HALO 2'S LOST ENDING 

Yes, this would've been so satisfying

That's why halo needs to remake and make a reboot

He completed his story fine in release

@@HaloUP that will never happen lmaooo

In all honesty, The Arbiter is the Hero of Halo 2.

That would of been a way better ending than what we got

that music, bro i wish i could see it animated on blams engine

While both Guilty Spark and the Prophet of Truth refer to forerunners as the parents of humanity in Halo 3, the reveal is far better executed, and far more meaningful in this ending.

@@theneoreformationist Agreed. I think that’s what makes it easy to ignore that Forerunners were Humans in the original trilogy, because the big bombshell was cut from Halo 2 and never implemented in Halo 3.

I wonder why they never added it to Halo 3, it's completely feasible and although we get confirmation from Guilty Spark the impact of that scene is too good to pass up as a closer to the series. It could've gone something like this: As the Arbiter's half of Forward Unto Dawn comes out of the portal, it crashes into the structure and punches throught to the data vault. There he meets the monitor left in charge of the portal, data vault, and the machine after which the scene plays out like we see here.

@@Evilbob1555 Or it could've been explored in Halo 4. I do like the basic premise of Halo 4's story, although I do dislike the art style, and some of the creative choices that went into its development. I have a number of simple changes I would have made to Halo 4's story: 1. To have Jul M'dama fill the Didact's role in the game as the main villain, leading a unified Covenant remnant in its search for Halo rings, and other Foreunner artefacts, and when he is introduced, acquiring Forerunner armour and weapons, and eventually the Composer, with his role in the story pretty much playing out the same as it does with the Didact. 2. The Chief has a boss fight with Jul in the end, which involves Jul - with his Forerunner armour and weapons - having stronger shields than the chief, the ability to cloak, teleport, and fire an overpowered sentinel beam like 343 Guilty Spark could do in Halo 3. And Jul is obviously defeated, his ship is destroyed along with the Composer, and humanity is saved yet again. (Hoorah!) 3. The art style, obviously. (But I get why 343 changed it.) I was personally satisfied with Halo 3's ending. That said, I still like what they did with the arbiter finding a forerunner skeleton and the revelation that they are simply prehistoric humans. 3. So the final change I would have made to Halo 4's story is the most drastic, and it is to include the Arbiter as a playable protagonist, as he was in Halo 2. And from a completely different perspective to the chief's, we would see the Arbiter on his own mission against Jul M'Dama and his Covenant faction, we would see what the stakes are for him, and we would see his reluctance to fight and kill his own kind - who like Tartatus in Halo 2, are simply so set in their ways that they refuse to ally with humans, dismiss the truth about the Halo rings as propaganda, and so on. And in the end, the Arbiter's role in the story would culminate in the discovery originally intended for Halo 2 - a discovery that the Arbiter intends to share with the rest of the Galaxy, to finally break the hold that religious fanaticism and zealotry still has on the elites and the rest of the Covenant, and thereby hopefully ending the Covenant and the threat it poses on the Galaxy.

it wasn't a boss fight, he literally just broke his fucking neck

@@MisterChief711 it's the intro before a bossfight

@@Rythaze it isn't written anywhere it was a boss fight

@@MisterChief711 he literally says in the video "next will be the third and final hierarch boss battle"

@@MisterChief711 It literally is, are you blind?

We might have gotten it if Bungie wasn’t so burned out after Halo 2. Some members like Joseph Staten went on hiatus during Halo 3’s development which is why the story felt so dull and bland compared the writing of Halo 2.

@@alexanderrobins7497 Yeah, that and Frank O'Conner absolutely stepping all over Joe's vision.

Imagine someone using it to recreate the ending in a mod or something

@@The_Punisher its entirely possible to do, just need someone that has the skills and passion. What AI voice can do these days could also play a massive role in bringing it to life

I’ve always lamented this wasn’t a mission in Halo 3

This is what was missing from the Original Trilogy, we always see the marines completely demoralised (such as the bridge scene in new mombasa) we never really get that high moral marine focused seen. Best we got is "No way a spartan?!" from the wounded marines in 3.

@@reviveempires We do get applause and cameras in the beginning of Halo 2

Mods are an option

It would've been a way better opening than what we got for H3.

THANKS MINTY

@@C3_SABERTOOTH mate your channel is going to blow up. Good work on this!

JUST WENT 3 : 0 AGAINST YOU IN TOTAL CONTROL. GET REKT MINTY.

Obviously it's a nod to the ending of Halo 1, and brilliant

Upon rewatching it, it seems like Forerunners were not humans, but they did nudge human evolution so we end up resembling them. I think that interpretation is absolutely phenomenal since I cannot get behind the idea of cavemen building an advanced civilization then losing hundreds of thousands of years of societal progress with no evidence of it.

@@alexanderrobins7497 I agree

It feels criminal how dull and bland Halo 3’s story feels compared to Halo 2, but I also heard it was because everyone was so burned out. Apparently Joseph Staten went on hiatus during Halo 3’s early development stages.

MODS

​@@alexanderrobins7497 dang corporations making passionate developers burnt out mane

​@@The_Punishershii easier said than done

It brings an ending that actually makes sense lol

@@Powerof7even The ending of Halo 2 made sense, it was just a cliffhanger. This alternative ending is very good, but there are still plenty of issues with it. I hate the implied relationship between Master Chief and Miranda Keys. I also don't like that Cortana's fate is kind of unknown. Additionally, I don't love the weird fight with a cyclops thing. Lastly, and least importantly, some of the humor was a little off-putting and ill-timed. To it's credit, many of my issues likely would have been ironed out if this ending had been actually used. I always loved the idea of the Forerunners being just the ancient humans. However, I don't hate the current lore of the Forerunners, especially with the precursors. I really enjoyed the Forerunner trilogy of books as well.

@@ColinCreighton I think the original interpretation was a phenomenal idea. Instead of being Forerunners or spacefaring cavemen, the Forerunners nudged human evolution so we ended up resembling them. It is far less insulting to the people who have studied anthropology.

@@alexanderrobins7497 I like both ideas. Though, the term Inheritor was not just from the Forerunners. It goes back to the Precursors, who deemed the Forerunners too violent/wrathful for the Mantle of Responsibility and instead wanted Humanity to inherit the Mantle when ready. Which makes me think that the Precursors knew their fate before the Forerunners attacked them.

@@ColinCreighton that whole mantle trash is just a way of retconning Staten original story. none of that shit makes sense with the original story or Halo. Truths motivation actually makes sense, dialogue makes sense, and the irony of the covenant laying waste to what is considered to be their rightful gods in their religion makes way more sense than passing some mantle macguffin from one race to the next. hell even the symbolism of the naming, the flood being the unstoppable force, the covenant being the maniacal religious extremists, the holy prophets leading them, it actually works when it is contextualised in Statens original vision. its just a shame Halo will never be what it was supposed to be now and there isnt hope it will get anywhere on this level again.

oof wish that had been included in the vid

I haven’t watched it! My little heart can only take so much abuse.

I'm already scarred enough from Jimmy rings clapping covvie p.o.w. cheeks. This was tame by comparison. Lol

@@C3_SABERTOOTH Honestly; you've seen what 343 can do to Halo canon while they claimed to be a direct continuation. At least the TV series never claimed to be a faithful continuation.

@@meateaw Well, they _were_ claiming it was going to be canonical until 343’s fanbase got into a tizzy over black Miranda.

​@@C3_SABERTOOTHBecause a black Miranda makes since when Miranda is white

Frank O'Connor soiled any poetic impact forerunners would ever have ever since he wrote those goddamned H3 terminals.

Still hit pretty hard though

I never like the idea of humans actually being Forerunners or spacefaring cavemen, but the idea of the Forerunners nudging human evolution so we resemble them sounds phenomenal to me. No where near as insulting to people like me who have studied anthropology.

@@edboysvarietyhour6565 We already got Bonnie and Kiki the boot. One final hierarch remains, and his name is Frank O'Connor.

@@alexanderrobins7497 Nah humans being descendants of Forerunners is way cooler. Every setting has some "ancient alien civilization" messing with human history, for once it could've been HUMANITY that was the ancient alien civilization.

Ditto.

This ending would have been phenomenal. Instead of being Forerunner or spacefaring cavemen, human evolution would have been nudged so we ended up resembling Forerunners.

The dramatic, meaningful reveal to the Arbiter was a much better choice than Guilty Spark just saying, "You are the child of my makers. Inheritor of all they left behind. You are Forerunner!"

If Bungie weren't forced by Microsoft to a early release date Halo 3 would have been the 3-rd act of Halo 2 . They might have actually wrapped it up there since Bungie were pretty tired of doing Halo games after 3 so Reach had a short campaign too and ODST was an asset flip to fill the 5 games they had to make to get done with their contract ,there still not bad games though

Yeah and the Flood would still be an active threat in the galaxy too

@@ugiustuskeiserus8066 dang good point

@@ugiustuskeiserus8066 which begs the question if Halo 3 would have still been a thing. And if so, it'd probably be DRASTICALLY different from the version we have today.

I’ll be honest, while I included Marty’s quote in the trailer, I don’t entirely trust it. I think this version of Halo still would’ve been finally concluded in a third entry. It just would’ve been a different Halo 3.

@@C3_SABERTOOTH well the rest of Bungie still shared the same sentiments as Marty right? Looks like Halo 2 was going to have cliffhangers no matter what.

That would have been the best legendary ending in the series. I assume if the game was finished as intended legendary wouldn't be as broken and more people would play it.

Thank god I’m not alone in the world with this opinion. Even as a younger teenager Halo 3’s plot felt lackluster compared to 2. Not to mention that Halo 2’s cliffhanger with the Flood being resolved alongside the end of the Human-Covenant War denies us a full campaign on dealing with the Elites war on the Brutes, and the Flood. Which, ironically, is exactly what Halo 3 ended up being anyway.

I heard part of the reason was due to everyone at Bungie being so burned out, some when on hiatus during early development, like Joseph Staten.

​@@alexanderrobins7497couldn't imagine being an artist, having to cut out so much content and then having my creation ruined in the future

I like donkeys explanation that 343 industries is 343 guilty spark trying to imagine the future of the Halo universe after getting destroyed

My assumption would be enhancements would *reduce* lifespan, not increase it. Taking things to their limit typically doesn't increase their resilience. I think the Cryostasis is the best excuse for it though, since that literally halts the progression of aging, and thus chronologically he'd be 41, knocking even 5 years off his biological clock makes it far less icky. Having said all of that, 15 years isn't too bad a difference as long as the younger party is at least 25. (People don't really change much after 25 years of age).

and using AI generated voice. sure hope someone with skills and passion does this one day

Shii I'm going to build me a PC

Well it wasn't intended to be the end, but the start of a new, and very different, chapter. It was still going to have the post-credits cliffhanger scene with Cortana on high charity, so Halo 3 would probably feature Gravemind as the main antagonist without a mainline covenant force. Arbiter may be sent on some type of negotiation mission or diving deeper into the forerunners.

Maybe someday

Somebody needs to pay the voice actors to give a few lines. I know Steve Downs and Jeff Steitzer have done it for fans before.

I feel like we are all capable of great things, it's just this modern world does a good job at keeping us distracted

I know, it would have been Epic.

Happy to have your credited contributions!

It’s not just Captain Keyes - Dr. Halsey is arguably the Chief’s surrogate mom! The “knowing smile” definitely suggests romance to me, and my biggest qualm with the whole thing is how a romance between these two is borderline incestuous. I agree, they’re practically siblings!

@@C3_SABERTOOTH "Knowing Smile" to me just seems like an adjective to describe a subdued, but still obviously very joyful smile from Johnson now that the war is officially over. Again, I don't really mind the notion of them being a "thing", it would require some explanation, and perhaps you're right, but the sibling dynamic also works for them, and I think it's sweet that Halo 2 was the game where Chief finds his family in his comrades, Arbiter, his newfound brother, Johnson, his old time brother, and Miranda, his new younger sister.

@@C3_SABERTOOTH Also, I hate to resurrect an old comment, but I just finished Floodgate while playing for fun, and I realized that in the outro cutscene, after the Arbiter and Johnson take the other factions' weapons to their own, Chief and Miranda watch Lord Hood depart on a pelican, in a similar fashion to how they're depicted here. Not quite the same context, but perhaps in some early draft of Halo 3, the idea that the war with the the Elites/Seperatists was considered the end of the war in some capacity, and the idea of Chief and Miranda looking over at a planetary body was replaced with Lord Hood and the Ark Portal.

@@theta_clips Ah, I kind of see the parallel there!

@@C3_SABERTOOTH Just thought I'd mention it, I love your channel and it lets me delve into Halo lorecrafting and cut content. Keep it up man!

I can’t imagine Halo 3’s story would have changed much over development - I mean you’re basically looking at the earliest draft of it in this video.

343 Industries has invited modders to look through their archives and port what they can to the final builds. What sucks is they’ve implied their records aren’t complete.

Well there is a huge difference between storyboards and level design. Sometimes the ideas never get past the paper.

@@alexanderrobins7497 We know some of these did.

Wouldn't really work considering halo 3 exists

​@@peterlavery8830 I seen some pretty impressive Halo 3 mods ngl

No. Rewatch it again at 28:45. “Ah, the holotype. A reference for their development.” Human evolution was nudged by the Forerunners to resemble each other, but are still two separate species that never met. I think this interpretation is phenomenal compared to what we got in Halo 3 or with 343 Incompetencies.

What? This was still the case in Halo 3

343 guilty spark literally says to master chief "you are forerunner" in the final mission

YOU’RE WELCOME FOR MAKING THESE.

@@C3_SABERTOOTH Now we wait until someone turns these story boards into reality :)

Haha I _do_ read every comment because I’m desperate for validation! Thank you so much! It really means a lot.

(and I do have more planned)

@@C3_SABERTOOTH hahaha i am the same and take care i will share this with my halo friends

Yeah that would be the one unintended consequence if we got the original halo 2 story. Narratively I think it could still work, but gameplay wise [unless the remnants of the covenant lead by the brutes is in the story] could cause the gameplay to feel stale as flood levels with them as the only enemy were more of a chore to get through

Drone statement

​@@iboildogsalive6535buggers???

I think that Halo 3 is a Far more epic and Far more fitting conclusion to the Halo trilogy

I really like this Master Chief ending tbh aside from the random Miranda interest in Chief. It feels well earned for him and I think Arbiters fits pretty well too. He's completely freed from the lies of the Prophet's and the entirety of the Covenant's purpose/belief and he can be at peace with himself for once. Even though the sequel bait is still somewhat present by saying Arbiter and the elites are going to finish the Civil War in the Covenant but it's still pretty cool

Aw, I’m actually pretty self conscious about my voice so I really appreciate this comment!

Maybe when Halo 2 Anniversary Multiplayer Mod tools come out, maybe we can see a remake of the Halo 2 Campaign as it was originally envisioned!

@@Finger112 I like to envision an alternate timeline with this version of Halo 2 but we'd miss out on Halo 3, ODST, and probably Reach, I'm happy with what we got but sometimes I wonder also what would come of the 343 games they would be massively different, could they be better or worse

Just need to get some talented game designs together and pay the voice actors to reprise their rolls for a few days.

That 2nd paragraph would make more sense because why do forerunners not exist anymore... doesnt make sense that they would obliterate themselves out of existence and preserve everything except themselves. Not sure what the lore reason given is but i'm sure it's a stretch to cover that plothole.

@@randomhiphop5055 I'm guessing it was part of removing the food sources for the flood but keeping themselves as the ones with the mantle of responsibility, hence destroying themselves in the process. But we can only speculate so much on alternative lore, fascinating nonetheless.

@@XradicalD Actually we have a reason, and it's even stated in the Terminals of CEA. The reason why the Forerunners chose extinction was to atone for the sins of creating the Flood outbreak to begin with. The reason why Humanity are the Reclaimers is because we were chosen by the Precursors to hold the Mantle of Resonsibility, causing the Forerunners to become jealous and spiteful, and then committed genocide on the Precursors, the ancient gods of the Halo universe, who then turned themselves into a dust form to try and escape the massacre. This dust corrupted and became the Flood, which began to infect Human planets and when humanity tried to run they wound up in Forerunner territory, burning an infected Forerunner planet to stop the plague from spreading, which sparked off the Human-Forerunner war. Weakened by the war against humanity, and with humanity unable to focus on the Flood, the parasite became too powerful and took over everything. The Forerunners' war avainst humanity without giving them a chance to explain and genocide against the Precursors were the reason why the Halos were needed.

Also, I would love to get my hands on the lore how Forerunners thought Data Vault would affect humanity. I study theology and this just opened a possible research in my mind. That would be so fun to connect the dots between Abrahamic religions and Halo!

It should be a Fracture.

@@velshu I think Joseph Staten majored in theology which makes sense. It sounds like the original intended lore in Halo 2 was that humans were not Forerunners or spacefaring cavemen, but our evolution was nudged by the Forerunners which I find to be a phenomenal idea compared to what we got.

Probably.

Would of been a perfect line to put there as a callback to CE and also with the implication of the flood still being loose.

They couldn't have done the latter as these story boards were long gone and it would conflate with Halo 3. Now the former they definitely could have done. Simply reducing some numbers in the code would have been simple. Best company indeed.

@@spartanq7781 the only changes id make would be the gravemind starting fight (you die as the game loads in, make a script stop the brutes from firing for atleast 2 or 3 seconds), and reduce legendary damage multiplier from enemies from 1.5 to 1.25. This will prevent jackals from one shotting chief.

id also add a script to make the ai not shoot immediately after you get off regret in his boss fight, its very RNG based.

@@halinaqi2194 Halo 2 cranked the damage and the enemies rate of fire way too much. Halo 2 on heroic is a bit too easy so there is no perfect difficulty. Halo 1 nailed difficulty perfectly but later Halo games always got one or two things wrong. Halo 2 way too hard. Halo 3 and Odst way too easy Halo Reach way to frustrating Halo 4 a pain in the ass I don't know about the later games.

Sounds like its still a setup for a potential "Halo 3" or some other followup. Resolves the Covenant storyline but leaves a bunch of threads that can be picked up to make an interesting and dramatic 3rd game, just without the Halo ring/Covenant situation.