: Yeah, it's kind of tough to answer the question of how someone can approach
: the franchise when it's so sprawling. I think it's really as simple as
: "whatever grabs you", but it's tough to blindly introduce
: someone because there's so many different approaches—what introduces the
: most of the universe, what thematically is most similar to the rest of it,
: what has the most story resonance to the ongoing narrative. 343 is
: obviously trying to figure that out too—Outpost Discovery, MC in Fortnite,
: and especially the (apparently abandoned) YA novels are clearly them
: trying to hook the younger kids who didn't grow up with Halo as an
: omnipresent gaming juggernaut.

: I noticed in the last one or two novels they've reorganized and slightly
: rebranded the various series, so I think part of their plan is if someone
: reads on Denning Ferret Team book, get them to get the rest of that
: series, rather than "hey you liked that story of some scrappy special
: ops guys, now would you like a book about licking rocks and traveling
: across inscrutable alien landscapes?"

In a way, I wonder what happened to tie-in novels during the 2000s. Used to be that science fiction series had a very strong presence in thelnovel market. Star Wars, Star Trek, Stargate, and Battletech had really, really good novel series, the first and last being real standouts. Then, in the 2000s, that all ground to a halt. And it happened at aboutmthe dame time that Halo tried to get off the ground after Halo 2 proved that the series wasn't just a flash in the pan.

What happened?

I dunno about Wars, Trek, and Gate. They seem to have fallen apart for their own reasons. Star Wars seemed to go all-in on the Vong War and then floundered when that was resolved. Star Trek got rebooted. Stargate.... who knows?

But Battletech had a Hell of a system for its EU, one that 343i should have stolen. BTech was a tabletop wargame, and each rules release was an update to the universe and a major conflict. In other words, itmwas its own era, just like Star Wars has Old Republic, Republic, Empire,, New republic, and Yuuzan Vong eras. After each rules release, Micheal Stackpole would write spine novels that detail the conflict and coverhthe malor astropolitical changes. Other writers would write smaller series that follow their own characters.

What happend? Battletech had a hundrd tie-in novels to its name in th span of time that Halo managed about twenty, and it has never been as big as Halo.

Well, Battletech smashed against the rocks when WotC bought out FASA and ordered a spiritual reboot that negated all of the progress in the story, and the era written to cover the gap was full of asspulls. And this was after the FedCom Civil War mashed a big reset button. Micheal Stackpole left when the publisher mandated that he cut down his novels to 70,000 words, the length of a YA novel, so that they could save on shipping and printing costs.

But why aren't moremwriters stepping in? In a decade where people are reading more and the Indie book market is exploding, why is the EU market comparatively empty?

Well, I think it comes down to royalties and priorities. Media executives in the 80s and 90s saw tie-in novels as a way to expand the brand. Modern executives don't. Publishers in the 80s and 90s were good, if not great. Mass market publishers in the present day are ass*, and a lot of very skilled writers know that they could make more money with less hassle writing their own thing.

*I want the details of why 343i split from Tor to go to Gallery books. If it is anything like how Tor screwed over Phil Foglio at roughly the same time... watch out.