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I'm thinking that audiences are maturing and expecting more. They don't want to spend $60 on a game starring a nameless, speechless, and emotionless lead that they themselves can't have explicit agency over with games like Mass Effect. Who wants to spend money on a story with a character that isn't fully realized? I personally have never bought into the sense of immersion that Bungie seems to have wanted for the Master Chief. I can't imagine myself doing these things because I'll never be a gargantuan supersoldier. I don't want the Master Chief to be me. Otherwise I'd be sitting in orbit aboard a starship, press a single button, and nuke a Halo ring. When I buy a $60 game I honestly expect some care put into the person you're putting front and center in your cover.
Destiny soured me completely to the concept of a blank slate and I'm not too surprised that this let down came from Bungie. Our Guardians were unfulfilled entities in a universe that was supposed to be absolutely rich with amazing stories. Not only did we barely get that in the game's narrative itself, having to rely on some trading cards to make sense of the story, but we were given nothing to imagine how our Guardians felt overcoming these tremendous foes. Your guess is honestly as good as mine as to what my very own Guardian's personality, emotions, aspirations, fears, etc. are like. That's why I gave up on Destiny almost immediately after it came out. I buy games first and foremost to experience a rich new universe or an exciting new entry in an established franchise. Touting Destiny as exactly that then not even caring to put time or energy into fleshing the Guardians out felt like a waste of time.
It can be done right, don't get me wrong, but sometimes a blank slate avatar just seems like a poor cop out for not wanting to fully realize them and bring your character to life. Headcanon is great but it doesn't leave you with the same since of fulfillment that something imbedded in the game can provide. When you decide to make these characters an avatar but don't offer players the tools to make them their own outside of appearance and gameplay style that doesn't sit well with me. Role playing only goes so far in a universe where you expect your character to have more of an impact outside of shooting a gun, swinging a sword, or casting a spell.
: I would also rather have a blank slate than the cartoonishly evil origin
: story we got from Nylund. Abducting little kids, replacing them with
: clones that will die soon, training the kids in combat, subjecting them to
: experimental procedures that kill a bunch of them and make others unable
: to have a normal life... we're used to overlooking it but that's on the
: level of a bad comic book villain. The fact a lot of things established in
: The Fall of Reach were contradicted by other authors suggests... well you
: can probably see where that's going. I still wonder if giving the
: Spartan-IIIs a slightly different origin was a response to feedback on the
: S-IIs. I will say I don't particularly blame him beyond the existence of
: certain concepts-- the whole thing was stressful, he had to write it in 7
: weeks, it was his first entry into the universe, and Bungie, who came up
: with the universe, were too busy to talk to him.
I don't see how it's cartoonishly evil when the science behind it, however monsterous it may be, appears to be quite solid and the kidnapping of young children to become soldiers sadly has precedent even today. The SPARTAN-II's are a perfect example of how an empire will do whatever it can to maintain a grasp on what they believe is only theirs. That means using their subjects, often those on the fringes of society such as in the Outer Colonies, to carry out violence against their own people. New canon has only added to the politics and emotions behind the SPARTAN-II's coming to existence such as the brief mentions of the "Carver Findings."
SPARTAN-III's being recruited and volunteering for service, instead of kidnapped and conscripted, comes out of the circumstances the UNSC found itself in with countless millions of orphaned children from the war. They had neither the resources nor the will to bother with nighttime kidnappings when they could easily scrounge up some blood thirsty kids withering away on the streets of the colonies. CINCONI knew what she did with the Two's was wrong, at least in hindsight, and I'm sure Colonel Ackerson didn't want to get his hands dirty like Dr. Halsey had. The Human-Covenant War served as the Three's reason for being and also it's saving grace not having to deal with kidnapped six year olds.
I don't think fan feedback had anything to do with how the SPARTAN-III's came to be. Even back then the vast majority of fans supported the Two's mere existence. Do we debate endlessly about the morality of these programs? Absolutely and we should continue to do so. It's a good topic to discuss concerning the universe's most controversial elements and how we can tie them into the real world. Even the most ardently anti-Halsey fans, however, myself included, will admit without hesitation that if Humanity not had Spartans they would have gone extinct long before we had the chance to screw around on a Halo ring.