megastructure)
Halos are fictional megastructures and superweapons in the Halo video game series. They are referred to as "Installations" by their AI monitors, and are collectively referred to as "the Array" by the installations' creators, the Forerunners...
: large, habitable ringed structures, similar to the Orbitals in Iain M Banks' Culture
The Culture
The Culture is a fictional interstellar anarchist, socialist, and utopian society created by the Scottish writer Iain M. Banks which features in a number of science fiction novels and works of short fiction by him, collectively called the Culture series....
novels, or author Larry Niven
Larry Niven
Laurence van Cott Niven / ˈlæri ˈnɪvən/ is an American science fiction author. His best-known work is Ringworld , which received Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. His work is primarily hard science fiction, using big science concepts and theoretical physics...
's Ringworld
Ringworld
Ringworld is a Hugo, Nebula, and Locus award-winning 1970 science fiction novel by Larry Niven, set in his Known Space universe and considered a classic of science fiction literature. It is followed by three sequels, and preceded by four prequels, and ties into numerous other books set in Known Space...
.
The series has been praised as being among the best first-person shooter
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
s on a video game console
Video game console
A video game console is an interactive entertainment computer or customized computer system that produces a video display signal which can be used with a display device to display a video game...
, and are considered the Microsoft Xbox
Xbox
The Xbox is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Microsoft. It was released on November 15, 2001 in North America, February 22, 2002 in Japan, and March 14, 2002 in Australia and Europe and is the predecessor to the Xbox 360. It was Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console...
's "killer app". This has led to the term "Halo killer" being used to describe console games that aspire, or are considered, to be better than Halo. Fueled by the success of Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo: Combat Evolved, frequently referred to as Halo: CE, or Halo 1, is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft Game Studios. The first game of the Halo franchise, it was released on November 15, 2001 as a launch title for the Xbox gaming system, and is...
, and immense marketing campaigns from publisher Microsoft, its sequels went on to break various sales records. Halo 3
Halo 3
Halo 3 is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie for the Xbox 360 console. The third installment in the Halo franchise, the game concludes the story arc begun in Halo: Combat Evolved and continued in Halo 2...
sold more than US$
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
170 million worth of copies in the first twenty-four hours of release, breaking the record set by Halo 2
Halo 2
Halo 2 is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie Studios. Released for the Xbox video game console on November 9, 2004, the game is the second installment in the Halo franchise and the sequel to 2001's critically acclaimed Halo: Combat Evolved...
three years prior. Halo: Reach
Halo: Reach
Halo: Reach is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 console. Reach was released in North America, Australia, and Europe on September 14, 2010. The game takes place in the year 2552, where humanity is locked in a war with the...
, in turn, broke the record set by Halo 3, selling $200 million USD worth of copies on its first day of release. The games have sold over 40 million copies worldwide, and all Halo merchandise has grossed more than $2 billion.
Strong sales of the games led to the franchise's expansion to other mediums; there are multiple bestselling novels, graphic novel
Graphic novel
A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format...
s, and other licensed products. Beyond the original trilogy, other "Halo" games have branched off into other video game genres, including Halo Wars
Halo Wars
Halo Wars is a real-time strategy video game developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 video game console. It was released in Japan and Australia on February 26, 2009, in PAL territories on February 27, and in North America on March 3...
, a real-time strategy
Real-time strategy
Real-time strategy is a sub-genre of strategy video game which does not progress incrementally in turns. Brett Sperry is credited with coining the term to market Dune II....
game produced as developer Ensemble Studios
Ensemble Studios
Ensemble Studios was a video game developer initially established in 1995 as an independent company, but was owned by Microsoft from 2001 to 2009, when it was officially disbanded. Ensemble developed many real-time strategy games, including the Age of Empires game series, Age of Mythology, and Halo...
' last project. Bungie also contributed the expansion Halo 3: ODST and a prequel Halo: Reach
Halo: Reach
Halo: Reach is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 console. Reach was released in North America, Australia, and Europe on September 14, 2010. The game takes place in the year 2552, where humanity is locked in a war with the...
, their last project for the franchise. A new title, Halo 4
Halo 4
Halo 4 is an upcoming video game and the eighth installment in the Halo franchise. Halo 4 is intended to be the first of a new trilogy of Halo series games, named the "Reclaimer Trilogy". Whereas the previous Halo games were developed by Bungie, Halo 4 will be developed by 343 Industries...
, is currently in development, as well as a high-definition remake of the first game entitled Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, also referred to as Halo: Anniversary, or Halo: CEA, is a first-person shooter video game set in the Halo universe and is an enhanced remake of Halo: Combat Evolved. Microsoft announced the game along with Halo 4 at their Electronic Entertainment Expo 2011 press...
.
The cultural impact of the Halo series has been compared by writer Brian Bendis to that of Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
. The collective group of fans of the series is referred to as the "Halo Nation".
Story overview
In the distant past, an intelligent race called the Forerunners used their advanced technology to protect life. The Forerunner fought an alien parasite known as the Flood. The Flood, which spread through infestation of sentient life, overran much of the Milky Way Galaxy. The Forerunners conceived a weapon of last resort to combat the Flood. Using an installation known as the Ark, they built seven large ring-shaped megastructures known as HalosHalo (megastructure)
Halos are fictional megastructures and superweapons in the Halo video game series. They are referred to as "Installations" by their AI monitors, and are collectively referred to as "the Array" by the installations' creators, the Forerunners...
. The Halo Array, when activated, would destroy all sentient life in the galaxy—depriving the Flood of their food. Delaying as long as they could, the Forerunners activated the rings and disappeared.
Tens of thousands of years later in the 26th century
26th century
The 26th century of the anno Domini era will span from January 1, 2501–December 31, 2600 of the Gregorian calendar.-List of the long total solar eclipses:* June 14, 2504 : Solar eclipse,, , of saros 145....
, humanity—under the auspices of the United Nations Space Command or UNSC—colonize many worlds thanks to the development of faster-than-light "slipstream
Slipstream (science fiction)
"Slipstream" is a science fiction term for a fictional method of faster-than-light space travel, similar to hyperspace travel, warp drive, or "transfer points" from David Brin's Uplift series.-Usage in Star Trek:...
" travel. Tensions escalate between the older and more stable "Inner Colonies" and the remote "Outer Colonies", leading to civil war. The UNSC creates an elite group of enhanced supersoldiers, known as Spartans, to suppress the rebellion covertly. In the year 2525 the human colony of Harvest falls under attack by a theocratic alliance of alien races known as the Covenant
Covenant (Halo)
The Covenant are a fictional theocratic military alliance of alien races who serve as the main antagonists in the Halo video game series. They are composed of a variety of diverse species, united under the religious worship of the enigmatic Forerunners and their belief that Forerunner ringworlds...
. The Covenant leadership declares humanity heretics and an affront to their gods—the Forerunners—and begins to methodically exterminate human worlds. The Covenant's superior technology and numbers prove decisive advantages; though effective, the Spartans are too few in number to turn the tide of battle in humanity's favor.
In 2552, the Covenant arrive at Reach, the UNSC's last major stronghold, and launch an invasion of the planet. The last Spartans and UNSC military are unable to stop the Covenant from bombarding the surface with plasma. Following directives to avoid leading the Covenant to Earth, the artificial intelligence (AI) Cortana
Cortana
Cortana is a fictional artificially intelligent character in Bungie's Halo video game series. Voiced by Jen Taylor, she appears in Halo: Combat Evolved and its sequels, Halo 2 and Halo 3, in the prequel and epilogue of Halo: Reach, as well the novels Halo: The Flood, Halo: The Fall of Reach, ...
aboard the fleeing UNSC ship Pillar of Autumn selects coordinates that lead the ship to a Halo installation. The Covenant follow, damaging the Autumn and leading its crew to take the fight to the ring's surface. The Covenant accidentally release Flood imprisoned on the ring; in order to nullify the threat, the ring's AI caretaker, 343 Guilty Spark, enlists the help of the Spartan, John-117
Master Chief (Halo)
Master Chief Petty Officer John-117 is a fictional character and protagonist of the Halo fictional universe, created by Bungie. Master Chief is a player character in the trilogy of science fiction first-person shooter video games Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, and Halo 3 and will appear in the...
. Before the pair can activate Halo's defenses, however, Cortana reveals that Halo's activation would mean their own destruction. Master Chief and Cortana instead detonate the Autumns engines, destroying Halo and preventing the escape of the Flood. They and a few other human survivors return to Earth, warning of an impending Covenant attack.
Soon after, a Covenant fleet arrives at Earth. Most of the fleet is destroyed, but a single ship under the command of one of the Covenant's Hierarchs, the Prophet of Regret, breaks through the human defenses and invades the African city of New Mombasa. Before the humans can assault Regret's carrier, he retreats through a slipspace portal, pursued by the Master Chief aboard the human ship In Amber Clad. Regret travels to another Halo installation, where the Master Chief kills Regret. Inner turmoil in the Covenant leads to civil war between the various member races. Learning that the activation of the Halo Array (a central tenet of the Covenant religion) would lead to their extinction, the Covenant warrior Arbiter
Arbiter (Halo)
Arbiter is a fictional ceremonial, religious, and political rank bestowed upon alien Covenant Elites in the Halo science fiction universe. In the 2004 video game Halo 2, the rank is given to a disgraced commander as a way to atone for his failures...
and his brethren ally with humanity to stop the rings from being fired. The aborted activation of the ring puts all the Halo installations on standby: the remaining rings can be activated remotely from a location known as "The Ark".
The Covenant begin a full-scale invasion of Earth and excavate a Forerunner artifact in the African desert that creates a slipspace portal to the Ark. The Master Chief and Arbiter travel through the portal to kill the last High Prophet, Truth, and discover the installation is building a new Halo ring to replace the one destroyed previously. In order to destroy the spreading infestation led by the Flood intelligence Gravemind
Gravemind
The Gravemind is a parasitic intelligence in the Halo universe. While only one Gravemind is ever seen in the games, the title is given to the final stage of Flood evolution. The Flood is a highly-infectious parasite which is released several times during Halos story...
, the Master Chief activates the incomplete ring—as the Ark lies outside the Milky Way Galaxy, the blast destroys the Flood but spares the galaxy at large. Because the ring's construction is incomplete, the resulting pulse destroys the ring and damages the Ark. The Arbiter escapes the explosion through a slipspace portal, but only half the ship makes it through before it closes. The Master Chief and Cortana are left drifting in space, trapped in the severed rear half of their ship. The Master Chief cryonically
Cryonics
Cryonics is the low-temperature preservation of humans and animals who can no longer be sustained by contemporary medicine, with the hope that healing and resuscitation may be possible in the future. Cryopreservation of people or large animals is not reversible with current technology...
freezes himself as he and Cortana wait for rescue while floating toward an unknown planet.
Original trilogy
Real-time strategy
Real-time strategy is a sub-genre of strategy video game which does not progress incrementally in turns. Brett Sperry is credited with coining the term to market Dune II....
game for the Apple Macintosh platform, Halo: Combat Evolved went through several iterations before arriving at the console first person shooter for which it is recognized. When the developers, Bungie, were bought by Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
in 2001, the game was rapidly finished and became an Xbox
Xbox
The Xbox is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Microsoft. It was released on November 15, 2001 in North America, February 22, 2002 in Japan, and March 14, 2002 in Australia and Europe and is the predecessor to the Xbox 360. It was Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console...
launch title and platform exclusive. Released on November 15, 2001, the Xbox version of Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo: Combat Evolved, frequently referred to as Halo: CE, or Halo 1, is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft Game Studios. The first game of the Halo franchise, it was released on November 15, 2001 as a launch title for the Xbox gaming system, and is...
is the first Halo video game. The games of the main trilogy are first-person shooter
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
s, with the player experiencing most action from the protagonist's perspective. Combat Evolved introduced many gameplay and plot themes common to the whole trilogy. Players battle various aliens on foot and in vehicles to complete objectives, while attempting to uncover the secrets of the eponym
Eponym
An eponym is the name of a person or thing, whether real or fictitious, after which a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item is named or thought to be named...
ous Halo. One concept introduced in Halo: Combat Evolved, is limiting the number of weapons players could carry to two, forcing them to carefully select their preferred armament. Players fight with ranged and melee attacks, as well as a limited number of grenades. Bungie refers to the "weapons-grenades-melee" format as the "Golden Triangle of Halo", which has remained fundamentally unchanged throughout the trilogy. In Halo: Combat Evolved, the player's health is measured in both hit points and a continually recharging energy shield. A Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
and Mac OS X
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
port
Porting
In computer science, porting is the process of adapting software so that an executable program can be created for a computing environment that is different from the one for which it was originally designed...
was later developed by Gearbox Software
Gearbox Software
Gearbox Software, LLC is an American video game development company based in Plano, Texas.-History:Gearbox Software was founded in January 1999 by five members of the content team from the defunct developer Rebel Boat Rocker: Randy Pitchford, Brian Martel, Stephen Bahl, Landon Montgomery, and Rob...
, and released on September 30 and November 11, 2003 respectively. A stand-alone expansion, entitled Halo: Custom Edition, was released as a Windows exclusive, and allowed players to create custom content for the game.
Its sequel, Halo 2
Halo 2
Halo 2 is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie Studios. Released for the Xbox video game console on November 9, 2004, the game is the second installment in the Halo franchise and the sequel to 2001's critically acclaimed Halo: Combat Evolved...
was released on the Xbox on November 9, 2004 and later for Windows Vista
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
on May 17, 2007. For the first time, the game was released in two different editions: a standard edition with just the game disc and traditional Xbox packaging, and the Collector's Edition with a specially designed aluminum case, along with an additional bonus DVD, extra booklet, and slightly different user manual. Halo 2 introduced new gameplay elements, chief among them the ability to hold and fire two weapons simultaneously, known as "dual wielding". Unlike its predecessor, Halo 2 fully supports online multiplayer via Xbox Live
Xbox Live
Xbox Live is an online multiplayer gaming and digital media delivery service created and operated by Microsoft Corporation. It is currently the only online gaming service on consoles that charges users a fee to play multiplayer gaming. It was first made available to the Xbox system in 2002...
. The game uses "matchmaking" to facilitate joining online matches by grouping players looking for certain types of games. This was a change from the more traditional "server list" approach which was used to find matches in online games at this time. Upon release, Halo 2 became the game played by the most people on the Xbox Live service that week; regaining this title every week for over two years — the longest streak any game has held the spot.
Halo 3
Halo 3
Halo 3 is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie for the Xbox 360 console. The third installment in the Halo franchise, the game concludes the story arc begun in Halo: Combat Evolved and continued in Halo 2...
is the third and final game in the main Halo trilogy, ending the story arc
Story arc
A story arc is an extended or continuing storyline in episodic storytelling media such as television, comic books, comic strips, boardgames, video games, and in some cases, films. On a television program, for example, the story would unfold over many episodes. In television, the use of the story...
begun in Halo: Combat Evolved. The game was released on the Xbox 360
Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
on September 25, 2007. It adds to the series new vehicles, new weapons, and a class of items called equipment. The game also includes a limited map-editing tool known as the Forge, which allows players to insert game objects, such as weapons and crates, into existing multiplayer map geometry. Players can also save a recording of their gameplay sessions, and view them as video, from any angle.
Reclaimer trilogy
At E3 2011, Microsoft announced the development of Halo 4Halo 4
Halo 4 is an upcoming video game and the eighth installment in the Halo franchise. Halo 4 is intended to be the first of a new trilogy of Halo series games, named the "Reclaimer Trilogy". Whereas the previous Halo games were developed by Bungie, Halo 4 will be developed by 343 Industries...
, as the first entry in a new Halo trilogy. This trilogy has been announced to be called the Reclaimer Trilogy.
Spin-offs
The success of the main Halo trilogy has spurred the creation of spin-offs. Halo WarsHalo Wars
Halo Wars is a real-time strategy video game developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 video game console. It was released in Japan and Australia on February 26, 2009, in PAL territories on February 27, and in North America on March 3...
is a real-time strategy
Real-time strategy
Real-time strategy is a sub-genre of strategy video game which does not progress incrementally in turns. Brett Sperry is credited with coining the term to market Dune II....
game developed by Ensemble Studios
Ensemble Studios
Ensemble Studios was a video game developer initially established in 1995 as an independent company, but was owned by Microsoft from 2001 to 2009, when it was officially disbanded. Ensemble developed many real-time strategy games, including the Age of Empires game series, Age of Mythology, and Halo...
for the Xbox 360
Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
. Set in the year 2531, the game takes place 20 years prior to the events of Halo: Combat Evolved. According to Ensemble, much effort has been expended into developing a control scheme that is simple and does not have issues like those in other console strategy games. The game was announced at X06 and released in February and March 2009.
In a July 2008 interview with MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
, Microsoft’s head of Xbox business, Don Mattrick, stated that Bungie
Bungie
Bungie, Inc is an American video game developer currently located in Bellevue, Washington, USA. The company was established in May 1991 by University of Chicago undergraduate student Alex Seropian, who later brought in programmer Jason Jones after publishing Jones' game Minotaur: The Labyrinths of...
was working on a new Halo game for Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, independent of other Halo projects. An announcement of the new Halo project was expected at the 2008 E3 game exposition, which Bungie stated "has been building for several months", but was delayed by their publisher Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
. The Halo announcement was to be part of Microsoft's 150-minute E3 presentation, and was cut to trim the presentation down to 90 minutes; Microsoft stated it wanted to give the game its own dedicated event. After the release of an ambiguous teaser trailer on September 25, the project was revealed as Halo 3: Recon, later changed to Halo 3: ODST. Set between the events of Halo 2 and Halo 3, players take control of elite human soldiers called Orbital Drop Shock Troopers (ODST). The game was released on September 22, 2009.
Announced at E3 2009, Halo: Reach
Halo: Reach
Halo: Reach is a first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 console. Reach was released in North America, Australia, and Europe on September 14, 2010. The game takes place in the year 2552, where humanity is locked in a war with the...
is a prequel to the main trilogy; it is Bungie's last Halo game, and was released September 14, 2010. Players control Noble 6, a "Hyper Lethal Vector" who is one of the members of the Spartan squad "Noble Team" as they defend Reach against the Covenant. The ending of the game leads directly into the events of Combat Evolved.
Cancelled and related projects
Alternate reality gameAlternate reality game
An alternate reality game is an interactive narrative that uses the real world as a platform, often involving multiple media and game elements, to tell a story that may be affected by participants' ideas or actions....
s were used to promote the release of the games in the main trilogy. The Cortana Letters, a series of cryptic email messages, were circulated by Bungie prior to Halo: Combat Evolveds release. I Love Bees, an alternate reality game, was used to promote the release of Halo 2. The game focused on a website created by 42 Entertainment
42 Entertainment
42 Entertainment is an American company based in Pasadena which specializes in creating and producing alternate reality games . The company was founded in 2003 as an independently-owned, creative content and interactive agency under the name 4orty 2wo Entertainment. The company started with a...
, commissioned by Microsoft and endorsed by Bungie. Over the course of the game, audio clips were released that eventually formed a complete five-hour story set on Earth between Halo and Halo 2. Similarly, Iris was used as a viral marketing
Viral marketing
Viral marketing, viral advertising, or marketing buzz are buzzwords referring to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of viruses...
campaign for the release of Halo 3. It featured five web servers containing various media files related to the Halo universe.
Spin-off titles were planned for release on handheld systems, but proved to be either rumors or did not progress far in development. Rumors of a handheld Halo title for the Game Boy Advance
Game Boy Advance
The is a 32-bit handheld video game console developed, manufactured, and marketed by Nintendo. It is the successor to the Game Boy Color. It was released in Japan on March 21, 2001; in North America on June 11, 2001; in Australia and Europe on June 22, 2001; and in the People's Republic of China...
surfaced in 2004. Bungie denied the rumors and commented that such a project between Microsoft and Nintendo
Nintendo
is a multinational corporation located in Kyoto, Japan. Founded on September 23, 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it produced handmade hanafuda cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small niche businesses, such as a cab company and a love hotel....
would be "very unlikely". At a Las Vegas consumer technology convention in January 2005, rumors spread about a version of Halo for the handheld Gizmondo
Gizmondo
The Gizmondo is a handheld gaming console which was released by Tiger Telematics in March 2005. The electronics design was undertaken by Plextek Limited and the industrial design by Rick Dickinson....
system. Bungie denied the rumors stating they were not making a game for the system. A former Gizmondo employee later revealed development only extended to basic story and game structure concepts to obtain funding from investors. In 2006, a concept video for Microsoft's portable Ultra-Mobile PC
Ultra-Mobile PC
An ultra-mobile PC is a small form factor version of a pen computer, a class of laptop whose specifications were launched by Microsoft and Intel in spring 2006. Sony had already made a first attempt in this direction in 2004 with its Vaio U series, which was however only sold in Asia...
featured footage of Halo and caused speculation for a handheld title. Microsoft later stated the footage was for demonstration purposes only; Halo was included because it was a Microsoft-owned property. In January 2007, IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
editor-in-chief Matt Casamassina
Matt Casamassina
Matt Casamassina is a video game journalist who worked for IGN until April 23, 2010. In his time at the site, he was the author of many reviews and previews of Nintendo games. He resides in Los Angeles, California, is married and has two daughters, Zoe and Fiona Jade, and a son named Rocco Archer...
claimed he played a version of Halo for the Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
. He later demonstrated on-camera, in-game footage of an early-development style version of Halo DS. The demonstrated work featured dual-wielding and a version of the Halo 2 map Zanzibar. On October 5, 2007, Bungie employee Brian Jarrard explained the Halo DS demo was in fact an unsolicited pitch that was never taken on.
In 2006, Microsoft announced an episodic video game to be developed by film director Peter Jackson
Peter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
's Wingnut Interactive. The game, dubbed Halo: Chronicles, was confirmed to be in development in 2007, and by 2008 was still hiring for positions on the development team. Jackson told game blog Joystiq
Joystiq
Joystiq is a video gaming blog founded in June 2004 that has since become one of the most successful sites within the Weblogs, Inc. family of weblogs. It is the centerpiece of WIN's own network of video gaming blogs, which also includes a blog dealing specifically with the popular MMORPG World of...
in July 2009 that the project was no longer in development. Jackson's manager Ken Kamins explained that the project was cancelled as part of budget cuts tied to job layoffs in January 2009.
Before the company was shuttered, Ensemble Studios had been working on a Halo-themed massively multiplayer online game
Massively multiplayer online game
A massively multiplayer online game is a multiplayer video game which is capable of supporting hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously. By necessity, they are played on the Internet, and usually feature at least one persistent world. They are, however, not necessarily games played on...
. The project was cancelled internally in 2007, without a formal announcement from Microsoft.
Elements from the Halo universe have also appeared in other games. A Halo-based character, SPARTAN Nicole-458, appeared in Dead or Alive 4
Dead or Alive 4
Dead or Alive 4 has received generally positive reviews. IGN gave the game 9.0/10, calling it "a move in the right direction for the series", and praised the fighting system as "deeper and more sophisticated". GameSpot awarded the game a score of 8.8/10, with one of its only negative comments going...
, a product of the collaboration between Tecmo's Team Ninja and Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
's Bungie Studios. The Halo themetune was also available DLC for Guitar Hero III Legends of Rock.
Bungie games
BungieBungie
Bungie, Inc is an American video game developer currently located in Bellevue, Washington, USA. The company was established in May 1991 by University of Chicago undergraduate student Alex Seropian, who later brought in programmer Jason Jones after publishing Jones' game Minotaur: The Labyrinths of...
(formerly Bungie Software Products Corporation) was a Chicago, Illinois-based game development company started in 1991 by Alex Seropian
Alex Seropian
Alexander Seropian is an American video game developer, one of the initial founders and later president of Bungie Software Products Corporation, the developer of the Marathon, Myth, and Halo video game series. Seropian became interested in computer programming in college and teamed up with fellow...
. Seropian partnered with programmer Jason Jones
Jason Jones (programmer)
Jason Jones is a game developer and programmer who co-founded video game studio Bungie with Alex Seropian in 1991. Jones began programming on Apple computers in high school, assembling a multiplayer game called Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete...
to market and release Jones' game Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete
Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete
Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete is a 1992 Macintosh computer game produced by the founders of Bungie Studios, Jason Jones and Alex Seropian. It is a sharply detailed dungeon crawler similar to many other computer role-playing games and adventure games...
. Focusing on the Macintosh game market because it was smaller and easier to compete, Bungie became the biggest Mac developer with games including the shooters Pathways Into Darkness
Pathways Into Darkness
Pathways into Darkness is a first-person adventure video game developed and published by Bungie Software Products Corporation in 1993, exclusively for Apple Macintosh personal computers. Players assume the role of a Special Forces soldier who must stop a powerful, godlike being from awakening and...
and Marathon
Marathon (video game)
Marathon is a first-person shooter video game with a science fiction theme developed and published by Bungie released in December 1994 for the Apple Macintosh. The game was Bungie's second foray into the emerging genre of games with a first-person perspective, the first being Pathways into...
. What became Halo was originally code-named Monkey Nuts and Blam!, and took place on a hollowed-out world called Solipsis. The planet eventually became a ringworld
Ringworld
Ringworld is a Hugo, Nebula, and Locus award-winning 1970 science fiction novel by Larry Niven, set in his Known Space universe and considered a classic of science fiction literature. It is followed by three sequels, and preceded by four prequels, and ties into numerous other books set in Known Space...
, and an artist suggested the name "Halo", which became the game's title.
The first Halo game was announced on July 21, 1999, during the Macworld Conference & Expo
Macworld Conference & Expo
Produced by Boston-based IDG World Expo, Macworld | iWorld is a trade-show with conference tracks dedicated to the Apple Macintosh platform. It is held annually in the United States, usually during the second week of January...
. It was originally planned to be a real-time strategy
Real-time strategy
Real-time strategy is a sub-genre of strategy video game which does not progress incrementally in turns. Brett Sperry is credited with coining the term to market Dune II....
game for the Mac
Mac OS
Mac OS is a series of graphical user interface-based operating systems developed by Apple Inc. for their Macintosh line of computer systems. The Macintosh user experience is credited with popularizing the graphical user interface...
and Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
operating systems, but later changed into a third-person action game. On June 19, 2000, Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
acquired Bungie Studios and Halo: Combat Evolved became a launch title for the Xbox video game console
Video game console
A video game console is an interactive entertainment computer or customized computer system that produces a video display signal which can be used with a display device to display a video game...
. After receiving Xbox development kits, Bungie Studios rewrote the game's engine, heavily altered its presentation, and turned it into a first-person shooter
First-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
. Though the first Halo was meant to include an online multiplayer mode, it was excluded because Xbox Live was not yet available.
Halo was not intended to be the Xbox's flagship game due to internal concerns and gaming press criticism, but Microsoft VP of game publishing Ed Fries
Ed Fries
Ed Fries was vice president of game publishing at Microsoft during much of the Xbox's lifecycle. He was a prime evangelist of the platform to game developers and had an important role in the acquisition of developers Bungie Studios, Ensemble Studios and Rare....
did not act on these concerns. The Xbox's marketing heavily featured Halo, whose green color palette meshed with the console's design scheme.
The success of the game led to a sequel, Halo 2, which was announced on August 8, 2002 at the Microsoft's New York X02
X (Xbox show)
X is an annually held trade show hosted by Microsoft, showcasing its Xbox - and more recently, Games for Windows - portfolio of hardware, software, and services. The X show has been held every year since 2001 in diverse European cities...
press event. It featured improved graphics, new weapons, and a multiplayer mode on Xbox Live. Halo 3 was announced at the 2006 Electronic Entertainment Expo. The initial conception for the third game was done before Halo 2 was released in 2004. It utilized a proprietary, in-house graphics engine
Game engine
A game engine is a system designed for the creation and development of video games. There are many game engines that are designed to work on video game consoles and personal computers...
, and employed advanced graphics technologies.
They created two more Halo games before becoming independent as part of their deal with Microsoft: A side story Halo 3: ODST and a prequel Halo: Reach in 2009 and 2010 respectively. They have no plans for any more Halo games past 2011.
343 Industries
Following the release of Halo 3, Bungie announced it was splitting off from Microsoft and becoming an independent limited liability company. While Bungie remained involved in the Halo series by developing games such as ODST and Reach, the rights to Halo remain with Microsoft. To oversee everything Halo, Microsoft created an internal division, 343 Industries343 Industries
343 Industries, usually shortened to 343i, is an American video game developer located in Kirkland, Washington. It was established in 2007 by Microsoft Game Studios to oversee development of the Halo science fiction media franchise, which includes video games, novels, comics, and other multimedia...
, serving as "stewards" for the franchise. Frank O'Connor, formerly a Bungie employee, now serves as 343's creative director.
In announcing the formation of 343 Industries, Microsoft also announced that Xbox Live would be home to a central hub for Halo content called Halo Waypoint. Waypoint is accessed from the Xbox 360 Dashboard and offers players access to multimedia content in addition to tracking their Halo game "career". O'Connor described Waypoint as intended to be the prime destination for Halo.
The company is currently working on Halo 4
Cultural influences
In 2006, in acknowledgement of the "wealth of influences adopted by the Bungie team", a list of Bungie employees' favorite science fiction material was published on the company's website. The developers acknowledged that the Halo series' use of ring-shaped megastructureMegastructure
A megastructure is a very large manmade object, though the limits of precisely how large this is vary considerably. Some apply the term to any especially large or tall building....
s followed on from concepts featured in Larry Niven
Larry Niven
Laurence van Cott Niven / ˈlæri ˈnɪvən/ is an American science fiction author. His best-known work is Ringworld , which received Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. His work is primarily hard science fiction, using big science concepts and theoretical physics...
's Ringworld
Ringworld
Ringworld is a Hugo, Nebula, and Locus award-winning 1970 science fiction novel by Larry Niven, set in his Known Space universe and considered a classic of science fiction literature. It is followed by three sequels, and preceded by four prequels, and ties into numerous other books set in Known Space...
and Iain M. Banks
Iain Banks
Iain Banks is a Scottish writer. He writes mainstream fiction under the name Iain Banks, and science fiction as Iain M. Banks, including the initial of his adopted middle name Menzies...
' Culture series (of which Consider Phlebas
Consider Phlebas
Consider Phlebas, first published in 1987, is a space opera novel by Scottish writer Iain M. Banks. Written after a 1984 draft, it is the first to feature the Culture.-Overview:...
and Excession
Excession
Excession, first published in 1996, is Scottish writer Iain M. Banks's fourth science fiction novel to feature the Culture. It concerns the response of the Culture and other interstellar societies to an unprecedented alien artifact, the Excession of the title.The book is largely about the response...
were said to be particularly influential). In a retrospective article in Edge
Edge (magazine)
Edge is a multi-format computer and video game magazine published by Future Publishing in the United Kingdom. It is known for its industry contacts, editorial stance, distinctive anonymous third-person writing style, yearly awards and longevity....
, Bungie's Jaime Griesemer commented, "The influence of something like Ringworld isn't necessarily in the design—it's in that feeling of being somewhere else. That sense of scale and an epic story going on out there." Griesemer also explained, "One of the main sources of inspiration was Armor
Armor (novel)
Armor is a military science fiction novel by John Steakley. It has some superficial similarities with Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers but concentrates more on the psychological effects of violence on human beings rather than on the political aspects of the military, which was the focus of...
[by John Steakley
John Steakley
John William Steakley, Jr. was an American author, best known for his science fiction writing. He published two major novels, Armor and Vampire$ ; the latter was the basis for John Carpenter's Vampires movie...
], in which a soldier has to constantly re-live the same war over and over again. That sense of hopelessness, a relentless battle, was influential." The Flood were influenced by the assimilating alien species in Christopher Rowley
Christopher Rowley
Christopher Rowley is an American writer of both science fiction and fantasy novels.Rowley was born in 1948 in Lynn, Massachusetts to an American mother and an English father. Educated for the most part at Brentwood School, Essex, England, he became a London-based journalist in the 1970s...
's The Vang; it has also been speculated that the Master Chief's name "John 117" may have been a reference to a character named Jon 6725416 in Rowley's Starhammer, or to the John Spartan character of Demolition Man
Demolition Man (film)
Demolition Man is a 1993 American, science fiction action film directed by Marco Brambilla, and starring Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes. Sandra Bullock, Nigel Hawthorne, and Denis Leary co-star....
. An IGN article exploring the literary influences present in the Halo franchise commented on similarities between Halo and Orson Scott Card
Orson Scott Card
Orson Scott Card is an American author, critic, public speaker, essayist, columnist, and political activist. He writes in several genres, but is primarily known for his science fiction. His novel Ender's Game and its sequel Speaker for the Dead both won Hugo and Nebula Awards, making Card the...
's Ender's Game
Ender's Game
Ender's Game is a science fiction novel by American author Orson Scott Card. The book originated as the short story "Ender's Game", published in the August 1977 issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact. Elaborating on characters and plot lines depicted in the novel, Card later wrote additional...
: aspects of the SPARTAN Project and the design of the Covenant Drones are perceived as reminiscent of the super soldier program and Buggers found in the novel. Bungie has also acknowledged James Cameron
James Cameron
James Francis Cameron is a Canadian-American film director, film producer, screenwriter, editor, environmentalist and inventor...
's film Aliens
Aliens (film)
Aliens is a 1986 science fiction action film directed by James Cameron and starring Sigourney Weaver, Carrie Henn, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, William Hope, and Bill Paxton...
as a strong cinematic influence.
A report written by Roger Travis and published by The Escapist
The Escapist (magazine)
The Escapist is an online magazine covering video games, gamers, the gaming industry, and gaming culture. Published by the Themis Group, it was edited by Julianne Greer up to June 30, 2009, then by Russ Pitts through September 2011, and is currently edited by Steve Butts. The Escapist was first...
compares Halo with the Latin epic Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
, written by classical Roman poet Virgil
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...
. Travis posits similarities between the plots of both works and compares the characters present in them, with the Flood and Covenant taking the role performed by the Carthaginians, and the Master Chief's role in the series to that of Aeneas
Aeneas
Aeneas , in Greco-Roman mythology, was a Trojan hero, the son of the prince Anchises and the goddess Aphrodite. His father was the second cousin of King Priam of Troy, making Aeneas Priam's second cousin, once removed. The journey of Aeneas from Troy , which led to the founding a hamlet south of...
.
Music
Four Halo soundtracks, composed by Martin O'DonnellMartin O'Donnell
Martin "Marty" O'Donnell is an American composer known for his work on video game developer Bungie's series, such as Myth, Oni, and Halo...
, have been released. The Halo Original Soundtrack
Halo Original Soundtrack
The Halo Original Soundtrack is a soundtrack for the video game Halo: Combat Evolved. Composed and produced by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori for Bungie Studios, the soundtrack was released on June 11, 2002. Most of the music from Halo: Combat Evolved is present on the CD, although some...
contains most of Combat Evolveds music. Due to the varying nature of gameplay, the music present was designed to use the game's dynamic audio playback engine. The engine allows for the mood, theme, and duration of music played to change according to gameplay. To afford a more enjoyable listening experience, O'Donnell rearranged portions of the music of Halo into standalone suites, which follow the narrative course of the game. The soundtrack also contains music not used in the game, including a variation on the Halo theme that was first played at Halos debut at Macworld
Macworld
Macworld is a web site and monthly computer magazine dedicated to Apple Macintosh products. It is published by Mac Publishing, which is headquartered in San Francisco, California...
1999.
For Halo 2s soundtrack
Halo 2 Original Soundtrack
The Halo 2 Original Soundtrack is the soundtrack for Bungie's 2004 video game Halo 2. The soundtrack was released as two separate volumes, released almost two years apart...
, producer Nile Rodgers
Nile Rodgers
Nile Gregory Rodgers is an American musician, producer, composer, arranger, and guitarist.-Biography:...
and O’Donnell decided to split the music into two separate volumes. The first, Volume One, was released on November 9, 2004 and contained all the themes as well as the “inspired-by” music present in the game (featuring Steve Vai
Steve Vai
Steven Siro "Steve" Vai is a three time Grammy Award-winning American guitarist, songwriter and producer who has sold over 15 million albums. Steve Vai is widely known as a flamboyant guitar virtuoso....
, Incubus
Incubus (band)
Incubus is an American rock band from Calabasas, California. The band was formed in 1991 by vocalist Brandon Boyd, lead guitarist Mike Einziger, and drummer Jose Pasillas while enrolled in high school and later expanded to include bassist Alex "Dirk Lance" Katunich, and Gavin "DJ Lyfe" Koppell;...
, Hoobastank
Hoobastank
Hoobastank is an American rock band, best known for their 2004 hit "The Reason" and other hits "Crawling in the Dark" and "Running Away". They formed in 1994 in Agoura Hills, California, with singer Doug Robb, guitarist Dan Estrin, drummer Chris Hesse, and original bassist Markku Lappalainen. They...
, and Breaking Benjamin
Breaking Benjamin
Breaking Benjamin is an American rock band from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, currently consisting of Benjamin Burnley and Chad Szeliga. The band has released four studio albums to date and a greatest hits album that was released on August 16, 2011. The group initially went on indefinite hiatus due...
). The second release, Volume 2, contained the rest of the music, much of which was incomplete or not included in the first soundtrack, as the first soundtrack was shipped before the game was released; the second volume was released on April 25, 2006. Halo 2, unlike its predecessor, was mixed to take full advantage of Dolby 5.1 Digital Surround Sound
Surround sound
Surround sound encompasses a range of techniques such as for enriching the sound reproduction quality of an audio source with audio channels reproduced via additional, discrete speakers. Surround sound is characterized by a listener location or sweet spot where the audio effects work best, and...
.
The soundtrack for Halo 3
Halo 3 Original Soundtrack
The Halo 3 Original Soundtrack is the official soundtrack to Bungie Studios' first-person shooter video game Halo 3. Most of the original music was composed by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori, but also includes a bonus track, "LvUrFR3NZ", which was the winning entry in a contest held before...
was released on November 20, 2007. O'Donnell noted he wanted to bring back the themes from the original game in order to help tie together the end of the trilogy. The tracks are presented, similarly to the previous soundtrack for Halo 2, in a suite
Suite
In music, a suite is an ordered set of instrumental or orchestral pieces normally performed in a concert setting rather than as accompaniment; they may be extracts from an opera, ballet , or incidental music to a play or film , or they may be entirely original movements .In the...
form. Unlike previous soundtracks, where much of the music had been synthesized on computer, the soundtrack for Halo 3 was recorded using a 60-piece orchestra, along with a 24-voice chorus. The final soundtrack was recorded by the Northwest Sinfonia at Studio X in Seattle, Washington. The soundtracks were bundled and released as a box set in December 2008. A soundtrack for Halo 3: ODST was released alongside the game and included many of the tracks from the game.
For Halo Wars, the task of creating the game's music fell to Stephen Rippy
Stephen Rippy
-Life and career:Rippy grew up in the Spring area of Harris County, Texas and now resides in Plano, Texas, near Dallas. Making video game music was not Rippy's original career goal...
. Rippy listened to O'Donnell's soundtracks for inspiration and incorporated the Halo theme into parts of his arrangements. In addition to synthesized and orchestral components, the composer focused on the choir and piano as essential elements, feeling these were important in creating the "Halo sound". Rather than use the Northwest Sinfonia, Rippy travelled to Prague and recorded with the FILMharmonic Orchestra before returning to the United States to complete the music. A standalone compact disc and digital download retail version of the soundtrack was announced in January 2009 for release on February 17.
Adaptations
The Halo franchise includes various types of merchandise and adaptations outside of the video games. This includes bestselling novels, graphic novels, and other licensed products, from action figures to a packaging tie-in with Mountain DewMountain Dew
Mountain Dew is a citrus-flavored carbonated soft drink brand produced and owned by PepsiCo. The original formula was invented in the 1940s by Tennessee beverage bottlers Barney and Ally Hartman and was first marketed in Marion, VA, Knoxville and Johnson City, Tennessee. A revised formula was...
. Numerous action figures and vehicles based on Halo have been produced. Joyride Studios created Halo and Halo 2 action figures, while Halo 3 poseable and collectible action figures, aimed at collectors, were produced by McFarlane Toys
McFarlane Toys
McFarlane Toys, a subsidiary of Todd McFarlane Productions, Inc., is a company started by Todd McFarlane that makes highly detailed models of characters from movies, comics, musicians, video games, and sport figures...
and became some of the top-selling action figures of 2007 and 2008. MEGA Blocks
Mega Brands
Mega Brands, Incorporated , formerly Mega Bloks, Incorporated, is a publicly traded children's toy company. Mega Bloks is the name of their most popular product, a line of construction set toys, with other brands including Mega Puzzles, Board Dudes and Rose Art. Mega Brands, Inc. distributes a...
partnered with Microsoft to produce Halo Wars-themed toys.
Books and comic series
Canon (fiction)
In the context of a work of fiction, the term canon denotes the material accepted as "official" in a fictional universe's fan base. It is often contrasted with, or used as the basis for, works of fan fiction, which are not considered canonical...
established by the video games. Larry Niven (author of Ringworld) was originally approached to write a Halo novelization, but declined due to unfamiliarity with the subject matter. The first novel was Halo: The Fall of Reach
Halo: The Fall of Reach
Halo: The Fall of Reach is a 2001 science fiction novel by Eric Nylund based on the Halo series of video games and acts as a prequel to Halo: Combat Evolved, the first game in the series. It is set in the fictional Halo universe, taking place in the 26th century across several planets and locations...
, a prequel to Halo: Combat Evolved. It was written by Eric Nylund in seven weeks, and published in October 2001. William C. Dietz
William C. Dietz
William C. Dietz is the best-selling author of more than thirty novels some of which have been translated into German, French, Russian, Korean and Japanese...
wrote an adaptation of Halo: Combat Evolved called Halo: The Flood
Halo: The Flood
Halo: The Flood is a 2003 novel based on the 2001 Xbox video game Halo: Combat Evolved written by William C. Dietz. Closely depicting the events of the video game, The Flood begins with the escape of a human ship Pillar of Autumn from enemy aliens known as the Covenant...
, which was released in 2003. Eric Nylund returned to write the third novel, Halo: First Strike
Halo: First Strike
Halo: First Strike is the third novel in the Halo series and the second Halo novel written by Eric Nylund. Published in 2003, it serves as a bridge between the events of the video games Halo: Combat Evolved and its 2004 sequel Halo 2...
, which takes place between Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, and was published in December 2003. Nylund also wrote the fourth adaptation, Halo: Ghosts of Onyx
Halo: Ghosts of Onyx
Ghosts of Onyx is a novel by Eric Nylund, set in the universe of the Halo video game series and released on October 31, 2006. Ghosts of Onyx was the fourth Halo novel published, and Nylund's third contribution to the series...
, which was published on October 31, 2006. Bungie employee Joseph Staten
Joseph Staten
Joseph Staten is a bestselling American writer born in San Francisco, California. The son of a theologian, Staten originally planned on becoming an actor, but dropped the idea in college...
wrote the fifth book, Halo: Contact Harvest
Halo: Contact Harvest
Halo: Contact Harvest is a science fiction novel by Joseph Staten, set in the Halo universe. Staten is a longtime employee of Bungie, the developer of the Halo video game series; he directed the cut scenes in the video games and is a major contributor to Halos storyline...
, which was released on October 30, 2007, while Tobias S. Buckell
Tobias S. Buckell
Tobias S. Buckell is a Grenadian science fiction writer. His 2008 novel, Halo: The Cole Protocol, made the The New York Times Best Seller list. He currently lives in Bluffton, Ohio.-Biography:...
produced the sixth, Halo: The Cole Protocol
Halo: The Cole Protocol
Halo: The Cole Protocol is the sixth novel adaptation of the Halo science fiction franchise. The book was written by Tobias S. Buckell and published on November 25, 2008...
, published in November 2008. Bungie considers the Halo novels as additions to the Halo canon.
The Halo universe was first adapted into the graphic novel format in 2006, with the release of the Halo Graphic Novel
Halo Graphic Novel
The Halo Graphic Novel is the first graphic novel adaptation of the science fiction video game Halo, published by Marvel Comics in partnership with Bungie Studios...
, a collection of four short stories
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...
. It was written and illustrated by graphic novelists Lee Hammock, Jay Faerber
Jay Faerber
Jay Faerber is an American comic book and television writer. Faerber is known for his work on Generation X and New Warriors for Marvel Comics, and The Titans and Connor: Spotlight for DC Comics. He later wrote his own creator-owned titles for Image Comics, including Noble Causes, Dynamo 5 and Near...
, Tsutomu Nihei
Tsutomu Nihei
is a Japanese manga artist. His cyberpunk-influenced artwork has gained a strong cult following. He has a relatively large community of fans in Germany where his manga Blame!, NOiSE and Biomega were published by Ehapa. Blame! was also published in France and Spain by Glénat, in the US by Tokyopop...
, Brett Lewis, Simon Bisley
Simon Bisley
Simon Bisley is a British comics artist best known for his 1990s work on ABC Warriors, Lobo and Sláine. His style, reliant on paints, acrylics, inks and multiple-mediums, is strongly influenced by Frank Frazetta, Bill Sienkiewicz, Gustav Klimt, Salvador Dalí, Egon Schiele, and Richard Corben...
, Ed Lee and Jean Giraud
Jean Giraud
Jean Henri Gaston Giraud is a French comics artist. Giraud has earned worldwide fame, not only under his own name but also under the pseudonym Moebius, and to a lesser extent Gir, the latter appearing mostly in the form of a boxed signature at the bottom of the artist's paintings, for instance the...
. At the 2007 New York Comic Con, Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
announced they would be working on an ongoing Halo series with Brian Michael Bendis
Brian Michael Bendis
Brian Michael Bendis is an American comic book writer and erstwhile artist. He has won critical acclaim for his self-published, Image Comics and Marvel Comics work, and is one of the most successful writers working in mainstream comics, with his books selling consistently highly for over a...
and Alex Maleev
Alex Maleev
Alex Maleev is a Bulgarian-born comic book illustrator, best known for the Marvel Comics' series Daredevil , collaborating with writer Brian Michael Bendis.-Career:...
. The limited series, titled Halo: Uprising
Halo: Uprising
Halo: Uprising is a four-issue American comic book limited series set in the Halo universe. The series was written by Brian Michael Bendis, illustrated by Alex Maleev, and published by Marvel Comics...
, bridges the gap between the events of Halo 2 and Halo 3; initially planned to conclude shortly before the release of Halo 3, the constant delays led to the final issue being published April 2009.
Marvel announced at the 2009 Comic Con that two new comics, a five-part series written by Peter David
Peter David
Peter Allen David , often abbreviated PAD, is an American writer of comic books, novels, television, movies and video games...
and a second series written by Fred Van Lente
Fred Van Lente
Fred Van Lente is an American writer, primarily of comic books and graphic novels.-Career:Van Lente is the co-founder, along with artist Ryan Dunlavey, of Evil Twin Comics, which produces his and Dunlavey’s non-fiction comic books, the first and most famous of which is Action Philosophers.Recent...
, would appear the coming summer and winter. David's series, Halo: Helljumper, is set prior to Halo: Combat Evolved and focuses on the elite Orbital Drop Shock Troopers. The five-part series was published between July and November 2009. Lente's series, originally titled Spartan Black, revolves around a black ops team of Spartan supersoldiers assigned to the UNSC Office of Naval Intelligence. The rebranded comic, Halo: Blood Line, debuted in December 2009. A comic-retelling of the novel Halo: The Fall of Reach was the most recent comic series entitled: Halo: Fall of Reach. Fall of Reach was split into 3 mini-stories: Boot Camp, Covenant, and Invasion.
A collection of Halo stories, Halo: Evolutions, was simultaneously released in print and audiobook formats in November 2009. Evolutions includes original material by Nylund, Buckell, Karen Traviss
Karen Traviss
Karen Traviss is a science fiction author, and full-time novelist from Wiltshire, England. Originally from the Portsmouth area, Traviss worked as both a journalist and defence correspondent before turning her attention to writing fiction. She also served in both the Territorial Army and the Royal...
and contributions from Bungie. Tor eventually re-released the first three Halo novels with new content and cover art.
Science fiction author Greg Bear
Greg Bear
Gregory Dale Bear is an American science fiction and mainstream author. His work has covered themes of galactic conflict , artificial universes , consciousness and cultural practices , and accelerated evolution...
has been contracted to write a trilogy of books focusing on the Forerunners, the first titled Halo: Cryptum
Halo: Cryptum
Halo: Cryptum is a science fiction novel by Greg Bear, set in the Halo universe. The book released on January 4, 2011, and is the eighth Halo novel, following 2009s Halo: Evolutions, an anthology written by various writers creating short stories.Set approximately 100,000 years before the events of...
released in January 2011 , while his second Halo: Primordium will be released January 2012. Traviss is writing a series of novels taking place after the events of Halo 3 and Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, the first entitled Halo: Glasslands comes out October 2011.
Film
In 2005, Columbia Pictures president Peter Schlessel began working outside the studio system to produce a Halo filmic adaptation. Alex GarlandAlex Garland
Alexander Medawar "Alex" Garland is a British novelist and screenwriter.-Early life:Garland was born in London, England, the son of psychoanalyst Caroline and political cartoonist Nicholas Garland. His maternal grandparents were zoologist Peter Medawar and author Jean Medawar...
wrote the first script, which was then pitched to studios by couriers dressed as Master Chief. Microsoft's terms required $10 million against 15 percent of gross; most studios passed, citing the lack of risk for Microsoft compared to their large share of potential profits. 20th Century Fox and Universal Studios decided to partner to produce the film, paying Microsoft $5 million to option the film and 10 percent of grosses. Peter Jackson
Peter Jackson
Sir Peter Robert Jackson, KNZM is a New Zealand film director, producer, actor, and screenwriter, known for his The Lord of the Rings film trilogy , adapted from the novel by J. R. R...
was slated to be the executive producer
Executive producer
An executive producer is a producer who is not involved in any technical aspects of the film making or music process, but who is still responsible for the overall production...
, with Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp is an Afrikaner-Canadian film and advertisement writer and director. Blomkamp employs a documentary-style, hand-held, cinéma vérité technique, blending naturalistic and photo-realistic computer-generated effects. He is best known as the co-writer and director of critically acclaimed...
as director. Before Blomkamp signed on, Guillermo del Toro
Guillermo del Toro
Guillermo del Toro is a Mexican director, producer, screenwriter, novelist and designer. He is mostly known for his acclaimed films, Blade II, Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy film franchise. He is a frequent collaborator with Ron Perlman, Federico Luppi and Doug Jones...
was in negotiations to direct.
D. B. Weiss
D. B. Weiss
Daniel B. Weiss is an American author. His debut novel Lucky Wander Boy was themed around video games and has since been linked with the screen adaptations of various science-fiction and fantasy stories...
and Josh Olson
Josh Olson
Josh Olson is an American screenwriter and director. Olson began his career working as a production assistant in the art department on the 1987 film Masters of the Universe...
rewrote Garland's script during 2006. The crew stopped and resumed preproduction of the film several times. Later that year, 20th Century Fox threatened to pull out of the project, leading Universal to issue an ultimatum to Jackson and Schlessel: either cut their large "first-dollar" deals, or the project was ended. Both refused, and the project stalled.
Blomkamp declared the project dead in late 2007, but Jackson replied that the film would still be made. Blomkamp and Jackson collaborated on District 9
District 9
District 9 is a 2009 South African science fiction thriller film directed by Neill Blomkamp. It was written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, and produced by Peter Jackson and Carolynne Cunningham. The film stars Sharlto Copley, Jason Cope, and David James...
, but the director told /Film
/Film
/Film is a blog that covers movie news, reviews, interviews, and trailers. It was founded by Peter Sciretta in August 2005.-Podcasts:Two podcasts run on the site. The /Filmcast airs Sunday nights, hosted by David Chen, Adam Quigley, and Devindra Hardawar, in which they and a guest discuss TV and...
that he was no longer considering working on a Halo film if the opportunity arose, saying that after working on the film for five months before the project's collapse it would be difficult to return. The rights for the film have since reverted back to Microsoft. O'Connor has stated that the movie will be made at some point. At one point, filmmaker Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
had expressed interest in being involved in the making of a film adaptation of Halo. A fan-film, Halo: Faith is currently in development.
Anime
Microsoft announced at Comic-Con 2009 that it was overseeing production of a series of seven short anime films, together called Halo Legends. Financed by 343 Industries, the animation was created by five Japanese production houses: BonesBones (studio)
is a Japanese anime studio. It has produced numerous series, including RahXephon, Wolf's Rain, Scrapped Princess, Eureka Seven, Angelic Layer, Darker than Black, Soul Eater, Ouran High School Host Club and two adaptions of the Fullmetal Alchemist manga along with Star Driver: Kagayaki no Takuto and...
, Casio Entertainment, Production I.G.
Production I.G.
is a Japanese anime studio and production enterprise, which was founded on December 15, 1987 by Mitsuhisa Ishikawa. It is headquartered in Kokubunji, Tokyo, Japan....
, Studio 4°C
Studio 4°C
is a Japanese animation studio founded by Eiko Tanaka in 1986. The name comes from the temperature at which water is most dense.-History:STUDIO4°C has produced numerous feature films, OVAs, and shorts. Early film titles include; Memories , Spriggan and Princess Arete...
, and Toei Animation
Toei Animation
Toei Animation Co., Ltd. is a Japanese animation studio owned by Toei Co., Ltd. The studio was founded in 1948 as Japan Animated Films . In 1956, Toei purchased the studio and it was reincorporated under its current name...
. Shinji Aramaki
Shinji Aramaki
is a Japanese anime director and mechanical designer, born in Fukuoka Prefecture. He was a member of Artmic.He is noted for work on powered exoskeletons and his mecha and CG design on several anime series.-As director:...
, creator and director of Appleseed and Appleseed Ex Machina
Appleseed Ex Machina
Appleseed Ex Machina is a 2007 Japanese animated CG film and is the sequel to the 2004 Appleseed film, similarly directed by Shinji Aramaki, and was produced by Hong Kong director and producer John Woo. It was released on October 20, 2007 in Japan and made its American premiere at the Jules Verne...
, serves as the project's creative director. Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
distributed Legends on DVD and Blu-ray in February 2010. Six of the stories are officially part of the Halo canon, with the seventh, made by Toei, intended to be a parody of the universe.
Reception and critical response
The Halo franchise has been highly successful commercially and critically. During the two months following Halo: Combat Evolveds release, it sold alongside more than fifty percent of Xbox consoles and sold a million units by April 2002. Halo 2s sales generated US$125 million on its premiere day, making it the fastest selling United States media product in history up to that time. Combined with Halos sales, the two games sold 14.8 million units before Halo 3s release.GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
reported 4.2 million units of Halo 3 were in retail outlets on September 24, 2007, a day before official release—a world record volume. Halo 3 broke the previous record for the highest grossing opening day in entertainment history, making US$
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
170 million in its first twenty-four hours. Worldwide, sales exceeded US$300 million the first week, helping to more than double the sales of the Xbox 360 when compared with the weekly average before the Halo 3 launch. At the end of 2007, Halo 2 and Halo: Combat Evolved were the number one and two best-selling Xbox titles, respectively, and Halo 3 was the best-selling Xbox 360 title. Halo Wars was the best-selling RTS console game, selling more than one million units. The Halo series went on to sell more than 27 million copies by August 2009, and more than 34 million copies by May 2010. Tor Books reported that sales of all franchise materials are greater than $1.7 billion, and Bungie's games before Reach accounted for $1.5 billion in sales. The soundtracks to Halo 2, Halo 3, ODST and Reach all appeared on the Billboard 200 charts for at least one week. By May 2011, total gross of Halo merchandise was $2 billion, with 40 million copies of the games sold. By July, the total amount climbed to $2.3 billion.
The Halo adaptations have been successful as well. Many of the novels have appeared on Publisher Weeklys bestseller charts and the Halo Graphic Novel sold more than 100,000 copies, a "rare hit" for the games-to-comics genre. Ghosts of Onyx, Contact Harvest, The Cole Protocol and the first volume of Cryptum appeared on The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
bestseller lists, and The Cole Protocol also opened 50th overall on USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
bestsellers list. Tor's first three novels sold more than one million copies by April 2009.
Overall, the Halo series has been well received by critics. Halo: Combat Evolved has received numerous Game of the Year
Game of the Year
Game of the Year is a title awarded by various magazines, websites, and shows to a deserving game. Many are only for PC or console video games...
awards. In March 2007, IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
listed it as the top Xbox game of all time, while readers ranked it the fourteenth best game ever on "IGN Readers' Choice 2006 - The Top 100 Games Ever". Conversely, GameSpy
GameSpy
GameSpy Industries, Inc., known simply as GameSpy, is a division of IGN Entertainment, which operates a network of game websites and provides online video game-related services and software. GameSpy dates back to the 1996 release of an internet Quake server search program named QSpy. The current...
ranked Halo: Combat Evolved tenth on its list of "Top 25 Most Overrated Games of All Time", citing repetitive level design and the lack of an online multiplayer mode. Halo 2 also received numerous awards, with IGN listing it as the number two top Xbox game of all time in March 2007. From its initial release on the Xbox in November 2004 until the launch of Gears of War
Gears of War
Gears of War is a military science fiction third-person shooter video game developed by Epic Games and published by Microsoft Game Studios...
on the Xbox 360 in November 2006 - two years later - Halo 2 was the most popular video game on Xbox Live. Halo 3 was nominated for and won multiple awards; it won Time magazine's
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
"Game of the Year" and IGN chose it as the Best Xbox 360 Online Multiplayer Game and Innovative Design of 2007. Most publications called the multiplayer aspect one of the best features; IGN said the multiplayer map lineup was the strongest of the series, and GameSpy added that the multiplayer offering will greatly please "Halo veterans". Complaints focused on the game's plot. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
said the game had a "throwaway" plot and Total Video Games judged the single-player aspect ultimately disappointing. The series' music and audio has received enthusiastic response from game reviewers.
Cultural impact
The main trilogy, particularly its protagonist, has been declared iconic and a symbol of today's videogames; a wax replica of the Master Chief was made by Madame TussaudsMadame Tussauds
Madame Tussauds is a wax museum in London with branches in a number of major cities. It was founded by wax sculptor Marie Tussaud and was formerly known as "Madame Tussaud's", but the apostrophe is no longer used...
in Las Vegas
Las Vegas Strip
The Las Vegas Strip is an approximately stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard in Clark County, Nevada; adjacent to, but outside the city limits of Las Vegas proper. The Strip lies within the unincorporated townships of Paradise and Winchester...
, where Pete Wentz compared the character to notable characters from previous generations like Spider-Man
Spider-Man
Spider-Man is a fictional Marvel Comics superhero. The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee and writer-artist Steve Ditko. He first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15...
, Frodo
Frodo Baggins
Frodo Baggins is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium.He is the main protagonist of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. He was a hobbit of the Shire who inherited Sauron's Ring from Bilbo Baggins and undertook the quest to destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom...
, and Luke Skywalker
Luke Skywalker
Luke Skywalker is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the original film trilogy of the Star Wars franchise, where he is portrayed by Mark Hamill. He is introduced in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, in which he is forced to leave home, and finds himself apprenticed to the Jedi master...
. The Escapist author Roger Travis compared Halos story to Virgil's Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
, saying the religious and political struggle described in the games relates to the modern epic tradition. GamesTM
GamesTM
GamesTM is a UK-based, multi-format video games magazine, covering many video game platforms including PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Wii, GameCube, Xbox, PlayStation 2, PC games, Game Boy Advance, PlayStation Portable, Nintendo DS and Arcade machines...
stated Halo: Combat Evolved "changed videogame combat forever", and Halo 2 showcased Xbox Live as a tool for communities. GameDaily noted Halo 2s launch was "easily comparable to the biggest in other sectors of the entertainment industry", marking the first time a video game launch has become a major cultural event in America. Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine included the franchise in the "2005 Time 100", highlighting that in the first ten weeks after the release of Halo 2, players spent 91 million combined hours playing the game online. A The New York Times report noted the success of Halo 3 was critical for Microsoft, persuading consumers to buy the Xbox 360 console which was experiencing waning sales compared with the Nintendo Wii
Wii
The Wii is a home video game console released by Nintendo on November 19, 2006. As a seventh-generation console, the Wii primarily competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. Nintendo states that its console targets a broader demographic than that of the two others...
, as well as helping restore the console's image. On September 25, 2007, the release date for Halo 3, Microsoft's shares rose 1.7% based on sales expectations for the game. Halo has been described as a series that "has reinvented a genre that didn't know it needed to be reinvented", with aspects of the main trilogy being duplicated in other FPS games multiple times.
Variety called Halo "the equivalent of Star Wars".
Machinima
As a highly popular video game series with a large and active fan base, the Halo trilogy has given rise to an array of video productions in an emerging entertainment medium, machinimaMachinima
Machinima is the use of real-time 3D computer graphics rendering engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation...
. Virtually all machinima footage based around the Halo games is taken from the multiplayer modes of the main trilogy games. Most productions are set outside Halo canon
Canon (fiction)
In the context of a work of fiction, the term canon denotes the material accepted as "official" in a fictional universe's fan base. It is often contrasted with, or used as the basis for, works of fan fiction, which are not considered canonical...
, while others are based on fan fiction
Fan fiction
Fan fiction is a broadly-defined term for fan labor regarding stories about characters or settings written by fans of the original work, rather than by the original creator...
closely relating to the official story. Halo 3 includes a saved film function that allows camera angles not possible in previous games, and other features that simplify production. The game has become one of the most popular tools for generating machinima, and Microsoft updated its user license agreement
Software license agreement
A software license agreement is a contract between the "licensor" and purchaser of the right to use software. The license may define ways under which the copy can be used, in addition to the automatic rights of the buyer including the first sale doctrine and .Many form contracts are only contained...
to allow noncommercial distribution of such films.
A notable machinima production is the comedy
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...
series Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles
Red vs. Blue
Red vs. Blue, often abbreviated as RvB, is a set of related comic science fiction video series created by Rooster Teeth Productions and distributed through the Internet and on DVD...
created by Rooster Teeth Productions
Rooster Teeth Productions
Rooster Teeth Productions is a production group from Austin, Texas that specializes in the creation of live action shorts, animated peices and machinima, or films created using real-time, interactive engines from computer and video games. The name Rooster Teeth is a euphemism for Cockbite, an...
. It has achieved an unparalleled level of success in Halo machinima in specific, and machinima in general; it is credited with bringing attention to the genre. Red vs. Blue generated annual revenues of US$
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
200,000, and special promotional episodes were commissioned by Bungie. The series ended on June 28, 2007, after 100 regular episodes and numerous promotional videos. Sequels to the series include Reconstruction
Red vs. Blue: Reconstruction
Red vs. Blue: Reconstruction is a 2008 action-comedy machinima series produced by Rooster Teeth Productions and distributed via the Rooster Teeth website. A sequel to Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles, Red vs Blue: Reconstruction picks up where the Red vs. Blue: Recovery One miniseries left...
, which contains more dramatic elements than its comedic predecessor, Relocated
Red vs. Blue: Relocated
Red vs. Blue: Relocated is a 2009 comedy machinima miniseries produced by Rooster Teeth Productions and distributed via the Rooster Teeth website. Red vs Blue: Relocated is a four-part miniseries set just after the events of Reconstruction and just prior to Recreation in the Red vs. Blue continuity...
, Recreation
Red vs. Blue: Recreation
Red vs. Blue: Recreation is a 2009 Halo 3 machinima series created by Rooster Teeth Productions, Set three days after Red vs. Blue: Relocated, the Red team are back plotting against the Blue team, which currently consists of only one person, Caboose. In the main story line, the series is considered...
, and Revelation
Red vs. Blue: Revelation
Red vs. Blue: Revelation is a Halo 3 action comedy machinima series created in 2010 by Rooster Teeth Productions, set after Red vs. Blue: Recreation. In the main story line, the series is considered the eighth season of Red vs. Blue. This series will mark the end of the Recollections trilogy,...
. Other machinima series include Fire Team Charlie
Fire Team Charlie
Fire Team Charlie is a machinima series created by Fire Team Charlie Productions, part of a group called Xbox Ottawa. Although their first 4 films revolve around unrelated single movie stories , by Episode 5 a plotline and the main characters have been introduced, which for the rest of the series...
, The Codex
The Codex
The Codex is a 20-episode online machinima series made by Edgeworks Entertainment and set in Bungie Studios' Halo video game universe. Along with its prequel, The Heretic, The Codex is part of the greater Codex Series...
, and the in-game interview show This Spartan Life
This Spartan Life
This Spartan Life is an award-winning talk show created by Bong + Dern Productions and produced and directed by Chris Burke, who hosts the show under the pseudonym Damian Lacedaemion...
.