: I like most Bungie-era designs. It's the classic Halo, how couldn't I? But
: I'm not too picky about that stuff. I Grunts looked basically the same to
: me throughout the series; I don't pick apart the way their faces look in
: each iteration. I guess I don't sweat the details as much, which does bias
: me a lot in this conversation, I'll admit.

Well since you bring it up, that does too, along with liking the designs.
You're basically telling people it's fine so they should stop complaining, but your version of fine is their version of shit, so it doesn't carry any weight.

: I love the new Master Chief design; I think it's the best he's ever looked.
: Can't say why, I think he just looks like a badass now more than ever
: before. I actually like the new Jackals a bit more. Not that I don't like
: the old Jackals, but to me, the 343i-era Jackals look more like something
: that I can imagine actually existing.

What, why?

: With that list you've put your finger on exactly what I have the most problem
: with: Bungie changed a lot of stuff between every game.

No, they didn't. I don't know how you can say that if you didn't look at the details, either. There was a big jump from Halo 1 to Halo 2. There was a reworking of Brutes and Grunts for Halo 3, but everything else looked pretty much the same. ODST was the same as Halo 3. Reach was only marginally different from Halo 3 and ODST, aside from the Brutes, the Elite armor, and the Banshee. The jump for Elites from Reach to Halo 4 was kind of big, and it made it all but impossible to pick out ranks. The jump from Reach to Halo 4 for the Grunts was bigger, and if you include the new armor, it was the biggest ever (which, lest we forget, includes a tube blocking an eye, and I just realized they didn't fix that either, did they?). The jump from Reach to Halo 4 for Jackals was unequivocally the biggest ever.

The Jackal change is glaringly different, it's so different that to many people it's obvious it should not be the same thing, and indeed when you look at the variation in Earth life forms, there's no way it could be. You could say it's a whole different tree of life so things work differently and they are the same, but they didn't do that, they just gave some background about different parts of the moon they came from and said "they developed different, honest". That is what I'd call a lazy explanation.

Comparing that with the Skirmishers, if you take away the feathers and weird ridge things they're same as Jackal Classic. That's how you do it. What you don't do is take a distinct, recognizable appearance and completely change the head shape from "thin snout" to "dentist's nightmare".

: In either case, though, I just feel like what's the point of bringing up the
: Jackals or whatever in every conversation. Yeah, they changed and some
: folks don't like the new design. At this point, it's not going back, so
: we're not really moving the conversation forward by just focusing on the
: way the designs changed and continually using that as a point with which
: to bash 343i. It can only make you as angry as you let it.

It hasn't made me angry in quite some time. What bothers me now is people defending it, and, I'll admit, it bothers me that people like it, it is that awful that I don't see how anyone could like it.

Let's get away from that though. Even if you like it, you can see how it's generic, right? The big scary jaw thing has been done again and again. If they'd been like that from the beginning it would be one thing, but they introduced something that made them less unique. I can't even fathom the artistic principle behind that (if there even was one).

: Now, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with talking about it or even
: keeping track of all the changes or whatever. But just continually pointing
: them out and saying 343i ruined Halo because of it is getting a little tiring.

Everyone that said Halo was ruined doesn't post here any more. (I wish they'd stop saying it elsewhere too, and commenting about how HBO is all different and bad.)

: And, "it's a new model" is absolutely a lazy explanation. I'm not saying it's
: not a good one. They changed the design of the Master Chief between
: Halo 1 and 2 because they wanted to make him look better, and came up
: with the "new model" explanation after the fact (probably).

They made it act differently (no health display, backpack weapon icon, faster shield recharge, higher jump, no fall damage, fire doesn't hurt you), and that's gameplay stuff they probably would've done anyway, but it also justifies a new suit to me. Really it would be weird if they changed all that and didn't have the suit the be different, at least through some kind of upgrade.

That's what would really be good, not bending visuals to story but having them work together. You could have a whole subplot about Chief's old armor failing, even work it into gameplay without being obnoxious like the motion tracker doesn't work right, and then give him new armor. You could just say "oh BTW there were spare parts on the FUD, you should put them on", but they didn't even do that.

Anyway they had a whole origin story for the armor in the Halo Graphic Novel and alluded to it in the game ("just came up from Songnam this morning"), and that's not lazy. What's lazy is not even trying to explain how we got from A to B.

: 343i did the same thing, only because of the situation the Master Chief was in,
: they couldn't really come up with a good in-universe explanation. They should
: limit themselves artistically and creatively and be stuck with an old design just
: because the Master Chief is stuck on a ship that they didn't put him on in the first place?

Yes! At least for a while. Even if there were new people working on it, somebody in the chain knew that the Chief was stuck in bumfuck nowhere so they couldn't change his looks much without the fans calling bullshit. If you showed me that armor before Halo 4 without the helmet, again, I'm sure it would've taken me a long time to guess it was connected to Halo, and I never would've said it's the Master Chief's armor.

If you need an accessory like a shield or a helmet or a backpack to recognize what something is, then it's not actually recognizable.

Not only that, but Frankie said on this forum before release that there was an explanation for the armor difference. I'm still waiting.

One more thing, how often do you confuse the space suit Jackals for Elites or vice-versa? I know you do, everyone does. That's probably the best case of making something not be identifiable any more, and it shows their lack of good judgment (and/or lack of skill) in enemy design.