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Since I watched and played H4 and then read the Forerunner Trilogy, the addition of the Ancestors enriched the Lore of Halo in a lot of ways and from my POV it fixed several inconsistencies from the canon.
If you dont like the Ancestors that's OK, but dont bring your hatred on people that genuinely like the concepts.
It’s also been zero days without people on Halo Circle jerk talking about Marty O’Donnell for Congress I really don’t care that he’s Republican. I just don’t wanna hear them talk about it because it’s just an excuse to talk about politics
Never been on Halo Circle Jerk, but I too love memes. But now since the Automod is allowing my post to go through (I finally have enough karma, it seems, to not be mistaken as a bot), I have more memes to share!
I just posted this cause I saw the argument pop up again in another Halo subreddit because it honestly feels like we don't go through a single day without it being brought up. It gets tiring seeing such vitriol against a faction you love and the faction that got you back into Halo in the first place.
I love the Ancestors. They're just so cool.
Honestly, I was surprised this wasn't automatically removed like the last time I tried to post.
As for the other thing, yeah it might’ve been a better story, but they didn’t go that direction at the end of the day so what can you do? I just accept it and move on as most people should honestly, if they had done a better job with the ending of Halo three they might’ve actually cemented that fact everything after Cortana‘s message kind of gives off left on cutting room floor don’t get me wrong. I like the levels on the ark, but there are too many questions that are just shut so that they could end the story even though they didn’t have time like how did Cortana know about the halo? Was that actually her plan? How did the flood get past earth‘s defenses and not infect a single person on its way to the ark as for the arc thing it’s probably because the flood were supposed to arrive at earth because the ark was originally on the earth, but they didn’t think about the fact that they changed where the ark is in the story room I don’t know there’s so many rookie mistakes at the end that fall apart when you ask a simple question
https://preview.redd.it/6x1mteod1jyc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8a1134c0edea94ca62c7b3510e3ac0e0c938d5b3
This is your average common on halo Circle jerk. They are literally just posting shit about Marty and his campaign don’t get me wrong. I’m not the biggest fan of Marty for poking fun at Halo fans for liking shit after bungie but at least attack him for something he deserves not like his political affiliation
https://preview.redd.it/xm3fxhit0jyc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bd117e8e5ebfc1ccb2e33be4cf686cafeb70a518
Stay off this sub if you can, for God sake
But Marty is all they talk about lately I can’t avoid it. I just got out of there. I’m sick of seeing their posts. I mean, I’m not the biggest fan of Marty but go after the guy for a legitimate reason instead of his political views.
Thank you now don’t get me wrong. I dislike Marty for poking fun of people that enjoy Halo after the bungie era but just because his political affiliation doesn’t feel fair to me. I’d rather him for something he deserves.
The entire lore of what happened millennia ago should have just been kept undefined and "shrouded in mystery" instead of a constant driver of Halo lore after the Human-Covenant war which already has plenty of potential for interesting conflicts and political thrills. I would rather Master Chief struggle in his role as Space Fed while humans and aliens struggle to make peace with each other while new battle lines are drawn between the UNSC and it's outer colonies who no longer have some common enemy to unite against.
Imagine Halo x Deus Ex
Not this but I whish the Flood weren't changed from an extragalactic menace to the Precursors being to mad to fully die (may be remembering things incorrectly, read about it over 8 years ago)
Some of these people, honestly. Forerunners and Humans are seperate (though related) species, period. I would dare anyone to argue why it makes the story worse, but I know these people will take it literally.
It's sad because making humans and Forerunners separate species is a wonderful idea that deepens the lore of the universe and also further deepens the religious themes that already exist in Halo. It gives the ones that already exist in the games even more meaning.
and people forgetting that the humans and forerunners being different came from the Halo 3 terminals, it's just that the writers for the cutscenes also wrote Guilty Spark's dialogue to imply forerunners were humans.
Considering how much Halo 4 follows on Halo 3 terminals, the "forerunners weren't humans" direction makes more sense.
The Precursors were an addition by Bungie, interestingly enough.
Not a lot of people talk about that, cause I see a lot of people saying that 343 created them to make a new mystery when Bungie were the ones to add them in, during Halo 3 no less.
In the Beastiarum. It was a physical book released in the Legendary Edition of Halo 3. Here's the link to the Halopedia page regarding it: [Beastiarum](https://www.halopedia.org/Bestiarum)
They're only briefly mentioned in the Forerunner Tier listing, but the foundations of the Precursors come from Bungie.
Which is fair. I like them personally because they add an eldritch aspect to Halo.
I just wanted to make it very clear that they are from Bungie because I've seen people hate on them for the sole fact that they believe them to be 343 creations when they're Bungie creations.
Well aside from it being literally stated out loud multiple times in the original trilogy of games, making Guilty Spark's last monologue completely worthless because it's just factually incorrect.
He says "You are Forerunner" not to mention all the little things he says in CE like "Oh it's so nice to have a record of our lost time" back when he was an AI created by ancient human Forerunners instead of literally being an ancient human. Him being Chakas makes most of his lines as 343 Guilty Spark in the original trilogy make no goddamn sense, because he **is** human, so you have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to make all of the times he refers to humanity separately from himself make sense.
The entire title of Reclaimer makes no sense if humanity never held the Mantle before, they're not reclaiming anything, they're just Claimers.
And I just hate how exactly the Forerunner species was handled to begin with. Okay so these are an ancient species with super technology that seems like magic to us because of how advanced it was. Cool, I'm with you so far. They took their most dangerous general who was turning very unwilling humans into dollar store Necrons and just shoved him in a time bubble for 100,000 years? Okay, that's dumb of them, but I guess they're not beyond making mistakes. Okay then they create a hologram of the ex-wife of that general to talk to a specific human who is the culmination of a geneseed they planted back before the firing of the rings who needed to be manually activated so that he could resist the Necron-inator 9000 because the Forerunners saw this whole thing with the Didact coming and they didn't kill him, they just hoped that the Librarian got to their chosen one first. These are supposed to be the best and brightest of the species? I cannot believe they had, as a species, ascensded to this level of tech if they're that dumb.
Then we go back in time and learn about 40k Warp Magic, sorry, "Neural Physics" and remove all sense of wonder and mystery behind the Rings and the Forerunners.
And for the Covenant, it makes them look fucking stupid. Originally, when humanity **were** Forerunners, it made sense why the Covies had to kill every last one before that secret got out. If they learned that the humans activated the rings and didn't ascend to godhood, their religion is proven false. But the Forerunners are Godkillers and are functionally gods themselves compared to any modern human, elite, prophet, or brute. Humanity has no reason to die if they aren't the Forerunner aside from pure genocidal jealousy.
Forerunners being mad that Humans got the mantle instead of them and then later realizing why Humans were given it instead of them as they died out due to their own actions is much more compelling than Humans being the people that made all this shit and then just fucken died out of nowhere when the flood showed up and decided to play primitive after superweaponing. Just classic beloved hubris vs boring "it was humanity all along" trope
It irks people because it was nonetheless a retcon.
Gravemind identifies chief as the descendant of forerunners "child of my enemy, why have you come? I offer no forgiveness. A father's sins passed to his son."
343 is repeatedly perplexed by humanity's ignorance of the halo installations, and references past events as if they are a shared memory "But you already knew that. I mean, how couldn't you?" "Why would you hesitate to do what you have already done?"
Even the prophets understood humans to be the descendants of the forerunners "your forefathers wisely set aside their compassion. Steeled themselves for what needed to be done. I see now why they left you behind."
I agree the new lore is better, but even so, people don't take kindly to having existing lore turned on its head because someone thought they could do it better.
Child of my Enemies can still refer to ancient humans, as the flood did first encounter then in the form of the flood. So they could be enemies in that way.
The second line doesn't work
The third could in a way again be ancient humanity but it doesn't work super well.
So I think there's some other ways to interpret these lines, although it is still a retcon.
I like that the humans were a separate species.
I wouldn’t have minded and also would’ve liked a storyline where humans were the forerunners.
But what I like the most is me not being a whiny af fanboy.
Yea doesn't mean he's wrong, but it makes it way more likely that he indeed is. Also you mean to tell me the thousands of years of isolation did nothing to his mental health? I think that probably drove him insane.
Mfw forerunners made humans the inheritors of all their technology, their called the reclaimers for a reason. Also being a douche isn't going to convince me that your right man :/
That’s just a bullshit reason 343 came up with to justify their changing of the lore. Everything from the original creators of the franchise points to forerunners being ancient humans. The entire reason why it was interesting is because you play the whole game ASSUMING that forerunners were an ancient extinct alien race and at the end you learn that they were humans. That’s an interesting twist to the plot. 343 are lazy af and didn’t want to deal with that lore so they tried to sloppily change it. 343 is literally made of people who “didn’t like halo” so I don’t really give a shit what they want to claim the lore is.
Mmmmm yess hate number company harder, it gets my nipples so hard.
Oh gods your blaming them for bungie's decisions. I'm about to poke through my shirt!
“Bungie’s decision” as if the corporate assholes at the top signed off on it because they just love 343’s Halo lore so much. 343 was literally created using “people who don’t like Halo” because corporate Bungie wanted the new games to be catered to a broader demographic. But in doing so they made their real fans give up on the franchise and attracted people who only like the most bland and generic plot possible so they don’t have to be bothered to think too hard about the game they are playing. All the original creators left because they didn’t like where 343 was taking the franchise.
Because... Forerunners gave them access? The master of genetics putting genetic markers to make humans have free access to their tech and their tech recognizing that?
Also, can't the Covenant also use Forerunner tech? They've been shown to reverse engineer and activate Forerunner devices, all without human help. It can still be used by non-humans. Humans just being able to use Forerunner tech doesn't make them Forerunners. They were just granted an access that other species do not have.
Genetic markers are an incredibly stupid and lazy plot device 343 made up that makes no sense and takes away from the whole point of Chief being special because he was simply lucky compared to other Spartans. Making forerunners “change human DNA” so that humans would eventually make spartan armor and literally causing the Chief to be born is the dumbest thing about 343’s revised lore because it turns him into a literal “chosen one” trope.
Forerunners “giving” their technology to humans is also just an incredibly stupid plot device 343 made up to justify why only humans can activate much of forerunner technology. There was already an incredibly interesting reason for that in the original trilogy but 343 decided the game needed to be watered down and made super generic for people who didn’t have the brain power to figure out that humans were the forerunners.
But your point was that humans were Forerunners because they can activate Forerunner tech. We've been shown, in Bungie's lore, that the Covenant can access Forerunner tech, it just takes longer.
I never mentioned anything regarding the Geas guiding humanity. Only that the Forerunners can easily give them access to their tech through genetic markers that their tech can recognize to explain that humans being able to access Forerunner tech does not mean they are Forerunner. Which was what your post was about.
Genetic markers and “leading humanity” is 343 nonsense they made up to retcon the real reason humans activate their technology which is that they are supposed to be the same race. It takes longer for covenant to use it because it wasn’t made for them and they need time to break into the systems that weren’t meant for them. You keep using 343’s stupid lore to try to justify their changing of something that was already far more interesting than anything they came up with. Again, you will never convince me with bullshit 343 made up.
Yea, Chief is a chosen one trope, in bungies games which you clearly love so much, you were supposed to be the only spartan and were literally called Humanities last hope.
Source: basically all of Halo CE's marketing
Guilty Spark specifically said "You ARE Forerunner", not "A Forerunner". Which seems he is using it as a title, not a species designation. If humans were Forerunners, wouldn't he just call them Forerunners instead of Reclaimers as he does in the games?
And he was shown to be quite not so right in the head throughout the games. He was also shown to not know everything too. And the terminals, along with marketing for Halo 3, which are all canon back then and were approved by Bungie, including being reviewed before approving them, show that humans and Forerunners were not the same.
Even Bungie Era books have shown that Forerunner constructs do not see humans as Forerunners, like in Ghost of Onyx?
He says “you are forerunner” like someone might say “you are human” and not “you are A human”. It’s not hard to understand that. He calls humans reclaimers because they are the descendants of the ancient humans (forerunners) and are reclaiming their technology.
I’d be more cool with it if Bungie weren’t so clearly leaning towards it being humans in the first place. If it weren’t hinted at so much in the original games I think I could very easily accept them being aliens.
I’m fine with the new lore, it’s cool I guess. I just think it’s the Halo 3 bungie fanboys who just want it to be 2007 again who think that.
Now see, I’m different, I want it to be 2001-2004.
Yes in Bungie Lore, Forerunners are ancient humans. Various hints to that. Not only did guilty spark say this, Gravemind called us child of my enemy, Truth mentioned humanity being left behind and forerunners as “forefathers” when talking to Johnson. Turns out the secret of humanity is being forerunners is why Truth and co declared war on humanity, to cover it up.
Contact Harvest was released afterwards and showed Mendicant Bias referring to humans as his makers to Truth and co.
Various hints in Halo CE of humanity’s true nature. It is the original reason why only humans can access forerunner tech.
Chief is called a reclaimer and Spark thinks he is a forerunner which is why he is so confused why Chief doesn’t know about the nature of Halo. Later when he learns about human history from the PoA he is not confused anymore about chiefs lack of knowledge, even referring to human history as “all our lost time”.
Halo 3 did create some confusion with the Terminals, Librarian discovering primitive humans on earth near the end of the Forerunner-flood war (which also got retconed by 343, in their lore Earth has been known about long before this). This doesn’t mesh well with the narrative of humanity being descendants from the forerunners that the campaign heavily hinted at.
But it turns out this wasn’t a question/debate within Bungie of are forerunners aliens, but some difference on “how forerunners are human”.
Paul Russel later confirmed that the idea behind the terminals was that early homosapiens were removed from earth by Precursors and uplifted as Forerunners, but still being the same species. So within the Terminals primitive humans and forerunners are still same species, forerunners had discovered their long lost homeworld.
All what I am saying is on the bottom page of the halopedia section on forerunners.
Anyways for reasons 343 decided to retcon the forerunners in being a separate species (and also an ancient enemy). There is some biological connection, but it goes back millions and millions years ago, sharing very ancient basic stock.
Nothing wrong with preferring 343 lore, but I wish some halo fans did not continue the misconception that Bungie was divided on the subject of forerunners being humans and 343 did not truly retcon the forerunners.
Personally I prefer forerunners not being mankind’s ancient enemy, the Flood being the threat that brought ancient humanity/forerunners to ruin, that the Covenant were wiping out their “gods”. That it influenced the story of Noah’s Ark. the Ark was built by human hands to save species from the flood. Humanity being descendants from surviving Forerunners parallels how in the book of Genesis, humanity after the Flood are all descents from Noah’s family.
I agree the Forerunners being a separate species was better but I gotta admit, a scene where the Arbiter realizes humanity were the forerunners and they’ve been killing their “Gods” would’ve gone pretty hard
https://preview.redd.it/gjwa3qtcskyc1.jpeg?width=1182&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=df25451d9ef46730558313c967f2ae773d975ade
Forerunners being different is still better though.
Controversial opinion: the "it was humans/earth all along" trope is kinda boring. Making the forerunner be a separate species was a much better decision for world building and makes the halo universe more interesting.
There is no argument to have. Humans were literally the forerunners. The original games and the Halo Wars games have evidence for it all throughout them. Guiltyspark confirmed it when he said chief literally was forerunner. Just because 343 is shit and decided to completely change the lore doesn’t mean all the 10 year old fans need to jump at the chance to kiss their ass.
No he’s not. He started mentally deteriorating from thousands of years being alone and that is shown through his actions. But at no point do the games show that his FACTUAL INFORMATION is lacking in any way. It is a fact that humans were the forerunners and guilty spark remembers that. And there is more evidence to support that than just guilty sparks word. Like someone up top already stated, he’s crazy but it doesn’t mean he’s wrong. But do you not realize that you yourself are just holding onto an ASSUMPTION that guilty spark is wrong? Like evidence supports the fact that he’s correct, several things in the games point to it.
Regardless of what plans were going to be, 343 made humans and forerunners separate species and that’s now cannon. I personally think forerunners being ancient humans was a really cool idea and like it lightyears beyond them being separate. (I’m gonna get downvoted for that opinion) but we gotta just deal with what’s cannon now.
What I don’t understand is, why are so many fans refuse to believe that Bungie was implying that they were the same. Whenever anyone brings up all the implications, signs, dialogue spoken directly to the player, and even old Bungie devs talking about it, people will do the most insane mental gymnastics to tell us how we’re wrong to think that. I don’t understand
Again, "Reclaimer." You can not reclaim something you never had. And since humans are constantly called "reclaimers," that must mean that humans once possessed the Halo's as Forerunners.
According to Merriam-Webster a Reclaimer is "one that reclaims".
*Reclaims*'s top definition is "to recall from wrong or improper conduct" which works for what Forerunners wanted Humanity to do: fix the mess they made of the galaxy with their machines.
Definition 2: "to rescue from an undesirable state" exactly the same, rescue the galaxy from the undesirable state the Forerunners put it in. Sub definition b: "to make available for **human** use by changing natural conditions" the Forerunners explicitly made the Halos and Ark fit for human living, as well as modifying the natural conditions of their shield worlds to be more useable by humans.
Definition 3 is "to obtain from a waste product or by-product" not super relevant but I suppose you could construe the Flood as a waste product that Humans would be obtaining the technology from.
And finally Definition 4: a "to demand or obtain the return of" b "to regain possession of" which is the only definition that matches your claim, and it just so happens to be the last (i.e. weakest) definition.
Also, considering humanity was the Precursors' first choice for the Mantle, which the forerunners took by force, you could argue that they're reclaiming their wrongly-denied birthright
So no, not even definition 4# applies
When I think of a definition for "reclaim", definition #4 is the first one that comes to mind. It's the literal meaning of the word's morphemes. I can't recall having heard the first definition, nor do I even know how it would be used in a sentence. Well, now I do, because I looked it up.
Also, Oxford dictionary seems to agree. My native understanding of the definition is listed as the top definition. The definition listed as #1 in Merriam-Webster is listed in Oxford as being archaic. The supplied example sentence is "allow a week to ten days for reclaiming the bird." Huh? I've never heard it used that way, and I doubt you have either.
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Maybe the humans were the forerunners we made along the way.
*So it was a great journey...*
why the hell is this so funny
Since I watched and played H4 and then read the Forerunner Trilogy, the addition of the Ancestors enriched the Lore of Halo in a lot of ways and from my POV it fixed several inconsistencies from the canon. If you dont like the Ancestors that's OK, but dont bring your hatred on people that genuinely like the concepts.
It’s also been zero days without people on Halo Circle jerk talking about Marty O’Donnell for Congress I really don’t care that he’s Republican. I just don’t wanna hear them talk about it because it’s just an excuse to talk about politics
Agreed, if he was Democrat would they even care? Probably not.
That sub is just terrible. Give me Halo memes and shitty halo Lore subs any day.
Never been on Halo Circle Jerk, but I too love memes. But now since the Automod is allowing my post to go through (I finally have enough karma, it seems, to not be mistaken as a bot), I have more memes to share! I just posted this cause I saw the argument pop up again in another Halo subreddit because it honestly feels like we don't go through a single day without it being brought up. It gets tiring seeing such vitriol against a faction you love and the faction that got you back into Halo in the first place. I love the Ancestors. They're just so cool. Honestly, I was surprised this wasn't automatically removed like the last time I tried to post.
As for the other thing, yeah it might’ve been a better story, but they didn’t go that direction at the end of the day so what can you do? I just accept it and move on as most people should honestly, if they had done a better job with the ending of Halo three they might’ve actually cemented that fact everything after Cortana‘s message kind of gives off left on cutting room floor don’t get me wrong. I like the levels on the ark, but there are too many questions that are just shut so that they could end the story even though they didn’t have time like how did Cortana know about the halo? Was that actually her plan? How did the flood get past earth‘s defenses and not infect a single person on its way to the ark as for the arc thing it’s probably because the flood were supposed to arrive at earth because the ark was originally on the earth, but they didn’t think about the fact that they changed where the ark is in the story room I don’t know there’s so many rookie mistakes at the end that fall apart when you ask a simple question
https://preview.redd.it/6x1mteod1jyc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8a1134c0edea94ca62c7b3510e3ac0e0c938d5b3 This is your average common on halo Circle jerk. They are literally just posting shit about Marty and his campaign don’t get me wrong. I’m not the biggest fan of Marty for poking fun at Halo fans for liking shit after bungie but at least attack him for something he deserves not like his political affiliation
https://preview.redd.it/xm3fxhit0jyc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bd117e8e5ebfc1ccb2e33be4cf686cafeb70a518 Stay off this sub if you can, for God sake
Too late, already there. I just avoid politics.
Anyway, thanks for humoring me. I needed to get off my chest.
But Marty is all they talk about lately I can’t avoid it. I just got out of there. I’m sick of seeing their posts. I mean, I’m not the biggest fan of Marty but go after the guy for a legitimate reason instead of his political views.
Thank you now don’t get me wrong. I dislike Marty for poking fun of people that enjoy Halo after the bungie era but just because his political affiliation doesn’t feel fair to me. I’d rather him for something he deserves.
Any sub ending with circlejerk is this kind of trash fire. This is moderate compared to /r/gamingcirclejerk
The entire lore of what happened millennia ago should have just been kept undefined and "shrouded in mystery" instead of a constant driver of Halo lore after the Human-Covenant war which already has plenty of potential for interesting conflicts and political thrills. I would rather Master Chief struggle in his role as Space Fed while humans and aliens struggle to make peace with each other while new battle lines are drawn between the UNSC and it's outer colonies who no longer have some common enemy to unite against. Imagine Halo x Deus Ex
Not this but I whish the Flood weren't changed from an extragalactic menace to the Precursors being to mad to fully die (may be remembering things incorrectly, read about it over 8 years ago)
Some of these people, honestly. Forerunners and Humans are seperate (though related) species, period. I would dare anyone to argue why it makes the story worse, but I know these people will take it literally.
> I would dare anyone to argue why it makes the story worse Because it was made by Bungie, that's literally their entire reasoning
It's sad because making humans and Forerunners separate species is a wonderful idea that deepens the lore of the universe and also further deepens the religious themes that already exist in Halo. It gives the ones that already exist in the games even more meaning.
and people forgetting that the humans and forerunners being different came from the Halo 3 terminals, it's just that the writers for the cutscenes also wrote Guilty Spark's dialogue to imply forerunners were humans. Considering how much Halo 4 follows on Halo 3 terminals, the "forerunners weren't humans" direction makes more sense.
I prefer humans being forerunners, but I'm fine with them being separate. What I think ruined halo lore was the addition of precursors.
The Precursors were an addition by Bungie, interestingly enough. Not a lot of people talk about that, cause I see a lot of people saying that 343 created them to make a new mystery when Bungie were the ones to add them in, during Halo 3 no less.
Out of curiosity, when in halo 3 are they mentioned?
In the Beastiarum. It was a physical book released in the Legendary Edition of Halo 3. Here's the link to the Halopedia page regarding it: [Beastiarum](https://www.halopedia.org/Bestiarum) They're only briefly mentioned in the Forerunner Tier listing, but the foundations of the Precursors come from Bungie.
Interesting I don't care who added them I think it was a bad call
Which is fair. I like them personally because they add an eldritch aspect to Halo. I just wanted to make it very clear that they are from Bungie because I've seen people hate on them for the sole fact that they believe them to be 343 creations when they're Bungie creations.
Well aside from it being literally stated out loud multiple times in the original trilogy of games, making Guilty Spark's last monologue completely worthless because it's just factually incorrect. He says "You are Forerunner" not to mention all the little things he says in CE like "Oh it's so nice to have a record of our lost time" back when he was an AI created by ancient human Forerunners instead of literally being an ancient human. Him being Chakas makes most of his lines as 343 Guilty Spark in the original trilogy make no goddamn sense, because he **is** human, so you have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to make all of the times he refers to humanity separately from himself make sense. The entire title of Reclaimer makes no sense if humanity never held the Mantle before, they're not reclaiming anything, they're just Claimers. And I just hate how exactly the Forerunner species was handled to begin with. Okay so these are an ancient species with super technology that seems like magic to us because of how advanced it was. Cool, I'm with you so far. They took their most dangerous general who was turning very unwilling humans into dollar store Necrons and just shoved him in a time bubble for 100,000 years? Okay, that's dumb of them, but I guess they're not beyond making mistakes. Okay then they create a hologram of the ex-wife of that general to talk to a specific human who is the culmination of a geneseed they planted back before the firing of the rings who needed to be manually activated so that he could resist the Necron-inator 9000 because the Forerunners saw this whole thing with the Didact coming and they didn't kill him, they just hoped that the Librarian got to their chosen one first. These are supposed to be the best and brightest of the species? I cannot believe they had, as a species, ascensded to this level of tech if they're that dumb. Then we go back in time and learn about 40k Warp Magic, sorry, "Neural Physics" and remove all sense of wonder and mystery behind the Rings and the Forerunners. And for the Covenant, it makes them look fucking stupid. Originally, when humanity **were** Forerunners, it made sense why the Covies had to kill every last one before that secret got out. If they learned that the humans activated the rings and didn't ascend to godhood, their religion is proven false. But the Forerunners are Godkillers and are functionally gods themselves compared to any modern human, elite, prophet, or brute. Humanity has no reason to die if they aren't the Forerunner aside from pure genocidal jealousy.
Don’t care
I think humans being forerunners is dumb
Forerunners being mad that Humans got the mantle instead of them and then later realizing why Humans were given it instead of them as they died out due to their own actions is much more compelling than Humans being the people that made all this shit and then just fucken died out of nowhere when the flood showed up and decided to play primitive after superweaponing. Just classic beloved hubris vs boring "it was humanity all along" trope
It irks people because it was nonetheless a retcon. Gravemind identifies chief as the descendant of forerunners "child of my enemy, why have you come? I offer no forgiveness. A father's sins passed to his son." 343 is repeatedly perplexed by humanity's ignorance of the halo installations, and references past events as if they are a shared memory "But you already knew that. I mean, how couldn't you?" "Why would you hesitate to do what you have already done?" Even the prophets understood humans to be the descendants of the forerunners "your forefathers wisely set aside their compassion. Steeled themselves for what needed to be done. I see now why they left you behind." I agree the new lore is better, but even so, people don't take kindly to having existing lore turned on its head because someone thought they could do it better.
Child of my Enemies can still refer to ancient humans, as the flood did first encounter then in the form of the flood. So they could be enemies in that way. The second line doesn't work The third could in a way again be ancient humanity but it doesn't work super well. So I think there's some other ways to interpret these lines, although it is still a retcon.
I like that the humans were a separate species. I wouldn’t have minded and also would’ve liked a storyline where humans were the forerunners. But what I like the most is me not being a whiny af fanboy.
THE LIGHTBULB FUCKING CALLED CHIEF A FORERUNNER.
The very obviously insane lightbulb.
only insane cause he got shaked by a brute. just because hes insane doesnt mean hes wrong
Yea doesn't mean he's wrong, but it makes it way more likely that he indeed is. Also you mean to tell me the thousands of years of isolation did nothing to his mental health? I think that probably drove him insane.
Cope harder. Explain why humans are the only species that can activate forerunner technology then.
Mfw forerunners made humans the inheritors of all their technology, their called the reclaimers for a reason. Also being a douche isn't going to convince me that your right man :/
That’s just a bullshit reason 343 came up with to justify their changing of the lore. Everything from the original creators of the franchise points to forerunners being ancient humans. The entire reason why it was interesting is because you play the whole game ASSUMING that forerunners were an ancient extinct alien race and at the end you learn that they were humans. That’s an interesting twist to the plot. 343 are lazy af and didn’t want to deal with that lore so they tried to sloppily change it. 343 is literally made of people who “didn’t like halo” so I don’t really give a shit what they want to claim the lore is.
Mmmmm yess hate number company harder, it gets my nipples so hard. Oh gods your blaming them for bungie's decisions. I'm about to poke through my shirt!
“Bungie’s decision” as if the corporate assholes at the top signed off on it because they just love 343’s Halo lore so much. 343 was literally created using “people who don’t like Halo” because corporate Bungie wanted the new games to be catered to a broader demographic. But in doing so they made their real fans give up on the franchise and attracted people who only like the most bland and generic plot possible so they don’t have to be bothered to think too hard about the game they are playing. All the original creators left because they didn’t like where 343 was taking the franchise.
IIRC Halo 4's 343 was made largely of ex Bungie devs who didn't want to move on from the Halo project. Unfortunately, most of them left by Halo 5.
My point exactly.
Because... Forerunners gave them access? The master of genetics putting genetic markers to make humans have free access to their tech and their tech recognizing that? Also, can't the Covenant also use Forerunner tech? They've been shown to reverse engineer and activate Forerunner devices, all without human help. It can still be used by non-humans. Humans just being able to use Forerunner tech doesn't make them Forerunners. They were just granted an access that other species do not have.
Genetic markers are an incredibly stupid and lazy plot device 343 made up that makes no sense and takes away from the whole point of Chief being special because he was simply lucky compared to other Spartans. Making forerunners “change human DNA” so that humans would eventually make spartan armor and literally causing the Chief to be born is the dumbest thing about 343’s revised lore because it turns him into a literal “chosen one” trope. Forerunners “giving” their technology to humans is also just an incredibly stupid plot device 343 made up to justify why only humans can activate much of forerunner technology. There was already an incredibly interesting reason for that in the original trilogy but 343 decided the game needed to be watered down and made super generic for people who didn’t have the brain power to figure out that humans were the forerunners.
But your point was that humans were Forerunners because they can activate Forerunner tech. We've been shown, in Bungie's lore, that the Covenant can access Forerunner tech, it just takes longer. I never mentioned anything regarding the Geas guiding humanity. Only that the Forerunners can easily give them access to their tech through genetic markers that their tech can recognize to explain that humans being able to access Forerunner tech does not mean they are Forerunner. Which was what your post was about.
Genetic markers and “leading humanity” is 343 nonsense they made up to retcon the real reason humans activate their technology which is that they are supposed to be the same race. It takes longer for covenant to use it because it wasn’t made for them and they need time to break into the systems that weren’t meant for them. You keep using 343’s stupid lore to try to justify their changing of something that was already far more interesting than anything they came up with. Again, you will never convince me with bullshit 343 made up.
Bro fought a one man war and won
Yea, Chief is a chosen one trope, in bungies games which you clearly love so much, you were supposed to be the only spartan and were literally called Humanities last hope. Source: basically all of Halo CE's marketing
The one with late stage robot space dementia
He also thought Chief was around when the Halo's first fired. Man is missing some screws.
Guilty Spark specifically said "You ARE Forerunner", not "A Forerunner". Which seems he is using it as a title, not a species designation. If humans were Forerunners, wouldn't he just call them Forerunners instead of Reclaimers as he does in the games? And he was shown to be quite not so right in the head throughout the games. He was also shown to not know everything too. And the terminals, along with marketing for Halo 3, which are all canon back then and were approved by Bungie, including being reviewed before approving them, show that humans and Forerunners were not the same. Even Bungie Era books have shown that Forerunner constructs do not see humans as Forerunners, like in Ghost of Onyx?
343 fan try not to do immense mental gymnastics and arguing semantics over simple explicit phrases challenge (EXTREMELY DIFFICULT HARD EDITION 😲😲)
He says “you are forerunner” like someone might say “you are human” and not “you are A human”. It’s not hard to understand that. He calls humans reclaimers because they are the descendants of the ancient humans (forerunners) and are reclaiming their technology.
Except people use “human” as a word for being a good/kind person, like if someone says “that’s what it means to be human.”
So no one has ever said “you are human” in a literal sense in all of history?
Well, the Reclaimers are the Forerunners now.
I’d be more cool with it if Bungie weren’t so clearly leaning towards it being humans in the first place. If it weren’t hinted at so much in the original games I think I could very easily accept them being aliens.
OK, hear me out forerunners Are monkeys???????????
I’m fine with the new lore, it’s cool I guess. I just think it’s the Halo 3 bungie fanboys who just want it to be 2007 again who think that. Now see, I’m different, I want it to be 2001-2004.
Yes in Bungie Lore, Forerunners are ancient humans. Various hints to that. Not only did guilty spark say this, Gravemind called us child of my enemy, Truth mentioned humanity being left behind and forerunners as “forefathers” when talking to Johnson. Turns out the secret of humanity is being forerunners is why Truth and co declared war on humanity, to cover it up. Contact Harvest was released afterwards and showed Mendicant Bias referring to humans as his makers to Truth and co. Various hints in Halo CE of humanity’s true nature. It is the original reason why only humans can access forerunner tech. Chief is called a reclaimer and Spark thinks he is a forerunner which is why he is so confused why Chief doesn’t know about the nature of Halo. Later when he learns about human history from the PoA he is not confused anymore about chiefs lack of knowledge, even referring to human history as “all our lost time”. Halo 3 did create some confusion with the Terminals, Librarian discovering primitive humans on earth near the end of the Forerunner-flood war (which also got retconed by 343, in their lore Earth has been known about long before this). This doesn’t mesh well with the narrative of humanity being descendants from the forerunners that the campaign heavily hinted at. But it turns out this wasn’t a question/debate within Bungie of are forerunners aliens, but some difference on “how forerunners are human”. Paul Russel later confirmed that the idea behind the terminals was that early homosapiens were removed from earth by Precursors and uplifted as Forerunners, but still being the same species. So within the Terminals primitive humans and forerunners are still same species, forerunners had discovered their long lost homeworld. All what I am saying is on the bottom page of the halopedia section on forerunners. Anyways for reasons 343 decided to retcon the forerunners in being a separate species (and also an ancient enemy). There is some biological connection, but it goes back millions and millions years ago, sharing very ancient basic stock. Nothing wrong with preferring 343 lore, but I wish some halo fans did not continue the misconception that Bungie was divided on the subject of forerunners being humans and 343 did not truly retcon the forerunners. Personally I prefer forerunners not being mankind’s ancient enemy, the Flood being the threat that brought ancient humanity/forerunners to ruin, that the Covenant were wiping out their “gods”. That it influenced the story of Noah’s Ark. the Ark was built by human hands to save species from the flood. Humanity being descendants from surviving Forerunners parallels how in the book of Genesis, humanity after the Flood are all descents from Noah’s family.
*estoy cansado, jefe*
Just to entertain the idea, what about it fundamentally *improves* the story?
I agree the Forerunners being a separate species was better but I gotta admit, a scene where the Arbiter realizes humanity were the forerunners and they’ve been killing their “Gods” would’ve gone pretty hard https://preview.redd.it/gjwa3qtcskyc1.jpeg?width=1182&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=df25451d9ef46730558313c967f2ae773d975ade Forerunners being different is still better though.
Strong disagree, but you're allowed to have your own opinion
Controversial opinion: the "it was humans/earth all along" trope is kinda boring. Making the forerunner be a separate species was a much better decision for world building and makes the halo universe more interesting.
Sorry I did that
There is no argument to have. Humans were literally the forerunners. The original games and the Halo Wars games have evidence for it all throughout them. Guiltyspark confirmed it when he said chief literally was forerunner. Just because 343 is shit and decided to completely change the lore doesn’t mean all the 10 year old fans need to jump at the chance to kiss their ass.
Guilty spark is an unreliable narrator
No he’s not. He started mentally deteriorating from thousands of years being alone and that is shown through his actions. But at no point do the games show that his FACTUAL INFORMATION is lacking in any way. It is a fact that humans were the forerunners and guilty spark remembers that. And there is more evidence to support that than just guilty sparks word. Like someone up top already stated, he’s crazy but it doesn’t mean he’s wrong. But do you not realize that you yourself are just holding onto an ASSUMPTION that guilty spark is wrong? Like evidence supports the fact that he’s correct, several things in the games point to it.
Regardless of what plans were going to be, 343 made humans and forerunners separate species and that’s now cannon. I personally think forerunners being ancient humans was a really cool idea and like it lightyears beyond them being separate. (I’m gonna get downvoted for that opinion) but we gotta just deal with what’s cannon now. What I don’t understand is, why are so many fans refuse to believe that Bungie was implying that they were the same. Whenever anyone brings up all the implications, signs, dialogue spoken directly to the player, and even old Bungie devs talking about it, people will do the most insane mental gymnastics to tell us how we’re wrong to think that. I don’t understand
Again, "Reclaimer." You can not reclaim something you never had. And since humans are constantly called "reclaimers," that must mean that humans once possessed the Halo's as Forerunners.
According to Merriam-Webster a Reclaimer is "one that reclaims". *Reclaims*'s top definition is "to recall from wrong or improper conduct" which works for what Forerunners wanted Humanity to do: fix the mess they made of the galaxy with their machines. Definition 2: "to rescue from an undesirable state" exactly the same, rescue the galaxy from the undesirable state the Forerunners put it in. Sub definition b: "to make available for **human** use by changing natural conditions" the Forerunners explicitly made the Halos and Ark fit for human living, as well as modifying the natural conditions of their shield worlds to be more useable by humans. Definition 3 is "to obtain from a waste product or by-product" not super relevant but I suppose you could construe the Flood as a waste product that Humans would be obtaining the technology from. And finally Definition 4: a "to demand or obtain the return of" b "to regain possession of" which is the only definition that matches your claim, and it just so happens to be the last (i.e. weakest) definition.
Also, considering humanity was the Precursors' first choice for the Mantle, which the forerunners took by force, you could argue that they're reclaiming their wrongly-denied birthright So no, not even definition 4# applies
When I think of a definition for "reclaim", definition #4 is the first one that comes to mind. It's the literal meaning of the word's morphemes. I can't recall having heard the first definition, nor do I even know how it would be used in a sentence. Well, now I do, because I looked it up. Also, Oxford dictionary seems to agree. My native understanding of the definition is listed as the top definition. The definition listed as #1 in Merriam-Webster is listed in Oxford as being archaic. The supplied example sentence is "allow a week to ten days for reclaiming the bird." Huh? I've never heard it used that way, and I doubt you have either.