: Amen to that. Although I don't feel like it's telling the original artists to
: fuck off, I do think that it is really unnecessary and time-wasting.
: Saying that the artists wanted to express themselves by changing
: established visuals seems like kind of a weak excuse for doing it. To me,
: that's like saying, "yeah, I can't really draw Master Chief too well,
: so I just drew him in my style".

: Plus, there was plenty of new things in Halo 4 for the artists to express
: themselves with. Changing the Dawn was unnecessary- the game didn't have
: to have a level take place on the ship.

Well, to anyone but us hardcore, the level is done in 30-40 minutes and you don't revisit it. But the redesign has lasting implications for the series.

Even 343 didn't know what to do with the design. The deck of the ship that the cryo bay is on changes a couple of times. In Halo 3 it's in the mid decks, in the Halo 4 announcement it's in a similar spot, but is directly back from the bow (in Halo 3 it was after the longitudinal corridor made a 90 degree turn), and then in the final game the cryo deck is just one below the observation deck with is almost at the top of the ship.

In fact, from the game, Cortana says we have to get to the "Observation Deck, four decks up", yet we only go up one level (in the elevator shaft) to get there, so I'm not sure 343 even knew the layout they wanted.