Halo 4
Halo 4 is a 2012 first-person shooter game developed by 343 Industries and published by Microsoft Studios for the Xbox 360. Halo 4s story follows a genetically enhanced human supersoldier, Master Chief, and his artificial intelligence construct Cortana, as they encounter unknown threats while exploring an ancient civilization's planet. The player assumes the role of Master Chief who battles against a new faction that splintered off from remnants of the Covenant, a former military alliance of alien races, as well as a new enemy: mechanical warriors of the Forerunner empire known as the Prometheans. The game features a new selection of weapons, enemies, and game modes not present in previous titles of the series.
Development of Halo 4 began in 2009 and continued until September 2012. Halo 4 is 343 Industries' first original title within the Halo series—previously, development of the main series was undertaken by Bungie, the creator of the franchise. In the developmental process, 343 Industries decided to explore the Forerunner fiction within the Halo universe, leading the team to design a new setting, enemies, and main antagonist. Existing characters and assets received visual overhauls, recreated from the ground up, and motion capture was used for animation within cutscenes. A goal for Halo 4s story was to incorporate more human elements; to achieve this, the developers chose to delve more deeply into the relationship between the two protagonists, Master Chief and Cortana. Several external studios assisted 343 Industries with developing Halo 4, and over 350 people worked on the game in total.
The game was officially announced at Electronic Entertainment Expo 2011 on June 6. Prior to launch, Microsoft stated that Halo 4 was the most expensive video game title the company had created so far. The game was marketed with promotional events and videos, including the creation of a live-action film, Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn. Halo 4 grossed million on its launch day and $300 million in its opening week—a record for the franchise. More than one million people played Halo 4 on Xbox Live within the first 24 hours of its release. The game was met with positive reviews by professional critics and received multiple nominations and awards from the press. It was re-released as part of Halo: The Master Chief Collection for the Xbox One in 2014, and for Windows in 2020. It was followed by a sequel, Halo 5: Guardians, in 2015 for Xbox One.
Gameplay
Halo 4 is a shooter game in which players predominantly experience gameplay from a first-person perspective; the game perspective switches to third-person when using certain weapons, abilities and vehicles. The player's head-up display shows real-time information on the player character's armor system, such as shield status, information on current weapons and abilities, and waypoints for goals and objectives. The HUD also has a motion tracker that detects allies, enemies, and vehicles within a certain radius of the player. The game sees the return of the alien species who were formerly members of the Covenant as foes, and introduces a new type of enemy called the Prometheans, which are Forerunner artificial intelligence constructs. There are three types of Prometheans: Knights serve as leaders of the group and are considered the deadliest of the Promethean forces; Crawlers are a weaker class that often attack in packs; and Watchers offer support and have the ability to shield or revive Promethean allies.Halo 4 features updated versions of many human and Covenant weaponry from previous Halo games, as well as introducing new weapons for the humans, Covenant and Prometheans. The game also features reusable equipment, called armor abilities, introduced in Halo: Reach. New armor abilities are autosentry; the hardlight shield, which activates a protective barrier similar to a riot shield; Promethean vision, which diminishes environment detail and shows hidden players as silhouettes; a regeneration field, which heals all players in close proximity and can emit a short range kinetic blast; and finally the thruster pack, which allows the player to launch themselves several feet in a horizontal direction. Returning abilities include active camouflage; jetpack; and hologram, which creates a doppelgänger of the player running towards a target point. Sprinting returns in Halo 4; however, players can now use it independently of their armor ability. New gameplay mechanics introduced to the series include throwing and catching, which has been implemented into the multiplayer game modes Oddball and Grifball.
Modes
Halo 4s story or campaign mode can be played alone or cooperatively with one other player on the same console via split screen, and up to three other players through Xbox Live. Unlike in Halo 3 cooperative campaign where each player takes the role of a different character, in Halo 4 all players assume the role of Master Chief. Players can enable "skulls" in the campaign menu which act as gameplay modifiers such as increasing enemy health, changing NPC behavior or removing elements of the player's HUD. The campaign also features terminals which provide the player with additional backstory via videos viewed in the Halo Waypoint application on the Xbox 360.In Halo 4s multiplayer component, titled "Infinity", players assume the role of a customizable Spartan-IV super-soldier. Players can progress through ranks by earning experience points from completing matches and challenges. Gameplay items such as visual customizations, weapons, armor abilities, and various upgrades are unlocked and can be acquired by players when they gain ranks. Once players attain rank SR-50, they can enlist into a "Specialization", enabling them to unlock further cosmetic and gameplay-enhancing customizations for their Spartan. War Games is a competitive multiplayer matchmaking mode. There are various playlists with different game types ranging from standard deathmatch to objective oriented modes such as capture the flag. War Games can be played with up to sixteen players on Xbox Live and has up to four-player split screen support. In Halo 4, players are able to join certain multiplayer matchmaking sessions while they are in progress. Spartan Ops is a story-driven episodic game mode, that can be played solo or cooperatively like the campaign mode. It serves as a replacement for the Firefight game mode that featured in Halo: Reach and Halo 3: ODST. Ten episodes of content were released for Spartan Ops, each featured a cinematic and five objective-based missions. The first five episodes were delivered on a weekly basis following Halo 4s launch, the final five episodes were released in early 2013.
Other game features include Forge, a map-editing tool first introduced in Halo 3. Like War Games it has both split screen and Xbox Live support. Using the tool, players can edit default multiplayer maps by adding or modifying spawn points, weapons and items, or create new ones using canvases. Forge in Halo 4 contains a new "magnet" feature for connecting forge pieces together. Theater mode allows players to view films, create video clips, and capture screen shots from recent matches in War Games or custom games. Halo 4 also offers a file sharing system that allows players to upload and share video clips, screenshots, custom maps and game variants.
Synopsis
Setting and characters
Halo 4 takes place in a futuristic science fiction setting in the year 2557, four years after the events of Halo 3. Backstory details that hundreds of thousands of years before the modern era, humans were one of several interstellar civilizations. Following a war with the parasitic Flood, the humans came into conflict with the Forerunners, a powerful race that upheld a policy of benevolent shepherding of other races known as the Mantle of Responsibility. After centuries of war the Forerunners defeated the humans and stripped them of their technology and empire. The Forerunners soon fought the Flood themselves; after exhausting every other strategic option available to them, the Forerunners activated weapons of mass destruction known as the Halo Array. The Array's firing killed all sentient life in the galaxy to deprive the Flood of their food. Life that the Forerunners cataloged was then reseeded throughout the galaxy.In the 26th century, humanity came under attack by the Covenant, an alien collective of species that worship the Forerunners as gods. The human supersoldier Master Chief Petty Officer John-117 and his artificial intelligence companion Cortana, were instrumental in stopping the Halos from being activated, sterilizing the Flood outbreak before they could menace the galaxy once again, and defeating the Covenant resulting in the end of the war. At the end of Halo 3, Chief and Cortana were left stranded in unknown space aboard the remains of the vessel Forward Unto Dawn.
Plot
Campaign
Forward Unto Dawn drifts towards an unknown Forerunner planet, later revealed to be the shield world Requiem. Cortana wakes Master Chief from cryonic sleep shortly before forces from a newly formed Covenant splinter faction board the vessel. The remnants of Forward Unto Dawn are caught in Requiem's gravity well and pass through an opening to crash-land on its interior. As Chief and Cortana explore Requiem, fighting hostile forces from the new Covenant faction and mechanical warriors called "Promethean Knights", Cortana malfunctions. She reveals that she is experiencing "rampancy", a declining mental state faced by smart AIs past their usual seven-year life span. Chief promises to get Cortana to Earth, believing that Cortana's creator, Doctor Catherine Halsey, can fix Cortana's condition. Chief and Cortana pick up garbled transmissions from a human ship, UNSC Infinity, who have picked up the Dawns distress call. Cortana attempts to warn Infinity away from Requiem's gravity well and directs the Chief to deactivate what she believes are communications jammers. Instead, the Chief unwittingly releases the Didact, an ancient Forerunner warrior, from imprisonment. The Didact, who deems Man unworthy of the Mantle of Responsibility, takes control of the Prometheans and the Covenant faction, then attacks Infinity after it is dragged into Requiem.Chief makes contact with Infinity and helps repel the Didact's attack. Chief and Cortana recommend attacking the Didact while he is vulnerable, but Infinity captain Del Rio orders them to destroy the gravity well so their ship can escape. In the process, Chief is contacted by a Forerunner known as the Librarian—the wife of the Didact, as well as ancient humanity's protector. She explains that the Forerunners were divided on how best to combat the Flood. After failing to discover a way to immunize biological beings from the parasite, the Didact used a device called the Composer to convert the warriors under his command into Promethean Knights immune to infection. Requiring more soldiers, the Didact forcibly converted captured humans into Prometheans, before being stopped and imprisoned by the Librarian. The Librarian, who has guided humanity's development, accelerates the Chief's evolution to grant him immunity to the Composer.
After destroying the gravity well, Del Rio orders a retreat back to Earth, doubting the Chief and Cortana's testimony. The Master Chief disobeys orders to stand down and relinquish the malfunctioning Cortana, and stays behind to oppose the Didact. Chief and Cortana attempt to sabotage the Didact's ship before he leaves, but are unsuccessful. They follow the Didact to a Halo ring, Installation 03. The Composer has been moved from the ring onto the nearby Ivanoff Research Station, which the Covenant faction attacks. The Chief defends Ivanoff, but the Didact retrieves the Composer and uses it on the station, composing everyone on Ivanoff except for Chief.
Chief and Cortana use a fighter to follow the Didact's ship to Earth. Aided by Infinity and the home fleet, the Chief boards the Didact's ship with a nuclear warhead. Cortana inserts copies of herself into the Didact's computer systems to overwhelm the Didact's shield, but not before the Didact directs the Composer at Earth and begins composing the population of New Phoenix. With the help of Cortana, the Chief defeats the Didact, who falls into a portal underneath the Composer. The Master Chief activates the bomb but is saved by Cortana, who sacrifices herself. The Chief is found by a rescue team and is taken back to Infinity, where he mourns the loss of Cortana.
In a post-credits scene, the Didact proclaims the Forerunners' role as custodians of the galaxy having to bear the Mantle of Responsibility, and humanity as the greatest threat in the galaxy. Master Chief removes his armor aboard Infinity; if the player completes the game on Legendary difficulty, the Chief's heavily scarred face is briefly shown.