Halo was the most accessible Military Sci-fi IP, this was supported by the most noble subversions of very grim tropes. Something that was refreshing from a 'dark genre'. ie the sentient AI, are actually great people and stay loyal. 343 discarded this

@TheCountofS yup. and 343 also didn't want to make Halo. you can tell by all the design choices. they wanted to make CoD.

@beltfedfanatic I'd say 343 really wanted a universe comparable to 40k and Star Wars, it's easier to manage and more lucrative for merchandise. They wanted to lower the bar for creators, since not everyone can write compelling war fiction.

@TheCountofS Tbf the Fall of Reach Novel doesn't exactly paint the UNSC as good guys before the Covenant show up

@salsaverse No, Contact Harvest/Cole Protocol didn't paint the UNSC as good guys. Which came later - Nylund had a very noble depiction of the UNSC.

@TheCountofS Sure, never mind the SPARTAN Program, the one with the abducted child super soldiers was literally designed to out down dissenters, and was rum by the shady shadow government that is ONI was a Bungie era creation

@LUCEC_LDR That's how ignorant people only described the situation in 2004, and the tone 343 went with. There was a subversion of various military sci-fi tropes at play, but 343 made it 'this' easy to shoot down any detailed explanation. Sorry but you're a 343 fan w/ that.

@TheCountofS How so? The UNSC has always been grey at best and a bit overbearing at worse. Also I don’t see how they’re like the Imperial Guard at all considering they care about their soldiers and don’t just execute folks for disobeying orders

@NomadicAllo If you look at the gulf war propaganda political backdrop Halo had. The original characterization was "how far would a democratic government go to survive". So NATO X British Empire, have their gulf war interrupted (the innies were bad guys) by an alien invasion.

@TheCountofS The UNSC being a democracy willing to go as far as possible- so far as to kidnap orphans and turn them to super soldiers- to survive against an unstoppable foe is 100% more compelling as an idea than people give it credit for, I feel like.

@Dish_Dog_DELUX The trope subversions that blew everyone's mind back in 2002/3 (also what naysayers completely missed). This is like the only IP where the 'mad scientist' was right, and the government listens. It was the most rational and ethical supersoldier program in fiction.

@TheCountofS Every government is an autocratic oligarchy. Just because you have freedoms now doesn't mean they won't take them when they see fit to benefit. Read the books not revoling around cheif, unsc is treats the outer colonies like dog water. Innes did nothing wrong.

@GOLDENBUFFALO07 Nu-school fan, innies were completely evil originally.

@TheCountofS ONI works better as a fascist/shady group anyways, doesn't make sense to make the UNSC blend with that a lot

@TheReclaimedOne ONI was what the CIA wanted to be, so the 'evilness' contradicts their competence. Now it's just the CIA, without any unique trimmings

@TheCountofS I never really got all that far in Halo Wars 2, but all I could think of was "Did the UNSC have these giant robots the entire time?"

@dickbutt_dirk No 343, just started making stuff as per usual.

@TheCountofS Literally the first thing written about Halo was that the government abducted a bunch of children and conducted hideous, often fatal experiments on them in order to create super soldiers tasked with crushing internal dissent.

@XWnHIST Are you speaking literally or figuratively cause that's got like 5 different answers which contradict your point.

@TheCountofS The way I like to view the UNSC is as a redemption. The insurrection had good points and the Spartans where made for originally nefarious purposes. But as the covenant came, the best of humanities brave manifested in an otherwise harsh era. The UNSC got a chance to save its soul.

@chabok2121 I like this a lot