: It's more like the differences between the Northrop YF-17, the McDonnell
: Douglas F/A-18, and the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. Different
: manufacturers, different flight characteristics, with a similar silhouette
: yet obvious distinctions.

Eh, I picked the F/A-18 and the F16 because they're both multirole fighters with a similar silhouette to the untrained eye, but they have different engine configurations and are fielded by different branches.

: Probably should have listened to yourself before you ended a fairly decent
: critique with such an underhanded comment.

Like I said, I loathe bringing it up.

: These abrupt, unsightly, and even unwelcomed changes were nothing new when
: 343's stewardship of the franchise came around. Bungie changed things up
: from time to time at their leisure even when it didn't make sense.

A: We bitched when Bungie did it. We bitched about the Pillar of Autumn's new design, we bitched about the changing Brutes, we bitched about the Marathon cruiser standing in for the Autumn. We probably bitched about the Jackal changes from Halo CE to Halo 2, but I wasn't around for it.

B: The changed designs generally stuck with the existing art scheme, and there was always enough of the old to get some feel of continuity.

C: Bungie's style was awesome. 343i's style isn't, with the sole exception of that sexy, sexy redesigned Carbine. And yes, I know that's an opinion.

: In the
: end it doesn't bother me that much because I simply accept it as their
: artistic interpretation and vision for that entity, be it a character, an
: enemy, a vehicle, or a set of armor.

For me, the new art style is like the lens flares in NuTrek. They're ugly, distracting, and it's hard to see what's going on under them. Abrams can say that they're his signature style (or whatever the excuse was) but he was better off with a simpler, cleaner look.

But I thought you hated Star Trek with the unbound fury of a thousand dying stars?

Well, yes, but that's beside the point.

: We can make that assumption for ourselves and
: we have. It is a nice courtesy though and one they've delivered on quite
: often in many forms since their stewardship began with diversity of the
: various Kig-Yar races, Banshee variants, starships, etc. If I remember
: correctly the old plasma rifle was even in the last issue of Escalation
: much to my surprise.

: 343i developer's fandom for Halo may not represent your and indeed all of
: HBO's majority expectations for Halo. I'm sure Waypoint, r/Halo, Archive,
: and any other community has a consensus of what they visually expect from
: Halo as well.

Heh. Nobody and no community has achieved a consensus on what they visually expect from Halo.

: It's all different and I think it's all valid. 343 are the
: ones putting hours and hours behind their own vision of Halo and applying
: that vision to how they interpret these objects in the universe. You're
: entitled to your own opinion on those efforts just like everyone else is
: whether it's positive, negative, or apathetic. 343 is similarly capable of
: having opinions and a vision that don't match yours. Like it or hate it
: all you want but they certainly can never cater to everyone.

My perspective is that of a Halo fan with a lot of time in the fanfiction community and some time at the periphery of the modding community. There's two kinds of fans that I've noticed (More than that, and there's overlap between the two kinds, but that's beside the point): There's fans who stay true to Halo canon, and then there's who change everything.

It's kind of a surreal experience recruiting a modeler for a Halo RTS, and hearing all the changes he wants to make. The Scorpion has to be changed into something 'Realistic' (An Abrams with a flatter profile) and the Marines have to have power armor and Jackals can't have shields and Banshees must have aerodynamic wings and the Wraith has to be more 'Practical' (By which he meant "Merkava with hover-treads").

I've seen worse in fanfiction. Alternate universe fictions where absolutely everything is changed, with spiteful authors notes calling Bungie out for not doing it right.

I just have a hard time connecting "Fan of Halo" with "Want to change absolutely everything" anymore.

: In any case it's pretty shitty of you to claim that 343's developers aren't
: fans of the series.

I'm not going to claim otherwise.

: While I'm sure
: many people at the studio are just there for a job, which I can't deride
: them for at all, that still shouldn't matter.

Of course it doesn't matter.

: I don't know anyone who
: would seek employment at a studio which will only ever develop for one
: franchise who doesn't have the least bit of respect, admiration, and love
: for this franchise. Y'know, like most western shooter fans.

You've heard me whine about Halo Wars, right?

Halo was forced on Ensemble Studios. Basically, they turned in a prototype for a console version of Age of Mythology and Microsoft told them to slap a Halo skin on it and ship it.

A lot of the ES guys were completely new to Halo. They didn't have the art assets from Bungie, and the art team never played the games. When they first modeled and animated the Spirit, they had it flying backwards!

Halo Wars was set at the very beginning of the Human-Covenant war. Ensemble Studios could have used that as a justification to go absolutely wild with reinterpetation, but they didn't. With a few exceptions, the designs in Halo Wars were faithful interpretations of Bungie designs, with new designs that fit in perfectly. Better yet, there's a few details on the classics that show that some time has changed, like the four-barreled LAAG on the Warthog.

That's the path that I wish 343i had gone down.