Key characters:

• The Didact
• The Librarian
• The Composer
• Master Chief John-117
• Cortana
• Commander Thomas Lasky
• Captain Del Rio

Key events

• Human-Forerunner War

Things to know

• THE TIMELINE OF HALO
• Rampancy
• Prehistoric Human Civilization
• UNSC Infinity
• SPARTAN-IV Program
• The Evolution of Cortana

Things to watch

A pre-pre-prequel to the below Terminals and the story of Halo 4 if you will. Watch this and then move onto the video below!



ALL of Halo 4's Terminals. I HIGHLY recomend watching it if you want to further your experience with the Halo 4's story and knowledge of the Universe EVEN if you haven't played the campaign!




The ending and what to make of it




The entire plot was centered around turning sentient organic beings into A.I, ancilla, etc. Take that in mind of where Cortana "died"; right beside the Composer.


Master Chief John-117's Humanity

The Reclaimer series' goal was to delve into the Master Chief's emotions and basic humanity. For the past 3 Halo games we have not seen the Chief as an emotional character and his actions in Halo 4 have turned the tables completely.

The prologue itself looks into sociopathic behaviors of spartans and even asks the question, "did the Master Chief succeed because he was, at his core broken?"

In Halo 4 we see the Chief talking more than any of the Halo games combined. He is very empathic towards Cortana who is dealing with her mortality and he is even dealing with the thought of being alone without her. Also, we see the Master Chief directly DISOBEYING orders from a Captain because of what he thinks will happen to humanity (when Captain Del Rio orders the Master Chief to stay on the UNSC Infinity). A huge character ark forming for our hero.


General FAQ

Q: So the ship Chief and Cortana were in just... randomly stumbled upon an ancient Forerunner shield world?

A: Forward Unto Dawn was travelling through the Forerunner's slipspace network, but the portal was destroyed before transport was complete. Dawn was thrown out somewhere else along the network, which just happened to be at Requiem.

Q: What the hell?! I thought we had a truce with the Covenant!

A: The Covenant we see in Halo 4 may very well be a fleet of 'rogue' or 'splinter' group Covenant not affiliated with The Seperatists. Think of the Heretic from Halo 2, or the insurrectionists in humanity.

Q: Wait, if The Librarian died when the Halo Arrays were activated, how did she interact with the Chief?

A: The "Librarian" that you meet is actually a Forerunner ancilla imprinted with the memories of the Librarian. There are also 2 more games and 1 more book in the Bear novels to expand on her character.

Q: What was that silver orb the Didact was flying around in?

A: That was a Cryptum, a Forerunner device created for Warrior-Servants to enter as a form of punishment by exile.

Q: So... what now?

A: Well, it seems the Didact is somehow still alive. However we do not know where he is or who he is with. The same Rebel-Covenants we encountered in Halo 4 now know he physically exists and may end up trying to find him. Or maybe the Didact was teleported to another shield world like Requiem.

Don't forget the Master Chief. The trilogy was written as a whole before production even began. Halo 4's story is just the beginning and should not be taken as it's own game, just think of it as an introduction to our new world. The story is as much John-117's story as it is humanity's. We will be delving deeper into John's behavior, thoughts and basic humanity.

Nice thread.

I wasn't a fan of the campaign, to be honest. The story felt too fast paced. Nothing felt memorable about it, besides the ending.

I loved the old missions they brought back. The Gondolas from Halo 2 and one of the missions felt like Assault on the Control Room from Halo 1.

Very, very fun campaign and easily better than the others besides maybe H1. Much better than I expected.

I guess I underestimated the amount of people interested in Halo's story at THF

This shit is actually really interesting as Bungie put a helluvalot of time into creating the Halo universe and making it rich as well as mysterious.

...which makes me want to read this thread, but i'd love to read something indepth like this on H1-Reach first.

I appreciate this thread, as it's good to mull over what happened, but I highly recommend people play the campaign themselves. I'd rate it 3rd out of all of the Halo campaigns. It has some truly moving moments and the prometheans are fun to fight after 10 years of slaughtering relatively predictable covenant.

And tm22, this is essentially a montage-kid forum, you can't expect the majority of players to care about campaign.

Yeah, that's why I'm trying to get this onto r/halo on reddit. I've been frequenting that soooooo much lately.

Every time I hear "Fix You" I think of Orima and the Halo 2 one. Do you plan on making another video?

I think of Ghoster's "Create". I have no idea why since it wasn't even a big video.

Another campaign montage or a montage in general?

Let's just say I've been saving 3 songs for 2 years. And now is the perfect time to make one last montage.