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I believe I have already suggested Internecion Cube and Halo: Remember on another video of yours, but I would like to add a bit to the former in that during the second episode there is a freeze frame(s) of a message on a vending machine that really adds to the horror aspect which is pretty easy to miss and a good example of detail despite the format. When it comes to new things, there is a Astartes quality animation for the BattleTech series (classic mecha tabletop) called Hired Steel. It is very interesting because you can see the quality noticeably improve over each episode, but certain aspects (the mechs') are always top tier. There is another recent high quality 40k animation series called Steel Coffins which currently has two episodes and focuses on an Imperial Guard tank unit. It is definitely worth keeping an eye on. Also, someone should probably point out that the amount of coordination from Cortana in the background of the "giving the Covenant back their bomb" scene had to have been insane to get everything timed correctly between making sure Chief even hit the Covenant ship to coordinating the UNSC fighter strike to hit at the perfect time to blow a hole directly where it needed to be, and then making sure that In Amber Clad would "catch" Chief once he leaves the Covenant carrier.
Star Wars SC 38 Reimagined It's Obi-Wan and Vader's fight on the death star, but so much better. It hits you with that nostalgia from the very first film, but also the badass action of something rivaling the Prequels or The Old Republic Trailers I think you'd have a blast reacting to it
Nice. I’d just like to point out that we didn’t do pre-rendered cutscenes back in 2004 - on purpose. The quality difference is even more pronounced because of that. However, cut for cut, move for move, it’s all what we imagined.
Amazing! Thank you for checking out the video. Loved your work on the original projects fella. You definitely had a helping hand in shaping my younger years. Nice tick too! KZ
Only thing I’d change about these cutscenes (and H2A in general) is to bring back the original score, and the credits roll. Love your work Marty and hope you’re having a lovely Christmas/New Years.
I always liked how the Halo games used to use the various game assets for the cut-scenes. There's a bunch of TH-cam channels that used mods to freely move the camera around during them, to show how cleverly some of them, like the Halo 3: ODST drop pod scene, were put together.
you are the perfect example of interacting with and acknowleding the profound effect you've had on a generation. I hope you have a great day and a lovely new year ahead!
the part where Lord Hood gave Master Chief the permission to leave the station it's not because he doesn't know what Master Chief was talking about, He knew exactly what Master Chief was going to do with the bomb so he gave the go
It's such a big difference between Hood and Captain Del Rio from H4. Del Rio wants to be in control and have the final say on everything, but Lord Hood knows that Chief knows what he's doing and how capable he is, so even when Chief is vague about leaving the station to give the covenant back their bomb, Hood is just like "fuck it, go ahead"
To be honest, my favorite part about the remastered cut-scenes is that you can switch between the old and new whenever you want in game. It's so cool to see the difference
As much praise is given to the Blur Studios teams, its important to note that none of this would be possible without the brilliant directing of the Original Halo 2 Cinematics by Joe Staten and CJ Cowan, they gave the perfect blueprint for such a cinematic remaster as much of Blurs remaster is just direct translation without much deviation.
The Anniversary cutscenes are nothing short of breathtaking. However myself and many others prefer the classic because of the almost timeless art style and the cinematography is much more seamless. Like how with the ending the Anniversary colossally screwed up the music que that made "Finishing This Fight" so iconic
@@I-DcompanyI just noticed they made an error with 2401's assigned ring. In the original Halo 2 cinematic, he was "the monitor of Installation 04", not 05 as he says in this cinematic
@@halofreak1990 No they didn't. Installation 04 was the ring from the first game and 343 Guilty Spark is its monitor. 2401 Penitent Tangent is the monitor of Installation 05 from the second game, also known as Delta Halo. The new ring being built by the Ark in Halo 3 is a replacement for the destroyed 04 ring and is why Sparky snaps when he learns Chief and Cortona intend to blow it up.
Right, I feel like he was pissed off when he uttered that word out of his mouth. Disdain, disgust type of outburst from a creature like that is very telling
Considering that "containment" was basically accelerated cellular aging at a rate a BILLION times faster than normal, that's exactly the kind of response you'd expect.
My favorite detail in the Cairo Station cutscene is Admiral Hood denying Miranda's request to engage an enemy carrier, but approves Chief's request to jump through space with nothing but a bomb. Not just that, but Chief also gets air support and entire ships moved out of the way, just for him.
tbf, Admiral Hood was on the cairo station so they had to do everything in order to stop the carrier from shooting down the station, they even sacrificed a ship that got in the way of the cannon to protect it (10:30)
Ive always loved that Bungie decided to make him Admiral Lord Hood and a direct descendant of the famous naval hero Lord Hood. Completely unnecessary for the game but just a great detail
@@JimmyThree-BallsI had a talk with some friends about it. They said “how did the bombers know?” So I said on you just looks cool, but in lore the nurolink implants in the heads of most high ranking UNSC officers and infact all personal have them but it gives a very advanced reaction time, and battle knowledge so our boy Lord T Hood would have known within seconds what was going on and sent the long swords to intercept/provide support. It’s super amazing how much lore, and details that was put into these old school hall games.
Well, it was more about stopping the Covenant from blowing a hole, take out 2-3 stations and you have a hole. Think that's what they're protecting more so than an admiral.@@Zerge6095
I always forget that Johnson is a Spartan I. But then you see him go toe-to-toe with the Arbiter (even briefly) and you can't help but remember, Johnson is quite literally a super-soldier too
He was more interesting before the books decided he wasn't just a regular soldier. He was someone strong enough and smart enough to survive the Halo incident. But they couldn't just leave it alone, and now Spartans are everywhere and aren't special at all.
@Baldeagle-tw2nv forge caught the Arbiter (Ripa 'Moramee) off guard. It should be noted Ripa 'Moramee was known to be very arrogant, so he most likely didn't expect to be stabbed, plus he had stopped to gloat to Forge about him winning, giving Forge the time to act. In the fight between Johnson and the Arbiter (Thel 'Vadam), it was the other way around. Arby had the drop on Johnson, as well as not holding back at all, except for when he had him pinned against the wall and disarmed already.
I think the Cortana lines hit harder when you're playing the game because most of her dialogue is during gameplay. Just watching the cutscenes you don't really form much of a connection with her
Whats even crazier is comparing it to the original cutscenes. Its almost 1 to 1 cinematography wise which just makes the originals look better too because u realise exactly what they were trying to accomplish 20 years ago and how well they made them despite the 20 year old quality now not holding up well the cinematography was great.
The remastered cutscenes are good, but there are some minor things that i wish they would have kept. 4:14 Like the brute here tries to grab Arbiters arm fails, but on the original the brute starts to walk towards Arbiter and Arbiter just gives him the glance of "touch me and i'll tie you in to a knot" and the brute just immidiately shits himself.
I do love how well done they mostly are in terms of cinematography, but there's one detail that I can't believe they missed in the cutscene that starts the level Uprising, the camera looks at the plasma rifle on the floor specifically lying in a pool of Sangheili blood in the original, in the remaster he just picks it up and you don't even see it on the ground, I was SO disappointed that they missed that one!
@@pieisgood235yeah that's exactly how I felt especially since you knew arbiter's comrades and brothers-in-arms were being slaughtered for beliefs not their own.
The only detail I don't like about this masterpiece of a remaster is when gravemind says "do not mistake their intent or all will perish, as they did before" in the original Arbiter is resisting the gravemind's hold, but as he is saying those words, arbiter slowly stops resisting, letting the weight of the gravemind's words dawn on him.
Halo fans dont read this u will never unsee it once u see it. 31:40 the animators and artists acidentally animated the ship going away from the library and they didnt have time to redo it so they just reversed the cutscene the opposite way lol. Thats why the ship is flying backwards.
Microsoft should approach Blur about making making the first 3 Halo games into films. As you stated, they're not just animators, they understand cinematography as well as any film maker. Blur also understand the aesthetic design of those original Halo games, and they seem to understand every minute detail of that universe. I speak as an animator and artist, and I believe Blur is one of the best collective of artistic talent in the western world.
I LOVE the dynamic that shows how effective Spartans are at everything they do: The CAPTAIN of a Naval WARSHIP - one built around a quarter mile long railgun - wants to engage a covenant ship in a space battle... Her entire purpose? "Negative. Not against a ship that size. Not on your own." Because he knows it would take multiple of those class of warships to bring that covenant cruiser down. It's basically suicide. BUT the moment Chief opens his mouth with a vague request like, "Can I ignore your last order of defend this station and leave it?" And Lord Hood knows damn well that whatever Chief is about to say next will get done... even if it's something astronomically crazy like blowing up a Covenant Cruiser you wont risk sending 70 billion metric tons of railgun armored death at it. And what does Chief ask to do? Exactly that. Lord Hood gave the green light without hesitation because THAT'S HOW EFFECTIVE CHIEF IS. He didn't even run through a quick idea of his plan. Lord Hood, the commander of Earth's space defensives, just heard one man ask to "give back a bomb" with no other context and really just went "Yeah, that's probably faster and more deadly than this fleet of naval warships I got floating outside." And it was. Every time. For the past 30 years of warfare against the Covenant.
But Chief isn't ignoring his last order. He was ordered to defend the station, and once he reached the bomb the biggest threat became the ships outside rather than anything inside, so the Chief changes his target to those ships. Lord Hood is such a good leader that he trusts his subordinates know what they are doing and can get on with their jobs rather than requiring constant micromanagement. In this case he trusts that the Chief can recognise the change in situation and adapt accordingly, so when the Chief asks to return the bomb Hood knows his aim must be to take out the ships threatening the station
One of the coolest parallels is that when the Super Carrier jumps inside the city, the ODSTs are dropping in amd get caught in that blast. It's so cool how the stories were connected
The bit with Locke at the start was a promo cutscene added to begining of the Aniversery edition of Halo 2 to promote Halo 5: Guardians. In terms of timelines, it takes place during the assault on the last Covenant fortress of Sunion on the elites' homeworld, Sanghelios.
When Rtas 'Vadum aka Half Jaw gives his speech to his elites, you see that all the other elites speak their lines, so their mandibles move. But the Arbiters mandibles doesnt, as he doesnt say the lines, because he doesnt fit in. He's the odd one out. Fascinating thing that loads of people wont catch their first time watching that cutscene. Incredible!
Bruh they really left out my favorite Gravemind line when Arbiter and Masterchief meet him. Arbiter: “Kill me or release me parasite, but do not waste my time with talk.” Gravemind: “There is much talk, and I have listened through rock and metal and time!”
They had to, I think it has something to do with de sync timing? There's a feature where you can switch back and forth from anniversary to OG graphics at any time, cut scenes included. But I've noticed if you do this, there is often a de sync in that og and anniversary are in different parts in the cut scene's run time. Hell you can even hear it in the metropolis scene when they chase the carrier down, the music suddenly cuts to the next part of the score despite never having done so in the original. The original was composed almost in perfect accompaniment to whatever was happening on screen, so that sudden rush forward in the score is to match what's going on if you happened to switch back to og at that moment.
I am still amazed that these came out nearly 10 years ago. Incredible detail for that time, especially considering how long the total amount of cinematics are.
“I am a monument to all your sins” and “There is still time to stop the key from turning” will always gives chills no matter how many times I hear the Gravemind say it. Halo 2’s story is so iconic and I loved it from playing it the first time and will always love it all these years later!
Make sure you watch Day at the Beach, an additional cutscene from Halo 2 that was also remastered! There's also different versions of Johnson's Scorpion speech for every difficulty if you'd like to check those out too.
The thing with characters like cortana is you bond with them over gameplay, as she talks a lot more mid mission than during cutscenes, so it’s no wonder it wouldn’t hit as hard
I get that but with Infinite, she was in every cutscenes pretty much so I felt her emotions. Her face was brilliant for animation. I didn't realise how little Cortana was actually in these cutscenes. Thank you btw for watching and hanging out with me. I appreciate it.
Halo 2 Anniversary was goated It legit gave me hype for more halo games again, like halo Wars 2, because I was excited for more insane cutscenes. Halo usually always had that
One thing I miss about the original cutscenes was when the arbiter fallout of the portal and is grabbing the plasma rifle you see some elite’s blood on the ground with it. Telling you an elite was killed before you find the other bodies in gameplay.
absolutely loved every bit of this. I even caught myself being annoyed at one point because I wanted to hear the cutscene more then the commentary, that how absorbed into the story i got even though I already know it. Seeing how much you enjoyed this one I can only recommend the Halo Reach cutscenes. which in quality wise might be dated but has a really cool story to it.
Around 13:30 when Sgt. Johnson gives his speech about the tank. He will say different things depending on difficulty with "Heroic" being the "way halo was meant to be played"
for you to say this should be a Netflix show when it came out about ten years ago is a big compliment. i was so blown away by these visuals, it made replaying my favorite Halo that much better on MCC
Like you, I haven’t seen these cutscenes since I played the game back when it originally came out in the early 00’s. It’s kind of interesting feeling. You know when you go play a game that you played as a kid and the thought crosses your mind like “These graphics are way worse than I remember.” Whether it’s nostalgia or just flawed memory, that usually ends up happening when you see what it really looked like versus what you remember it looking like as a kid. When you were a kid it looked so realistic and incredible, and it was for the time. Well watching this, and considering the fact that I haven’t played Halo 2 since the early 00’s, this looks to me now like how I remember Halo 2 looking to me as young teen. Watching this definitely makes me want to get and play this remastered edition or whatever they call it. Obviously this didn’t show any gameplay, but these cutscenes are absolutely gorgeous. I don’t know if these are exact remakes of the original cutscenes, or if they added some stuff to really update it and make it feel so awesome. It’s been so long I just don’t remember them that well. If someone could let me know the answer to that I’d appreciate it. I remember some of this stuff but there’s some shots in here that I have no memory of whatsoever. Either way, it seems like they did an incredible job (or at least they did with the cutscenes.) Also, if I’m not mistaken, the heavy use of super overexposed whites and heavy use of lens flares was starting to become a trend around this time in both games and movies if I remember correctly. Kinda like how the Bourne Identity series kicked off the trend of super quick cuts of close up fighting in dark rooms. I don’t think Halo started the trend of these things being used so heavily, but I believe this was about the time when that was becoming more and more common in games and movies, and especially so in action and sci-fi.
The part in the beginning between Spartan Locke and the Arbiter is a prelude for Halo 5’s campaign since when Halo 2 anniversary came out was a year before Halo 5
You know this may be the only person who reacts to videos that I like. He doesn’t sit there and jack his jaw the whole time. When he does speak he actually educates you with insider knowledge of film practices
Yeah the Flood were in the first Arbiter level (after the second cutscene). Real tedious elevator fight where you had to survive waves of Flood and Sentinels, and (if you felt like it) keep your two Elite buddies alive, then you fight your way through more Flood as you chase the Heretic Leader throughout the facility.
You sir, just made my night! ...Morning. Technically. I can't wait to watch this in it's entirety! Seriously, I've been loving the breakdowns - the insight is super intriguing and helpful for personal projects - but the overall vibe and personality you bring is what really keeps me coming back! I am *super* stingy with my subs / follows but you have absolutely earned it.
Thank you so much fella and I'm glad you like them. Your words really mean a lot and was awesome to read. Plenty more breakdowns to come and now I've changed my breakdown format, you'll learn loads more and get to know me more rather than a scripted me. Just a heads up, I had to remove 7 seconds of the cinematic when the Gravemind is talking due to a silly copyright notice. You can't make this up. I'll keep an eye out for your comments going forward, thank you my friend. 🙏🏻
I don't think they could have done a better job. This is perfection. One shot that really impressed me is the one around 8:14, where Cortana's face takes the screen for a moment and then seamlessly moves out of the way to reveal Hood. A lot of the camerawork reminds me of Succession, pans and zooms for both emotional affect and spatial understanding. And, how they managed the high contrast throughout everything without it being overbearing is also really something. It's almost a sort of cyber noir. This whole thing is a masterclass in composition
Chief in 4/5 was emotionally imbalanced and a very sudden change. But to me, chief is perfect in infinite, the way he connects with the pilot and the audience is one of my favourite moments in all of halo
@cpt-cheese3489 I like what they did in Halo 4, trying to Humanize chief. Especially that last cutscene on the bridge with Laskey. Always brings me to tears. Halo 5 is what ruined it when they made him a static character again, because it undid what Halo 4 tried to do
There is one thing that I like about the cutscene ( 43:52 ) where Cortana says she doesn’t want to chance a remote detonation, the camera is focused of Chief’s visor where her blue and his yellow mix showing her in a green contrast showing her future. To be questioned and tortured by the gravemind and potentially infected by the logic plague.
Watching this just made me so happy as a Halo fan. Really loved your in-depth perspective on so much of this. I often say I feel like Halo 2 anniversary is a legit movie as you play through it. It’s truly masterful. Got a new sub in me
Absolutely it did, it's a core memory haha. First girlfriend, my love for Xbox and really cementing my passion for gaming. Loads of things happened around that time including online gaming for me. Probably why my eyes started watering when it started. A lot of Halo to come on the channel so stick around with it, my first movie goes up on the channel soon and it's a halo one. ✌🏻
@@kaizammit aw fantastic, thanks for sharing. yea halo has touched so many hearts, with its strong story, gameplay, absolutely beautiful soundtracks & the immersion. (Liked you’re alien reference for Johnson) I got big alien vibes from the first halo game when the flood mic drop on scene lol. Excited to check more of you’re content out
I watched your Halo reach cutscene reaction video yesterday and it inspired me to want to play it again as I haven't played it in years. I went on steam only to discover than the Master Chief collection was on sale for 75% off. I got Halo 1-4, ODST, and Reach all in one go for $10. Looks like I'm going to be spending the next few months have a Halo game marathon. Thank you.
Fun fact, when Lord Hood awards Johnson the colonial cross he's awarded it for his service as a soldier of the "United Earth Space Corps". This originated as a script error where an instance of an early name for the UNSC was accidentally left in and went unnoticed until after Ron Perlman's lines were already recorded. It's neat that this little error was preserved in the remaster. :3
would be dope to see a reaction to H3's cutscenes (even though there is no remaster... yet). The game holds up pretty much everywhere besides human faces (especially lord hood)
I want Halo 3 Anniversary, Halo 3 ODST Anniversary (imagine the lighting in Mombasa Streets) and Reach Anniversary. The title reveal in Reach is absolutely perfect, all they would need to do is add the word "anniversary" under it, definitely with a musical cue. Imagine how absurdly beautiful those games would look with a Blur remaster... actually, I should do a mockup of how the title reveal should look at some point
Why was there a part of the cutscene where Chief and Arbiter meet the Gravemind cut out? After it calls Arbiter deluded Arbiter is supposed to reply with “Kill me or release me parasite, but do not waste my time with talk.” To which GM say “There is much talk, and i have listened through rock and metal and time. Now i shall talk, and you shall listen.”
The feels. I stand by halo two being the best of the franchise with such a memorable story and game changing multiplayer features. I’m tear up. Also do more overwatch. They have gotten constantly better over the years
I get why the Cortana scene didnt impact that well with you. A lot of the interaction and connection is done thought the gameplay with her. And thats what helps makes that scene more impactful
it's cool watching someone see these cutscenes for the first time. Halo 2 is one of my favorite games, and it is by far my favorite Halo game. I appreciate what was done with the remaster cutscenes, but there's quite a bit i like about the originals more, but that might just be nostalgia. Some of the voices appear to be done by different VAs, or as the audio was being enhanced, what was originally there didn't quite make it through completely as it was. The biggest differences seem to be with Cortana (some parts of the game leave it sounding as it was, others it sounds completely different to me, like it's a very different person), the Elites, and the Gravemind. The Gravemind looks incredible, but its voice not being bass boosted like it was takes away some of the impact of its presence, largely in giving a much greater sense of scale. I'd like to throw in Jormungandr from God of War (2018), as he has an immmensely deep, bass heavy voice that only goes to emphasize how large he is. The Coalition did something similar to General Raam in their remaster of Gears 1, they altered his appearance, for some reason, and completely changed his voice, and it took so much of the intimidation away that he had. He went from being this indestructible, fearless creature to like, some obnoxious scene kid from middle school. I dunno. enjoyed the reaction, it's cool seeing someone experience this stuff for the first time. I think a lot of my issues with the remastered cutscenes is purely based on nostalgia, but I'd like to think there's some legitimate complains. I'd write an essay typing out all my grievances, so i won't. thanks for the reaction.
Seeing these cinematics is genuinely making me want to play this game. I've never even really thought about going and playing the Halo games, but these scenes make me get the hype. Oh my GOODNESS they're good!
Wait a minute, where is the part where Arbiter says "Kill me or release me, parasite. But do not waste my time with talk!" and then the gravemind says "There is much talk... and I have listened through rock and metal and time... Now I shall talk and you shall listen..." around 37:03?
In the description box, I mentioned that I had to take it out due to copyright. Some music artist put that section of dialogue in a song so now every time it's used on TH-cam, you get a copyright notice. It's mental.
@@kaizammitImagine getting copyright struck for a singular sentence in the english language. Gotta love TH-cam these days with these outrageous copyright claims
And the fact that we can seamlessly change the graphics with a click of button at anytime EVEN DURING CUTSCENES!! It really gives perspective of how much work they did, and it's really fun to see the jump in technology.
looking forward to this halo is one of my favourite series but just wondering if youll do the halo wars 1 cutscenes at any point, also i did get a giggle when you said the cinematics look like they have a blur to them because the company that make these cutscenes is call blur studios
@@kaizammit ay that's good and the best thing to watch from blur would be their destiny 2 and rainbow 6 siege cinematics, they have amazing lighting and graphics over all.
I'm not sure if anyone noticed but there is some dialog that's been cut off or skipped in the gravemind cutscene. Right after the gravemind says "this one is machine and nerve and has it's mind concluded, this one is but flesh and faith and is the more deluded" arbiter says "kill me or release me parasite, but do not waste my time with talk" the gravemind mind says "there is much talk, and i have listened, through rock and metal and time. Now i shall talk and you will listen" But they skipped that part
17:11 Can’t recall if it was from the original concept of the mission Cortana or from a fan idea, but one of the two mentioned a section where you’d pass through that place, having to face off against the hundreds of flood infected and resurrected arbiters.
"To give the covenant back their bomb." That line and scene is obviously a fan favorite for several reasons. The banter between Cortana and Chief. The line delivery itself. The confidence of Chief. Even if you never played Halo before you know exactly what you're getting out of this game.
I do still love the implied trust that Hood has for the Chief. At that juncture of the story, even if we take expanded canon into play, there are only 5-6 spartans left (at least, of the spartan-2 class. There are some 3s running around, but those are secret ONI projects that Hood likely wouldn't be aware the status of, if he's even actually aware of their existence). Chief is considered the best of them. When he asks to leave the station, Hood, the head of the ENTIRE NAVY, doesn't stop to question what is effectively a sergeant asking permission to desert not only the current combat zone, but functionally the command ship as well. His question feels more along the lines of 'where are you going?' not 'what do you think you are doing', or even 'justify the actions to me'. He's asking 'why do you want to leave?' in a tone of clear confusion, without any sign of hostility or suspicion. Then, on being told than an infantry sergeant on a ship is planning to engage in ship-to-ship combat by turning the enemy's own munitions against them? He blinks, has that internal 'huh, that's an idea' and then proceeds to tell him to go ahead, with no doubts he can actually do it. He even apparently tasks a pair of longsword pilots to assist. I like Fleet Lord Terrence Hood. IIRC he's also canonically offered the chief a promotion straight to admiral before, but Chief turned him down, on the basis that he doesn't feel like retiring to desk jockey yet and feels he's still better suited to being in the field.
23:40 Chief and Johnson's exchange through the knocking is a mad shoutout to the books. Johnson is an Orion Spartan and helped Chief "become human". They shared a cigar on a mission which Chief I believe said "This is good shit". He was a sort of father figure to the ironclad warrior
I haven’t seen it commented, but the opening sequence and finale sequence with Locke and the Arbiter (and Swords of Sanghelios) was a little teaser/ set up for Halo 5 in line with a trailer for it where they announced Halo 2 Anniversary as a holographic rendition of Chief delivering the bomb saying that to hunt him, Locke will have to understand what he’s done and to follow his footsteps as he’s the sum of his actions.
I absolutely love the recurring gag of flying an aircraft and just barely missing the landing only to hit the wall. Even more so that this rule applies to the Arbiter.
Fun Fact: SgtMaj Avery Johnson is also a Supersoldier in the Halo Universe. He was part of the last iteration of the ORION Project, a precursor of what is going to be the SPARTAN-II Program - the one MCPO John-117 is part of - and both SPARTAN-III e IV Programs later on. That makes him a SPARTAN-I Supersoldier. Guy is a legend.
It's an idea! When I played them all originally, I was just a kid/teenager. I didn't know anything about storytelling or filmmaking. It would be like watching again for the first time. Love the idea though.
Right that ost that plays during chief turning off the bomb and arbiter and Johnson at the scarab is actually pretty nice to hear and a nice addition to the remastered
These cutscenes are BEAUTIFUL. A TV show using these graphics and more in line with the actual Canon would jave been better than a live action show that sucks.
They did Halo 2 anniversary so much justice in terms of the quality of production. I know it'll never happen but I'd do just about anything for a Halo 3 remaster with this level of quality.
At around the 30 minute mark you talk about how easily we get drawn into the Covenant dialogue scenes, and I think you're spot on. The Covenant are certainly physically inhuman, but every personality trait they exhibit is essentially exaggerated human traits, with the stoic nobility of the Elites, the chaotic childish energy of the Grunts, the shrewd, manipulative language of the Prophets, the uh, brutal brutality of the Brutes, it all makes them really fun and compelling to watch. The pseudo-medieval society they have is more high fantasy than scifi, and contrasts so sharply to the straightforward, military scifi of the UNSC. Every UNSC character we meet is some form of military, a professional soldier duty-bound to defend humanity against a literal genocidal war by a foreign power. They have their personalities, but they all still fit within that box - while the Covenant are grander, more ancient, more complex because their society's species diversity reflects a political diversity and division that doesn't exist in the UNSC. It's why even today Halo 2 has my favourite narrative of all the Halo games. The UNSC stuff is fine, but it's really a sideshow to move the plot along while the emotional meat is packed in to the real story of Halo 2, the shameful birth of the Arbiter, the rise of the Brutes and betrayal of the Prophets, a grand final act in a decade-running story that we're only learning even existed at the very last second. It's something very few stories, let alone video game stories, has managed.
i love learning the techniques that a person can do with just a camera and give the audience a feeling JUST by tilting the camera up or down like you said at 22:50
The remastered came out in Master Chief Collection which was used to announced Halo 5 and was the location of the H5 beta, they added the opening (which is a scene in the middle of H5 campaign) to H2A as one of the many H5 promotions.
When the arbiter first puts on the arbiter’s helmet, it felt like when Maximus put on the iconic helmet in Gladiator. I think he turned in a similar direction / blocking as Gladiator
I love this guy’s videos my only pet peeve is when he talks over the cutscenes when ppl are talking. Sometimes talking over “important dialogue” . other than that your videos are awesome and i love your insight and knowledge on film making !🎉
Thank you for being here and the reason I feel comfortable talking over dialogue etc is I'm assuming you've seen it before. You're showing a friend, that friend being me, hi! ✌🏻 Thank you for watching fella.
@@kaizammit as a suggestion maybe what you could do is let an entire idea play out --- whether it be a chain of dialogue, or particular set of shots --- and the record and stitch in your "more defined" responses to it. That way others don't feel you're missing stuff, and you can also give your piece.
![Fallout 4 No Mods Gameplay Walkthrough 2024 Free Roam - [No Commentary]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/vZ6Qc76BzTA/mqdefault.jpg)
If you have a suggestion or a piece of content with an amazing story, please let me know, I would love to see it!
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Someone made an animation based on the Warhammer 40k book Helsreach on youtube, perhaps you can give a review on the filming quality?
I believe I have already suggested Internecion Cube and Halo: Remember on another video of yours, but I would like to add a bit to the former in that during the second episode there is a freeze frame(s) of a message on a vending machine that really adds to the horror aspect which is pretty easy to miss and a good example of detail despite the format.
When it comes to new things, there is a Astartes quality animation for the BattleTech series (classic mecha tabletop) called Hired Steel. It is very interesting because you can see the quality noticeably improve over each episode, but certain aspects (the mechs') are always top tier.
There is another recent high quality 40k animation series called Steel Coffins which currently has two episodes and focuses on an Imperial Guard tank unit. It is definitely worth keeping an eye on.
Also, someone should probably point out that the amount of coordination from Cortana in the background of the "giving the Covenant back their bomb" scene had to have been insane to get everything timed correctly between making sure Chief even hit the Covenant ship to coordinating the UNSC fighter strike to hit at the perfect time to blow a hole directly where it needed to be, and then making sure that In Amber Clad would "catch" Chief once he leaves the Covenant carrier.
It's on my list to do but it's 2 something hours long right?
@@kaizammit Helsreach is very long, as it is a adaptation of a book proper.
Star Wars SC 38 Reimagined
It's Obi-Wan and Vader's fight on the death star, but so much better. It hits you with that nostalgia from the very first film, but also the badass action of something rivaling the Prequels or The Old Republic Trailers
I think you'd have a blast reacting to it
Nice. I’d just like to point out that we didn’t do pre-rendered cutscenes back in 2004 - on purpose. The quality difference is even more pronounced because of that. However, cut for cut, move for move, it’s all what we imagined.
Amazing! Thank you for checking out the video. Loved your work on the original projects fella. You definitely had a helping hand in shaping my younger years. Nice tick too! KZ
The legend himself!
Only thing I’d change about these cutscenes (and H2A in general) is to bring back the original score, and the credits roll. Love your work Marty and hope you’re having a lovely Christmas/New Years.
I always liked how the Halo games used to use the various game assets for the cut-scenes. There's a bunch of TH-cam channels that used mods to freely move the camera around during them, to show how cleverly some of them, like the Halo 3: ODST drop pod scene, were put together.
you are the perfect example of interacting with and acknowleding the profound effect you've had on a generation. I hope you have a great day and a lovely new year ahead!
the part where Lord Hood gave Master Chief the permission to leave the station it's not because he doesn't know what Master Chief was talking about, He knew exactly what Master Chief was going to do with the bomb so he gave the go
It's such a big difference between Hood and Captain Del Rio from H4. Del Rio wants to be in control and have the final say on everything, but Lord Hood knows that Chief knows what he's doing and how capable he is, so even when Chief is vague about leaving the station to give the covenant back their bomb, Hood is just like "fuck it, go ahead"
And he just trusts the master chief to do what he's gonna do and he knows he's gonna get it done
@primary2630 he would have also given the go ahead for the longswordss to open the covenant ship up for Master chief
@@Evelyn-qt3hi Del Rio is a rules lawyer and Lord Hood is the rule of cool DM
Either way, the man trusts Chief to do something crazy and be successful
To be honest, my favorite part about the remastered cut-scenes is that you can switch between the old and new whenever you want in game. It's so cool to see the difference
Yeah even in the middle of the scene you can swap which is so cool
It's very cool, but the remastered cutscenes are slightly longer than the originals, so they aren't always in sync when you switch them.
@@primary2630I remember being able to do this on ce anniversary on the 360 but it doesn’t seem to work on the mcc for me
@@jacobdarrigan826Correct. You can’t switch mid-cutscene on Halo CE on MCC.
Yeah... Even though I pretty much always just watch the Blur cutscenes. They're just too fucking beautiful, man.
As much praise is given to the Blur Studios teams, its important to note that none of this would be possible without the brilliant directing of the Original Halo 2 Cinematics by Joe Staten and CJ Cowan, they gave the perfect blueprint for such a cinematic remaster as much of Blurs remaster is just direct translation without much deviation.
true bungie was so ahead in dedication and technology back then
H2A is so ugly
The Anniversary cutscenes are nothing short of breathtaking. However myself and many others prefer the classic because of the almost timeless art style and the cinematography is much more seamless.
Like how with the ending the Anniversary colossally screwed up the music que that made "Finishing This Fight" so iconic
@@I-DcompanyI just noticed they made an error with 2401's assigned ring. In the original Halo 2 cinematic, he was "the monitor of Installation 04", not 05 as he says in this cinematic
@@halofreak1990 No they didn't. Installation 04 was the ring from the first game and 343 Guilty Spark is its monitor. 2401 Penitent Tangent is the monitor of Installation 05 from the second game, also known as Delta Halo. The new ring being built by the Ark in Halo 3 is a replacement for the destroyed 04 ring and is why Sparky snaps when he learns Chief and Cortona intend to blow it up.
22:15 I love how Arbiter crashes his Banshee just like Chief did in Halo CE. A subtle way to show how much Arby and Chief are alike.
I love the shudder the gravemind does after he says “containment” he know what it entails. Like he fears or is repulsed by it.
Right, I feel like he was pissed off when he uttered that word out of his mouth. Disdain, disgust type of outburst from a creature like that is very telling
Considering that "containment" was basically accelerated cellular aging at a rate a BILLION times faster than normal, that's exactly the kind of response you'd expect.
Thank you for saying this. I noticed this my first playthrough but I've never seen anyone else adress it
THAT! and how he says wrought
It doesn't like being treated like the plague it is
My favorite detail in the Cairo Station cutscene is Admiral Hood denying Miranda's request to engage an enemy carrier, but approves Chief's request to jump through space with nothing but a bomb. Not just that, but Chief also gets air support and entire ships moved out of the way, just for him.
You are the only other person I've seen that caught that part
tbf, Admiral Hood was on the cairo station so they had to do everything in order to stop the carrier from shooting down the station, they even sacrificed a ship that got in the way of the cannon to protect it (10:30)
Ive always loved that Bungie decided to make him Admiral Lord Hood and a direct descendant of the famous naval hero Lord Hood. Completely unnecessary for the game but just a great detail
@@JimmyThree-BallsI had a talk with some friends about it. They said “how did the bombers know?” So I said on you just looks cool, but in lore the nurolink implants in the heads of most high ranking UNSC officers and infact all personal have them but it gives a very advanced reaction time, and battle knowledge so our boy Lord T Hood would have known within seconds what was going on and sent the long swords to intercept/provide support.
It’s super amazing how much lore, and details that was put into these old school hall games.
Well, it was more about stopping the Covenant from blowing a hole, take out 2-3 stations and you have a hole. Think that's what they're protecting more so than an admiral.@@Zerge6095
I always forget that Johnson is a Spartan I. But then you see him go toe-to-toe with the Arbiter (even briefly) and you can't help but remember, Johnson is quite literally a super-soldier too
He was more interesting before the books decided he wasn't just a regular soldier. He was someone strong enough and smart enough to survive the Halo incident. But they couldn't just leave it alone, and now Spartans are everywhere and aren't special at all.
It was called the Orion Project. He's also 78 years old in this game.
People seem to forget that Sgt. Forge KILLED an Arbiter in 1-on-1 combat, so a normal Marine did what a Spartan 1 couldn't.
@Baldeagle-tw2nv forge caught the Arbiter (Ripa 'Moramee) off guard. It should be noted Ripa 'Moramee was known to be very arrogant, so he most likely didn't expect to be stabbed, plus he had stopped to gloat to Forge about him winning, giving Forge the time to act. In the fight between Johnson and the Arbiter (Thel 'Vadam), it was the other way around. Arby had the drop on Johnson, as well as not holding back at all, except for when he had him pinned against the wall and disarmed already.
@@skyraider87 Johnson's lucky it had been Thel, and not his brother, Jean Claude.
I think the Cortana lines hit harder when you're playing the game because most of her dialogue is during gameplay. Just watching the cutscenes you don't really form much of a connection with her
Watching people love this game, experiencing new things about it honestly is so wholesome.
Thanks for being here man. KZ
Halo is beyond timeless. We'll still be finding new things even a decade from now
Whats even crazier is comparing it to the original cutscenes. Its almost 1 to 1 cinematography wise which just makes the originals look better too because u realise exactly what they were trying to accomplish 20 years ago and how well they made them despite the 20 year old quality now not holding up well the cinematography was great.
The remastered cutscenes are good, but there are some minor things that i wish they would have kept. 4:14 Like the brute here tries to grab Arbiters arm fails, but on the original the brute starts to walk towards Arbiter and Arbiter just gives him the glance of "touch me and i'll tie you in to a knot" and the brute just immidiately shits himself.
@@battedbook5811 In the remastered the brute does actually grab him and he yanks his arm free from his grasp.
I do love how well done they mostly are in terms of cinematography, but there's one detail that I can't believe they missed
in the cutscene that starts the level Uprising, the camera looks at the plasma rifle on the floor specifically lying in a pool of Sangheili blood in the original, in the remaster he just picks it up and you don't even see it on the ground, I was SO disappointed that they missed that one!
@@pieisgood235yeah that's exactly how I felt especially since you knew arbiter's comrades and brothers-in-arms were being slaughtered for beliefs not their own.
The only detail I don't like about this masterpiece of a remaster is when gravemind says "do not mistake their intent or all will perish, as they did before" in the original Arbiter is resisting the gravemind's hold, but as he is saying those words, arbiter slowly stops resisting, letting the weight of the gravemind's words dawn on him.
There's a bonus cutscene with ODST's called 'Day at the Beach' that wasn't featured here. It was also remastered by Blur
Halo fans dont read this u will never unsee it once u see it. 31:40 the animators and artists acidentally animated the ship going away from the library and they didnt have time to redo it so they just reversed the cutscene the opposite way lol. Thats why the ship is flying backwards.
Oh yeah! Haha, epic! Good thing they animated the clouds the go screen left too in the next shot otherwise that wouldn't have worked.
I've never noticed that, it's really funny!
Noticed that when I played too. Like cmon we were doing so good lol
I'd like to believe the pilot was just showing off lol
@@ruanquang3367The one brute out of the entire covenant that actually knows how to pilot 😂
Microsoft should approach Blur about making making the first 3 Halo games into films. As you stated, they're not just animators, they understand cinematography as well as any film maker. Blur also understand the aesthetic design of those original Halo games, and they seem to understand every minute detail of that universe.
I speak as an animator and artist, and I believe Blur is one of the best collective of artistic talent in the western world.
I LOVE the dynamic that shows how effective Spartans are at everything they do:
The CAPTAIN of a Naval WARSHIP - one built around a quarter mile long railgun - wants to engage a covenant ship in a space battle... Her entire purpose?
"Negative. Not against a ship that size. Not on your own."
Because he knows it would take multiple of those class of warships to bring that covenant cruiser down. It's basically suicide.
BUT the moment Chief opens his mouth with a vague request like, "Can I ignore your last order of defend this station and leave it?" And Lord Hood knows damn well that whatever Chief is about to say next will get done... even if it's something astronomically crazy like blowing up a Covenant Cruiser you wont risk sending 70 billion metric tons of railgun armored death at it. And what does Chief ask to do?
Exactly that.
Lord Hood gave the green light without hesitation because THAT'S HOW EFFECTIVE CHIEF IS.
He didn't even run through a quick idea of his plan. Lord Hood, the commander of Earth's space defensives, just heard one man ask to "give back a bomb" with no other context and really just went "Yeah, that's probably faster and more deadly than this fleet of naval warships I got floating outside."
And it was. Every time. For the past 30 years of warfare against the Covenant.
One does not simply doubt the Master Chief
But Chief isn't ignoring his last order. He was ordered to defend the station, and once he reached the bomb the biggest threat became the ships outside rather than anything inside, so the Chief changes his target to those ships. Lord Hood is such a good leader that he trusts his subordinates know what they are doing and can get on with their jobs rather than requiring constant micromanagement. In this case he trusts that the Chief can recognise the change in situation and adapt accordingly, so when the Chief asks to return the bomb Hood knows his aim must be to take out the ships threatening the station
One of the coolest parallels is that when the Super Carrier jumps inside the city, the ODSTs are dropping in amd get caught in that blast. It's so cool how the stories were connected
Would be cool if we got a nod to this in the cutscenes too
The bit with Locke at the start was a promo cutscene added to begining of the Aniversery edition of Halo 2 to promote Halo 5: Guardians. In terms of timelines, it takes place during the assault on the last Covenant fortress of Sunion on the elites' homeworld, Sanghelios.
Legit felt kinda gross tho tbh, seeing that there.
When Rtas 'Vadum aka Half Jaw gives his speech to his elites, you see that all the other elites speak their lines, so their mandibles move. But the Arbiters mandibles doesnt, as he doesnt say the lines, because he doesnt fit in. He's the odd one out. Fascinating thing that loads of people wont catch their first time watching that cutscene. Incredible!
The halo TV show should have been more of this. We were robbed
honestly if they had BLUR make parts of the gameplay as a movie inbetween the cutsceens. it would make for a great movie.
halo 2 is so good. :)
It’s because the writers didn’t give two shits about the story
The set dressers, fight choreography, and costume designers put more dedication
We could have had a halo legends 2 or mini series or spin off made by blur studios.
Indeed, i honestly don't know why they didnt check the halo cutscenes and just stole stuff fromt here :(
@@XtreemAlan they need to stop letting people who dont give a damn about source material gain the rights to properties
I want a movie like this so bad. Watching these cutscenes makes me mad about the show ALLLLL over again every time XD
Yea, that would be awesome.
Too bad we got a shitty TV show by Paramount.
@@Casto3924 The show just makes me very sad now XD
I want them to make a movie that shows every scene every moment from the beginning to the end. Every battle everything.
@@24xstephx24 YES
@@24xstephx24 shut up and take my money !!!
the phrase "to give the covenant back their bomb" always gives me damn chills and a big smile on my lips
Bruh they really left out my favorite Gravemind line when Arbiter and Masterchief meet him.
Arbiter: “Kill me or release me parasite, but do not waste my time with talk.”
Gravemind: “There is much talk, and I have listened through rock and metal and time!”
"Now I shall speak, and you shall listen *flood noises*"
Oh, wow, never noticed that they cut any dialogue. That's disappointing.
They had to, I think it has something to do with de sync timing? There's a feature where you can switch back and forth from anniversary to OG graphics at any time, cut scenes included. But I've noticed if you do this, there is often a de sync in that og and anniversary are in different parts in the cut scene's run time. Hell you can even hear it in the metropolis scene when they chase the carrier down, the music suddenly cuts to the next part of the score despite never having done so in the original. The original was composed almost in perfect accompaniment to whatever was happening on screen, so that sudden rush forward in the score is to match what's going on if you happened to switch back to og at that moment.
@@kassarc16I think the compilation this guy is watching cuts it or something, because these lines are definitely in H2A.
The dialogue is definitely there. Search for the cutscene in youtube or play the remaster yourself. Don't know why here is cut.
I am still amazed that these came out nearly 10 years ago. Incredible detail for that time, especially considering how long the total amount of cinematics are.
25:21 When Johnson and Chief knock to each other on the medal wall, it’s just so badass for no reason 😭
10:50 that moment when you're doing film analysis but just decided to wait because this cutscene is just that damn good
“I am a monument to all your sins” and “There is still time to stop the key from turning” will always gives chills no matter how many times I hear the Gravemind say it. Halo 2’s story is so iconic and I loved it from playing it the first time and will always love it all these years later!
Dee Bradley Baker apparently can do those vocal effects without any editing
Make sure you watch Day at the Beach, an additional cutscene from Halo 2 that was also remastered! There's also different versions of Johnson's Scorpion speech for every difficulty if you'd like to check those out too.
Yeah, im annoyed that they included the Legendary ending but not the Legendary Johnson Scorpion speech.
@fleaguss Some people say the good lord works in mysterious ways, BUT NOT TODAY 😂😂😂
Two Sticks and a Rock is my favorite one.
@@Battleship009 "and we had to SHAAAARE the rock!"
I was floored by the quality of 2 remastered cinematics that stayed true to the original but also enhanced it to the studio did a fanaminal job.
They should create series with this level of animation for the numerous books that Halo has. They’ve got so much potential content at their fingertips
343: we have halo show at home!
Halo show at home: *amazon trash*
If only I could trust them to not fuck it up...
The thing with characters like cortana is you bond with them over gameplay, as she talks a lot more mid mission than during cutscenes, so it’s no wonder it wouldn’t hit as hard
I get that but with Infinite, she was in every cutscenes pretty much so I felt her emotions. Her face was brilliant for animation.
I didn't realise how little Cortana was actually in these cutscenes. Thank you btw for watching and hanging out with me. I appreciate it.
That’s because infinite wasn’t a straight line story the way the early ones were, so having character story through the missions was harder
Halo 2 Anniversary was goated It legit gave me hype for more halo games again, like halo Wars 2, because I was excited for more insane cutscenes. Halo usually always had that
One thing I miss about the original cutscenes was when the arbiter fallout of the portal and is grabbing the plasma rifle you see some elite’s blood on the ground with it. Telling you an elite was killed before you find the other bodies in gameplay.
absolutely loved every bit of this. I even caught myself being annoyed at one point because I wanted to hear the cutscene more then the commentary, that how absorbed into the story i got even though I already know it.
Seeing how much you enjoyed this one I can only recommend the Halo Reach cutscenes.
which in quality wise might be dated but has a really cool story to it.
Around 13:30 when Sgt. Johnson gives his speech about the tank. He will say different things depending on difficulty with "Heroic" being the "way halo was meant to be played"
2 sticks and a rock we had to share the rock
omg, I only expected one or two cutscenes. This has made my night, thanks.
for you to say this should be a Netflix show when it came out about ten years ago is a big compliment. i was so blown away by these visuals, it made replaying my favorite Halo that much better on MCC
Bloody brilliant. I've said it before and I'll say it again, this is better than most movies.
Like you, I haven’t seen these cutscenes since I played the game back when it originally came out in the early 00’s. It’s kind of interesting feeling. You know when you go play a game that you played as a kid and the thought crosses your mind like “These graphics are way worse than I remember.” Whether it’s nostalgia or just flawed memory, that usually ends up happening when you see what it really looked like versus what you remember it looking like as a kid. When you were a kid it looked so realistic and incredible, and it was for the time. Well watching this, and considering the fact that I haven’t played Halo 2 since the early 00’s, this looks to me now like how I remember Halo 2 looking to me as young teen.
Watching this definitely makes me want to get and play this remastered edition or whatever they call it. Obviously this didn’t show any gameplay, but these cutscenes are absolutely gorgeous. I don’t know if these are exact remakes of the original cutscenes, or if they added some stuff to really update it and make it feel so awesome. It’s been so long I just don’t remember them that well. If someone could let me know the answer to that I’d appreciate it. I remember some of this stuff but there’s some shots in here that I have no memory of whatsoever. Either way, it seems like they did an incredible job (or at least they did with the cutscenes.)
Also, if I’m not mistaken, the heavy use of super overexposed whites and heavy use of lens flares was starting to become a trend around this time in both games and movies if I remember correctly. Kinda like how the Bourne Identity series kicked off the trend of super quick cuts of close up fighting in dark rooms. I don’t think Halo started the trend of these things being used so heavily, but I believe this was about the time when that was becoming more and more common in games and movies, and especially so in action and sci-fi.
You were spot on btw:
Bungie writers took a TON of inspiration from the Marines from Aliens when creating the Marines/Johnson for Halo.
The part in the beginning between Spartan Locke and the Arbiter is a prelude for Halo 5’s campaign since when Halo 2 anniversary came out was a year before Halo 5
Thought as much, got to love a bit of preface marketing. Thank you for letting me know.
The "helljump" over the new halo-ring is just one of the best cinematic moments ever.
My favorite game cutscene of all time
You know this may be the only person who reacts to videos that I like. He doesn’t sit there and jack his jaw the whole time. When he does speak he actually educates you with insider knowledge of film practices
Love to see these cinematics get some love. Hard to believe these are 9 years old now. They hold up so well.
Yeah the Flood were in the first Arbiter level (after the second cutscene). Real tedious elevator fight where you had to survive waves of Flood and Sentinels, and (if you felt like it) keep your two Elite buddies alive, then you fight your way through more Flood as you chase the Heretic Leader throughout the facility.
You sir, just made my night! ...Morning. Technically. I can't wait to watch this in it's entirety! Seriously, I've been loving the breakdowns - the insight is super intriguing and helpful for personal projects - but the overall vibe and personality you bring is what really keeps me coming back!
I am *super* stingy with my subs / follows but you have absolutely earned it.
Thank you so much fella and I'm glad you like them. Your words really mean a lot and was awesome to read. Plenty more breakdowns to come and now I've changed my breakdown format, you'll learn loads more and get to know me more rather than a scripted me.
Just a heads up, I had to remove 7 seconds of the cinematic when the Gravemind is talking due to a silly copyright notice. You can't make this up.
I'll keep an eye out for your comments going forward, thank you my friend. 🙏🏻
I don't think they could have done a better job. This is perfection. One shot that really impressed me is the one around 8:14, where Cortana's face takes the screen for a moment and then seamlessly moves out of the way to reveal Hood. A lot of the camerawork reminds me of Succession, pans and zooms for both emotional affect and spatial understanding. And, how they managed the high contrast throughout everything without it being overbearing is also really something. It's almost a sort of cyber noir. This whole thing is a masterclass in composition
18:27 that’s why I think it’s brilliant how they were able to show master chiefs emotions in halo infinite despite not being able to see his face
Chief in 4/5 was emotionally imbalanced and a very sudden change. But to me, chief is perfect in infinite, the way he connects with the pilot and the audience is one of my favourite moments in all of halo
@@cpt-cheese3489 yea chief was perfect in halo infinite from the armour design to the way they wrote his character
@cpt-cheese3489 I like what they did in Halo 4, trying to Humanize chief. Especially that last cutscene on the bridge with Laskey. Always brings me to tears. Halo 5 is what ruined it when they made him a static character again, because it undid what Halo 4 tried to do
@@skyraider87 imo 4 just wasn’t as good as infinite
The fact that they were able to emulate all these lens manipulation tactics from cinematography into video game cut scenes is amazing.
There is one thing that I like about the cutscene ( 43:52 ) where Cortana says she doesn’t want to chance a remote detonation, the camera is focused of Chief’s visor where her blue and his yellow mix showing her in a green contrast showing her future. To be questioned and tortured by the gravemind and potentially infected by the logic plague.
Nice detail there
Watching this just made me so happy as a Halo fan. Really loved your in-depth perspective on so much of this. I often say I feel like Halo 2 anniversary is a legit movie as you play through it. It’s truly masterful. Got a new sub in me
Thank you so much and I'm glad you enjoyed it. More Halo to come.
The amount of things you remembered from back in the day I’m so impressed, seems like halo was impactful for ya. Great video
Absolutely it did, it's a core memory haha. First girlfriend, my love for Xbox and really cementing my passion for gaming. Loads of things happened around that time including online gaming for me.
Probably why my eyes started watering when it started. A lot of Halo to come on the channel so stick around with it, my first movie goes up on the channel soon and it's a halo one. ✌🏻
@@kaizammit aw fantastic, thanks for sharing. yea halo has touched so many hearts, with its strong story, gameplay, absolutely beautiful soundtracks & the immersion. (Liked you’re alien reference for Johnson) I got big alien vibes from the first halo game when the flood mic drop on scene lol. Excited to check more of you’re content out
Thank you so much! Aliens has a big spot in my heart too. Me and you would totally get on.
I watched your Halo reach cutscene reaction video yesterday and it inspired me to want to play it again as I haven't played it in years. I went on steam only to discover than the Master Chief collection was on sale for 75% off. I got Halo 1-4, ODST, and Reach all in one go for $10. Looks like I'm going to be spending the next few months have a Halo game marathon. Thank you.
I love it when a plan comes together! Have fun my friend.
@@kaizammit I will!
I agree with the Netflix show idea, if they had done that with the current tv show instead MAAAAN THATD BE SICKKKKK
You know it!
Fun fact, when Lord Hood awards Johnson the colonial cross he's awarded it for his service as a soldier of the "United Earth Space Corps".
This originated as a script error where an instance of an early name for the UNSC was accidentally left in and went unnoticed until after Ron Perlman's lines were already recorded.
It's neat that this little error was preserved in the remaster. :3
would be dope to see a reaction to H3's cutscenes (even though there is no remaster... yet). The game holds up pretty much everywhere besides human faces (especially lord hood)
I want Halo 3 Anniversary, Halo 3 ODST Anniversary (imagine the lighting in Mombasa Streets) and Reach Anniversary. The title reveal in Reach is absolutely perfect, all they would need to do is add the word "anniversary" under it, definitely with a musical cue. Imagine how absurdly beautiful those games would look with a Blur remaster... actually, I should do a mockup of how the title reveal should look at some point
I love the “I’ll talk in a minute” as he so stunned by the amazing story and graphics.
Why was there a part of the cutscene where Chief and Arbiter meet the Gravemind cut out? After it calls Arbiter deluded Arbiter is supposed to reply with “Kill me or release me parasite, but do not waste my time with talk.” To which GM say “There is much talk, and i have listened through rock and metal and time. Now i shall talk, and you shall listen.”
The feels. I stand by halo two being the best of the franchise with such a memorable story and game changing multiplayer features. I’m tear up. Also do more overwatch. They have gotten constantly better over the years
I get why the Cortana scene didnt impact that well with you.
A lot of the interaction and connection is done thought the gameplay with her. And thats what helps makes that scene more impactful
“For a brick, he flew pretty good” this whole sequence is better than most cinema these days lol
Awesome reaction. I'm still holding out hope that you'll react to the original Halo Wars cinematics. They're a little bit older, but still awesome.
it's cool watching someone see these cutscenes for the first time. Halo 2 is one of my favorite games, and it is by far my favorite Halo game. I appreciate what was done with the remaster cutscenes, but there's quite a bit i like about the originals more, but that might just be nostalgia. Some of the voices appear to be done by different VAs, or as the audio was being enhanced, what was originally there didn't quite make it through completely as it was. The biggest differences seem to be with Cortana (some parts of the game leave it sounding as it was, others it sounds completely different to me, like it's a very different person), the Elites, and the Gravemind. The Gravemind looks incredible, but its voice not being bass boosted like it was takes away some of the impact of its presence, largely in giving a much greater sense of scale.
I'd like to throw in Jormungandr from God of War (2018), as he has an immmensely deep, bass heavy voice that only goes to emphasize how large he is.
The Coalition did something similar to General Raam in their remaster of Gears 1, they altered his appearance, for some reason, and completely changed his voice, and it took so much of the intimidation away that he had. He went from being this indestructible, fearless creature to like, some obnoxious scene kid from middle school. I dunno. enjoyed the reaction, it's cool seeing someone experience this stuff for the first time. I think a lot of my issues with the remastered cutscenes is purely based on nostalgia, but I'd like to think there's some legitimate complains. I'd write an essay typing out all my grievances, so i won't. thanks for the reaction.
Thank you for watching and the comment. It was a good read.
10:03 Will always give me chills, their are very few quotes to match that badassery!
Seeing these cinematics is genuinely making me want to play this game. I've never even really thought about going and playing the Halo games, but these scenes make me get the hype. Oh my GOODNESS they're good!
Wait a minute, where is the part where Arbiter says "Kill me or release me, parasite. But do not waste my time with talk!" and then the gravemind says "There is much talk... and I have listened through rock and metal and time... Now I shall talk and you shall listen..." around 37:03?
In the description box, I mentioned that I had to take it out due to copyright. Some music artist put that section of dialogue in a song so now every time it's used on TH-cam, you get a copyright notice. It's mental.
@@kaizammit ah I didn't check there yet. That's so wierd whattttt
I know right! It's bloody cheeky mate.
@@kaizammitImagine getting copyright struck for a singular sentence in the english language. Gotta love TH-cam these days with these outrageous copyright claims
Fella... Tell me about it. It annoyed me tbh. Thank you for watching this though, means a lot.
13:20 Wish ya did the johnson's "motivational device" Cutscene for all the difficulties. Some great lines in there.
Master cheeks on the other hand”😂 that line had me laughing my ass on the floor
And the fact that we can seamlessly change the graphics with a click of button at anytime EVEN DURING CUTSCENES!! It really gives perspective of how much work they did, and it's really fun to see the jump in technology.
looking forward to this halo is one of my favourite series but just wondering if youll do the halo wars 1 cutscenes at any point, also i did get a giggle when you said the cinematics look like they have a blur to them because the company that make these cutscenes is call blur studios
I am planning on visiting Halo Wars 1 so stay tuned for that. Is it a signature style the blur look? Thank you for watching this video fella.
@@kaizammit ay that's good and the best thing to watch from blur would be their destiny 2 and rainbow 6 siege cinematics, they have amazing lighting and graphics over all.
I'm not sure if anyone noticed but there is some dialog that's been cut off or skipped in the gravemind cutscene. Right after the gravemind says "this one is machine and nerve and has it's mind concluded, this one is but flesh and faith and is the more deluded"
arbiter says "kill me or release me parasite, but do not waste my time with talk"
the gravemind mind says "there is much talk, and i have listened, through rock and metal and time. Now i shall talk and you will listen"
But they skipped that part
I removed that part from the original video. Reason is in the description box. Thank you for watching, KZ.
What a little bastard whoever that artist is
love seeing you gushing over a game you played as a child being remastered haha
17:11 Can’t recall if it was from the original concept of the mission Cortana or from a fan idea, but one of the two mentioned a section where you’d pass through that place, having to face off against the hundreds of flood infected and resurrected arbiters.
"Master cheeks, not so cool" Couldn't agree more. What a travesty the TV show is
"To give the covenant back their bomb."
That line and scene is obviously a fan favorite for several reasons.
The banter between Cortana and Chief. The line delivery itself. The confidence of Chief.
Even if you never played Halo before you know exactly what you're getting out of this game.
thanks for taking me down an old trip
Thank you for hanging out with me, hope you enjoyed it. ✌🏻
My favorite part about Halo 2 is the cutscenes @ 13:46 change depending on what difficulty you're playing on. It's subtle but still very cool
I do still love the implied trust that Hood has for the Chief.
At that juncture of the story, even if we take expanded canon into play, there are only 5-6 spartans left (at least, of the spartan-2 class. There are some 3s running around, but those are secret ONI projects that Hood likely wouldn't be aware the status of, if he's even actually aware of their existence). Chief is considered the best of them. When he asks to leave the station, Hood, the head of the ENTIRE NAVY, doesn't stop to question what is effectively a sergeant asking permission to desert not only the current combat zone, but functionally the command ship as well. His question feels more along the lines of 'where are you going?' not 'what do you think you are doing', or even 'justify the actions to me'. He's asking 'why do you want to leave?' in a tone of clear confusion, without any sign of hostility or suspicion. Then, on being told than an infantry sergeant on a ship is planning to engage in ship-to-ship combat by turning the enemy's own munitions against them? He blinks, has that internal 'huh, that's an idea' and then proceeds to tell him to go ahead, with no doubts he can actually do it. He even apparently tasks a pair of longsword pilots to assist.
I like Fleet Lord Terrence Hood. IIRC he's also canonically offered the chief a promotion straight to admiral before, but Chief turned him down, on the basis that he doesn't feel like retiring to desk jockey yet and feels he's still better suited to being in the field.
I was so pleasantly surprised when H2A and these cutscenes first came out. Glad to see you loved them just as much! ❤
I absolutely did! Thanks for watching along with me. Means a lot. KZ
These cutscenes look so real and not at the same time its wild, I loved this remaster.
23:40 Chief and Johnson's exchange through the knocking is a mad shoutout to the books. Johnson is an Orion Spartan and helped Chief "become human". They shared a cigar on a mission which Chief I believe said "This is good shit". He was a sort of father figure to the ironclad warrior
No way chief said that😭 that’s crazy aura
@@Tiny_bean47 I forget which book but I believe it was a prequel story based before CE.
To this day, these cut scenes are still some of the best looking in gaming!
I haven’t seen it commented, but the opening sequence and finale sequence with Locke and the Arbiter (and Swords of Sanghelios) was a little teaser/ set up for Halo 5 in line with a trailer for it where they announced Halo 2 Anniversary as a holographic rendition of Chief delivering the bomb saying that to hunt him, Locke will have to understand what he’s done and to follow his footsteps as he’s the sum of his actions.
watching this with you was like playing the game again for the first time. Plus learned some cool facts about cinematography.
I absolutely love the recurring gag of flying an aircraft and just barely missing the landing only to hit the wall. Even more so that this rule applies to the Arbiter.
That starting cutscene was a promotion for Halo 5 - it was basically like setting up the Arbiter “telling the events of halo 2” to Locke
The first clip links Halo 2 and Halo 5, telling a bit of Arbiter's thoughts on Chief as Locke gets ready to hunt 117.
The inspiration from apom onto sgt johnson is so clear. Never noticed that before but such a cool thing to notice
Fun Fact: SgtMaj Avery Johnson is also a Supersoldier in the Halo Universe. He was part of the last iteration of the ORION Project, a precursor of what is going to be the SPARTAN-II Program - the one MCPO John-117 is part of - and both SPARTAN-III e IV Programs later on. That makes him a SPARTAN-I Supersoldier. Guy is a legend.
Watching you do Halo content truly makes my day. You should review all the games 😂
It's an idea! When I played them all originally, I was just a kid/teenager. I didn't know anything about storytelling or filmmaking. It would be like watching again for the first time. Love the idea though.
Right that ost that plays during chief turning off the bomb and arbiter and Johnson at the scarab is actually pretty nice to hear and a nice addition to the remastered
These cutscenes are BEAUTIFUL. A TV show using these graphics and more in line with the actual Canon would jave been better than a live action show that sucks.
Man every time I hear “don’t make a girl a promise, if you know you can’t keep it” I swear it makes me cry know what she had to go through
They did Halo 2 anniversary so much justice in terms of the quality of production. I know it'll never happen but I'd do just about anything for a Halo 3 remaster with this level of quality.
At around the 30 minute mark you talk about how easily we get drawn into the Covenant dialogue scenes, and I think you're spot on.
The Covenant are certainly physically inhuman, but every personality trait they exhibit is essentially exaggerated human traits, with the stoic nobility of the Elites, the chaotic childish energy of the Grunts, the shrewd, manipulative language of the Prophets, the uh, brutal brutality of the Brutes, it all makes them really fun and compelling to watch. The pseudo-medieval society they have is more high fantasy than scifi, and contrasts so sharply to the straightforward, military scifi of the UNSC.
Every UNSC character we meet is some form of military, a professional soldier duty-bound to defend humanity against a literal genocidal war by a foreign power. They have their personalities, but they all still fit within that box - while the Covenant are grander, more ancient, more complex because their society's species diversity reflects a political diversity and division that doesn't exist in the UNSC.
It's why even today Halo 2 has my favourite narrative of all the Halo games. The UNSC stuff is fine, but it's really a sideshow to move the plot along while the emotional meat is packed in to the real story of Halo 2, the shameful birth of the Arbiter, the rise of the Brutes and betrayal of the Prophets, a grand final act in a decade-running story that we're only learning even existed at the very last second. It's something very few stories, let alone video game stories, has managed.
i love learning the techniques that a person can do with just a camera and give the audience a feeling JUST by tilting the camera up or down like you said at 22:50
The remastered came out in Master Chief Collection which was used to announced Halo 5 and was the location of the H5 beta, they added the opening (which is a scene in the middle of H5 campaign) to H2A as one of the many H5 promotions.
When the arbiter first puts on the arbiter’s helmet, it felt like when Maximus put on the iconic helmet in Gladiator. I think he turned in a similar direction / blocking as Gladiator
Fun fact there were 7 seconds left on the bomb. 7 is bungies favorite number and it is referenced several times throughout their games
I love this guy’s videos my only pet peeve is when he talks over the cutscenes when ppl are talking. Sometimes talking over “important dialogue” . other than that your videos are awesome and i love your insight and knowledge on film making !🎉
Thank you for being here and the reason I feel comfortable talking over dialogue etc is I'm assuming you've seen it before. You're showing a friend, that friend being me, hi! ✌🏻
Thank you for watching fella.
@@kaizammit as a suggestion maybe what you could do is let an entire idea play out --- whether it be a chain of dialogue, or particular set of shots --- and the record and stitch in your "more defined" responses to it.
That way others don't feel you're missing stuff, and you can also give your piece.