Into the Ashen Wake
And here we are, now one full year after the launch of Halo 3, yet still, Bungie’s managed to rekindle the same fervor and excitement garnered in those months prior to the game’s release. The interesting fact which has emerged from yesterday’s reveal is that this same excitement is somehow still in support of the same exact game – Halo 3.
In the weeks leading up to this year’s E3, Bungie began dropping interesting viral quips from a clever face that we’ve come to know as “The Superintendent.” This character perused Bungie’s forum offering advice to random members, telling them to “keep it clean” or to “proceed with caution.” These short bursts of marketing pollination culminated in a countdown for a teaser reveal during the Electronic Entertainment Expo’s final day. As controversy would have it, the countdown plans were changed by Microsoft in an effort to balance their pool of announcements for that event.
Fast forward to September 25, 2008, where we’ve already had a pair of short, but illuminating Bungie.net updates releasing cryptic information about the Superintendent, who he is and what he does. With all of the earmarks of the Halo franchise, it didn’t take a much closer inspection to realize that this project, whatever it might be, was deeply involved with the Halo fiction.
Making amends for the events of E3, Bungie released the 60-second teaser yesterday, which, with the pieces of the lead-up communiques on Bungie.net, make a pretty compelling case for an interesting expansion to the story of Halo.
That was an awesome detailed explanation! Nice work!
An idea for the time difference:
After the shockwave, SI had to reboot and may had all his data prior to its last memory save point erased or corrupted. When the time is 00:00:00:00 it says ATTEMPT RELINK / LINK FAIL. So when it can’t link to an outside source it just takes the time from its last save point: 16:01:06:09 (which is, by the way, the same date as as 01/06/09 if you take out the 16). From there, it analyzes what it can see through the cameras and tries to compensates the lost time by accelerating the clock.
Just a thought.
JC
Comment by JC — September 26, 2008 @ 12:37 pm
Great analysis man. I really enjoyed it and I hope you guys can keep the info comin!
Comment by TM22 — September 26, 2008 @ 3:37 pm
One of my buddies is always talking about your blog at work – finally came and checked it out today, nice work! I’m subscribing to your rss feed – keep on posting!
Comment by MattC — September 26, 2008 @ 7:30 pm
Nice job man! That was really informative and in depth.
Comment by tylerthet3 — September 26, 2008 @ 11:56 pm
Great job guys, i have been monitoring your forums with great interest recently and its great to see it all put together so professionally, maliciously and maturely in one place.
Keep It (Clean) Up
Comment by Phoenix — September 27, 2008 @ 8:42 am
Finally, a full, rational analysis of this. I am really excited for this, no matter when it hits. And the posssibility of 16 players together helps explain the ‘How will it work if you’re not a Spartan?’ question. Also, the first comment sounds like a good call too.
Comment by Parasites Lost — September 27, 2008 @ 10:02 am
Great job as always guys! I can tell this is a labor of love for you guys, still, the quality of the writing and the amount of research you guys do should and is appreciated.
I’m still not quite clear as to how this game will be delivered. They still call it Halo 3, giving me at first the impression that this would be a downloadable add on with new achievements to boot, yet when they compare it to GRAW and GoW (Third person shooters)then it must be a stand alone game. I’ve read the whole article, and I’m still not quite clear about this.
So, lets see who’s first at giving me an extremely clear and sensible answer and making me feel like an idiot?
Comment by zayas_81 — September 27, 2008 @ 9:37 pm
Nice. Thanks. 🙂 Pak Tam
Comment by Pak Tam — September 28, 2008 @ 8:54 pm
It is painfully clear that the single ODST tube crashes into the camera lens. Take that into consideration and the fact that people think it is “before” the slipspace jump incident. There is no cracked lens at that same camera angle earlier in the trailer.
So the theory that the “last drop tube is before all the others” I would say is successfully debunked.
Comment by Maj Williams — September 29, 2008 @ 2:04 pm
Once again Bungie shows confidence in the intelligence and attentiveness of its fans, and once again you magnificent bastards step up to the plate and singlehandedly validate that confidence.
Ascendent Justice has my thanks for being the first place I send my highbrow friends when they ask me why I like “that dumb mainstream shooter.” Bravo to you, gentlemen!
Comment by George K. — September 30, 2008 @ 10:28 am
Gah! Ascend*A*nt!
Somewhere, my high school English teachers are weeping.
Comment by George K. — September 30, 2008 @ 10:29 am
Wow, this analysis is amazing. A couple of things don’t quite add up, but overall it is incredibly insightful. Thanks!
Comment by Nick — October 1, 2008 @ 9:39 pm
Just want to add something about Tanaga It was referred to as a district, but I did a simple google search when i went through the trailer myself.
“The shot is now revealed to be *Tanaga*.0086 at 16:11 PM”
The Tanaga is a type of short Filipino poem, consisting of four lines with seven syllables each with the same rhyme at the end of each line — that is to say a 7-7-7-7 Syllabic vers,.with an AAAA rhyme scheme. (thanks to wikipedia)
And, yet another example of bungie using something with a seven in it.
Comment by TheHaloLlama — October 3, 2008 @ 5:40 pm
I thought it would be interesting to point out that the game could potentially be about the other Spartan II soldiers (other than Master Chief).
We know that after the events in Halo 1/First Strike, they returned to Earth with Master Chief and Sergeant Johnson.
Also, we know they ran a series of operations on Earth cleaning up Covenant on the ground before being sent to Onyx.
Additionally know that Spartans can use HEV drop pods (seen in Halo 2, when Master Chief uses one to drop onto the Halo Installation)
Comment by Saaaandeep — October 4, 2008 @ 5:12 am
Great article however…
i think there is one problem with it:
you said that the space tether was knocked down by the slip-space incident, however in halo 3 a marine clearly says that it fell when the city was glassed.
“Mombassa Space Elevator.”
“It collapsed when the city got glassed.”
“But the tether was thousands of kilometers high!”
“Yeah. Well, now, it’s scattered all over the Savannah.”
“Holy crap.” [Tsavo Highway, Halo 3]
Comment by Chro — October 8, 2008 @ 8:35 pm
“Great Post – keep it up 🙂
If you don’t mind me asking, which theme do you have at the moment? Its a great design and I would like to know if others can use it.”
Comment by warcraft gold — February 26, 2009 @ 5:52 pm
Unfortunately, the theme we are using has been customized and changed extensively, so it’s not something that’s available for download anywhere.
Comment by Cocopjojo — February 26, 2009 @ 6:56 pm