Like many players within the early 2000s, I acquired an Xbox particularly so I may play Halo: Combat Evolved. I grew to become so obsessive about it that I purchased the whole lot I may discover with “Halo” on the quilt, together with Eric Nylund’s Halo: The Fall of Attain. I didn’t count on it to fully change how I checked out Grasp Chief, but it surely did, chronicling his expertise as a baby kidnapped into an experimental navy program designed to create supersoldiers. The armored, weathered fight veteran from the sport, like the remainder of us, was as soon as a child. However even at solely six years previous, he was particular.
Late final month, Xbox announced that growth of the subsequent recreation set within the Halo universe could be handed off to Activision. Then, earlier this week, a leak shared by Rebs Gaming indicated that Activision is contemplating a tough reboot that will double as Grasp Chief’s origin story. However not solely does this miss the purpose of Fight Advanced, which thrust gamers instantly into an already ongoing future battle between humanity and a messianic alien empire generally known as The Covenant, it additionally threatens to overwrite a legitimately nice sci-fi story within the course of.
The boy contained in the armor
The Fall of Attain begins many years earlier than Fight Advanced, within the 12 months 2517, when Dr. Catherine Halsey identifies John as considered one of 150 youngsters genetically suited to the SPARTAN-II program. These youngsters are kidnapped and changed with short-lived flash clones designed to trick their dad and mom into considering every little one is useless. He is then subjected to years of navy coaching beneath Chief Petty Officer Franklin Mendez. All of this happens on the planet Attain which, apart from Earth, is positioned as the subsequent most-prominent human world.
Whereas the sport and nearly all of its sequels successfully current Grasp Chief because the final of his variety, The Fall of Attain surrounds him with dozens of Spartans. John grows up alongside Kelly, the quickest of them; Linda, an virtually impossibly exact marksman; Fred, who is sort of as succesful a frontrunner as John; and Sam, John’s first and closest buddy who’s additionally described because the strongest of all of them. Collectively, they turn out to be a discovered household and tight-knit squad.
Their earliest coaching workouts set up what finally makes John particular. He isn’t the quickest or the strongest Spartan. As an alternative, he earns the others’ belief and evokes bravery. Throughout one train, the kids are deserted within the wilderness and instructed the final considered one of them to achieve an extraction ship will likely be left behind. John organizes the group and ensures that no person is deserted, regardless that it means brazenly defying orders. That type of loyalty makes the Spartans’ eventual losses sting, since we all know virtually all of them die when the Covenant destroy Attain shortly earlier than the occasions introduced within the unique recreation.
When the 75 candidates bear the procedures meant to reinforce their power, velocity, senses, and reflexes, 30 die and one other 12 are left severely disabled. Solely 33 emerge as lively Spartans. The process turns John into one thing past human, but it surely additionally forces him to observe greater than half of the one household he is aware of die or disappear in a single day. At this level within the story, he is 14 years previous.
In a single notably memorable scene from the e book, John is testing out the bounds of his new physique within the fitness center. Weights really feel too mild. Objects transfer too slowly. When a gaggle of 4 older troopers harass him and transfer to assault, he effortlessly kills two and gravely injures the opposite two in seconds. When John asks Mendez whether or not the boys have been enemies or teammates, his teacher refuses to provide him a straight reply, which makes it look like the entire thing was a staged check. Scenes like this characterize the beginning of John’s legend and clarify why, when he marches onto the Pillar of Autumn’s bridge early in Halo, a number of crewmembers flip and stare with awe. It additionally communicates how he suits in with the remainder of human society outdoors of being merely checked out as a weapon.
That will get to the center of what makes Nylund’s novel so fascinating: It exhibits us different individuals who simply know Grasp Chief as John. They tease him, problem him, observe him, and sometimes perceive what he’s considering with none want for phrases. These relationships make his stoicism really feel much less like an absence of persona and extra just like the emotional armor of somebody who has spent his complete life dropping folks.
Late within the e book, John meets Cortana and assessments the upgraded MJOLNIR Mark V armor that he wears in Fight Advanced. The supposedly managed train is secretly sabotaged, forcing John and Cortana to dodge dwell ammunition, mines, and an incoming missile. Different Spartans could also be stronger, sooner, or extra naturally gifted, however Cortana acknowledges the elusive high quality that Halsey first noticed in John when he was six: Luck.
Halo is healthier when Spartans battle collectively
That very same concentrate on a full staff of Spartans is a serious motive Halo: Attain stays among the best video games within the franchise. Fairly than sending one other solitary supersoldier via the Covenant battle, Bungie surrounded the participant with Noble Crew. Carter, Kat, Jun, Emile, Jorge, and Noble Six all have distinguishable specialties and personalities. In contrast to with Grasp Chief, we additionally see most of them with out their helmets on at completely different factors, which humanizes the character and makes the story really feel that rather more private.
Most of Noble Crew consists of Spartan-IIIs, members of a later program designed to provide cheaper and extra expendable supersoldiers. Jorge-052 is the exception. He’s a Spartan-II like Grasp Chief. Regardless that Jorge isn’t explicitly talked about in The Fall of Attain, there are a selection of unnamed Spartans we merely by no means meet within the e book.
Halo: Attain is the furthest factor from an adaptation of Nylund’s novel, although it does have some overlapping material. What they share greater than something is an understanding that Spartans are extra compelling as a household than as interchangeable armored supersoldiers. Their camaraderie provides their sacrifices which means.
The Halo origin story that nearly didn’t occur
It is exceptional that The Fall of Attain established a lot of the franchise contemplating how shortly it was produced. Nylund reportedly wrote the novel in solely seven weeks, working from an accredited define and a narrative bible for a online game that hadn’t even been launched but.
The e book arrived on Oct. 30, 2001 — 16 days earlier than Halo: Fight Advanced. That technically makes this tie-in novel the primary launched piece of Halo media. Readers may study John’s historical past, meet his fellow Spartans, and witness the autumn of Attain earlier than anybody had set foot on the titular ringworld.
The novel additionally reportedly got here near by no means current as a result of Bungie was immune to giving Grasp Chief an outlined backstory. These issues are comprehensible: A largely silent protagonist made it simpler for gamers to think about themselves contained in the armor. However The Fall of Attain proved John could possibly be each an efficient participant avatar and an fascinating character on the similar time.
Nylund later returned to the collection for Halo: First Strike and Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, chronicling what occurred to Grasp Chief and a number of the different Spartans after the primary recreation and thru the top of Halo 2. Collectively, the three novels kind a free trilogy concerning the troopers left outdoors the video games’ highlight.
The largely maligned recreation Halo 5: Guardians does reunite Grasp Chief with Fred, Kelly, and Linda. For readers of Nylund’s novels, seeing Blue Crew collectively in a recreation is monumental. However for anybody who had solely performed the mainline collection, it’s a plot growth that feels half-cooked. That disconnect was considered one of Halo 5’s elementary storytelling issues.
A brand new recreation about John’s origins has the prospect to do one thing comparable. Activision doesn’t must discard The Fall of Attain or assume that its viewers has already learn it. It may carry the novel’s finest concepts into the video games correctly: John studying to steer Kelly and Sam as a baby, the devastating augmentation course of, his first missions with Blue Crew, the emergence of the Covenant, and the second Cortana chooses him not as a result of he’s the strongest or quickest Spartan, however as a result of he’s the bravest and the luckiest.
If Activision actually is creating a Grasp Chief origin story, The Fall of Attain ought to be its blueprint. Nylund understood that probably the most fascinating query was by no means how John-117 grew to become sturdy sufficient to save lots of humanity. It was how a kidnapped little boy held on to sufficient of his humanity to turn out to be its biggest hero.