Halo's Ancient History Might be Destiny's Future?

by Stephen Laughlin , Long Beach, CA, Monday, March 11, 2013, 15:08 (4277 days ago) @ narcogen
edited by Stephen Laughlin, Monday, March 11, 2013, 15:13

Well, I don't know that I'd call it troubled, but I think it's usual even for successful projects to change a lot over the course of development. Bungie does have a history of being forced to cut things that they bring back later...

Great article! I thought something felt very familiar about the whole concept but I couldn't quite place my finger on it. I had a hazy recollection that when I'd first read about Halo in some magazines back in 1999-early 2000 it was being spun as a sort of massive seamless game with a strong emphasis on cooperative multiplayer but when I dug around for the original articles I just came up with a lot of links to dead websites. Aside from the ambitious press release, I'm sure there was some pretty imaginative embellishment going on in the media as well. It would be interesting to read some of those early articles again.

...And I should have just checked HBO: http://halo.bungie.org/pressscans/?sortby=date

With Halo, Bungie's attempting to build an entire, wholly convincing world, with both indoor and breathtaking outdoor scenes joining together to make a massive playing area.

Bungie says there'll be an emphasis on teamwork: multi-player network or Internet games will see several players work together against the aliens

It's set in an expansive, level-less world where you wage determined guerrilla war against an alien power. Especially interesting is the co-operative multi-player mode, which enables you to play an entire squad of heroes and so create alternative strategies.

The emphasis is on multiplay, and you will be able to run wild online. [...] "We will design the game to encour- age players to specialize in certain skills, so that a player who is known as a good driver or pilot in a tight situation will make a name for himself as such, and will be sought out for these skills."

The game is mission-based, but there are no actual levels and different objectives can be pursued in any order.

Rather than the game being mission-based, Bungie has decided that Halo should be as free-flowing an experience as its impressive game engine allows and this lets the player take the battle to the air, water or underground -- anywhere the player sees fit to go.

However, all that is about to change with Halo -- they've picked up the game developers rule book, ripped out the chapter on level design and thrown it away. Halo has not one level but a big 'ringworld' on which players are free to roam, whether on foot, in ground-based vehicles, in the air or under water.

At some point in early-2000, prior to the Microsoft acquisition, those wild ambitions began to get cut down by reality.

But - and note this well - the rumours floating the Web of an entire planet for you to do as you will with are just delusional. Bungie have decided that 'Total Freedom' is impossible, so have to border their levels in natural ways (for example, mountain ranges of the edge of the ringworld).