7:25 Slight correction, a lot of this information was made into canon in Halo 2 itself. Most of the cut dialog in this scene is in the final game except it is givin to Regret instead. If you wait around Regrets holograms in Delta Halo/Regret he will deliver this dialog, almost verbatim in some cases So Bungie did incorporate this lore in, just in-game and in a way where 99% of the players miss it
@@C3_SABERTOOTH 343i also reintegrated a lot of this Lore into the Halo 2 Anniversary terminals, which I think is a good thing and I feel Bungie probably would have done this had they come up with the idea during Halo 2's development.
I got chills at 3:45, always a powerful scene. I was so captivated by the history being told with the murals, then BEETLE happened and I lost my shit LOL Thanks for uploading this separately. It would have been out of place in a full video, but the joke is so good I applaud you for going through with it!
Yeah, this scene would’ve completely shattered the pacing of the Act 2 video, as it would have presumably done to _Halo 2_ had it not been cut from the game. This is probably the only scene I’m actually _glad_ was cut.
@@C3_SABERTOOTH For sure, this long of a halt to the action to explain all this would have been boring to most. I wasn't thinking about it until now, but why does the Arbiter need a lecture on his own society's history? Such forced exposition hahaha
@@WestonHawk Add to that it's just one gigantic dump of info all at once.. We all know that when H2 first released this long ass scene depicting the history of a protagonist culture that most people hated at the time would have gone over about as well as a fart in church lol
On the topic of Rtas' apparent continuity error, I always read that scene as Truth giving his *final* decision with the implication that there had been prior debate with the Councilors up to that point.
It always seemed kinda odd that Rtas is there with two Elite Minors arguing with the Prophets. It makes sense to have the councillors there and Rtas outside to encounter the Arbiter. But it seems above his station, honestly. The original scene with the Elite and Prophet Councillors makes much more sense.
I feel like the purpose of this scene was to distract Arbiter from his questions through his faith. This is the last time he talks to Truth and Mercy before they send Tartarus to kill him. That's just me, but I feel like this is a little less ridiculous in the context of the Prophets exploiting Arbiter's faith and desire to be accepted back onto the path of the Great Journey to have him zealously charge into the Quarantine Zone and grab the Index, or at least clear the way for the new vanguard of the Covenant. I'm not saying he wouldn't already do this without the mural scene, but this scene was likely made as his version of hearing a Sgt Johnson speech with a Covenant flavor much like R' Tas' introduction.
Worth noting about the covenant vehicle names; like the various covenant species the vehicles have an official designation and a common name most likely given by humans (though unlike the species, the covenant themselves never use the official vehicle names likely for gameplay reasons). All of the vehicles named after spirits and such are all vehicles that float in a way that could remind the UNSC as ghosts and probably invoke similar fears (hell, in CE due to the audio design of wraiths and banshees you could hear those two vehicles from the other end of a huge map which certainly made them psychologically terrifying). The shade turret also fits into the ghostly appirition nomenclature, while it has had a completely reworked design in seemingly every game the one thing every iteration has in common is that they float when occupied, albeit only atop their base. The scarab on the other hand doesn't float but walks on multiple pointed legs similar to an insect's thus may have been a nickname the marines called them owing to their appearance; it makes sense to use a name that fits even a vague description. The next vehicle that followed the scarab in that nomenclature was the locust in halo wars. The locust has a ton in common with the scarab; it too is an excavation vehicle named after an insect heavily associated with ancient Egypt, which itself is a stereotypical target of tomb pillagers looking for artifacts... huh...
Forget about my previous comment, I think I may have figured it what the deal is with the beetles. The mural could in fact be depicting drones/yanme'e! Unlike our beetles the bugs depicted in the murals have 5 body segments (as opposed to 3), just like drones! (same goes for the depiction in Stone of Union) Additionally, the mural bug and the yanme'e both have 3 sets of legs, the rear-most pair on both is noticeably smaller than the other two sets as well. The only big inconsistency between them is that Halo 2 drones only have one pair of wings vs the mural bug's two (assuming we're not counting the opened carapace halves as wings), however I think that model only having two wings was a performance optimization to accommodate the original XBox rather than a deliberate design choice. Drones tend to engage in large swarms at multiple points in the game exclusively in huge rooms and a sudden frame drop when they show up definitely wouldn't have been welcome; they just relied on the animation to make the missing pair less obvious. Plus, they gained that missing pair of wings in halo 3 and their design never deviated from that since. Aside from the fact yanme'e fight in huge swarms I can only really speculate on what the 30 buggers have to do with the rest of the mural though.
I really wish that we would've gotten this in the game, while we got this many years later in Halo 5's levels set in Sanghelios (thank you 343, you at least did that right in H5's campaign), having all of this information during Halo 2 would've made the already exceptional world building even better, especially because they would've served as the equivalent of the stained glass art that you see in ancient cathedrals (the visual art in churches and the like were employed to leave people who were in the process of adopting the faith, believers and non-believers alike awestruck, also, it was heavily used because many were illiterate and their only way of learning and appreciating their faith was through the iconography).
The murals could have reworked to be displayed along those long curved corridors in grave mind. There's a few suitable iirc were there were few or no enemies and just the victims of the schism. Cortana could have popped out at each mural and given you the spiel as she compiled data from the covenant servers. If they were little away from the corridor it could have been something you trigger if you go off the beaten track to look at them, so not repetitive in repeat playthroughs. Thematically it could be nice to learn how the covenant came together as it all falls apart.
With the Beetles if it truly is from the Mural of Inquiry/Discovery it could be a reference to an old legend where the first Forerunner artifact was found because of a beetle, like someone following it into a cave and finding all this advanced tech, or someone noticing a crevice because a beetle came out behind it or through an opening and digging through the wall unearthed a treasure trove of tech or something. Thereafter the beetle/scarab became a symbol for inquiry and progress like how in human symbology a Dove and Olive branch is the symbol of peace which would be just as baffling to Aliens who haven't read the story of Noah's Ark.
@7:20 It's funny the lengths that fans will twist & turn scenes & events in a narrative to have some deeper or more cohesive meaning, when in all likelihood if you'd ask the creator(s) about it they'd be like "Nah fam I just made a mistake lol". Looking forward to seeing ep 2 & 3!
And, most importantly, most writers know themselves how many ideas they came up with that they didn't use. It's easy for fans to get attached to stories exactly as they played out but for a writer they know all the alternate paths the story could have taken.
I can see why this was removed. Would've been a boring exposition dump imo. In general, the final version of what we have for narrative pieces of this scrapped scene, I prefer
Yes, and most of the information and lines are present in other parts of the game. Truth even mentions part of the oath in the level Gravemind: 'Thou in faith shall keep us safe, whilst we find the path'. I always loved that line because it implies a level of depth in the Covenant without having to spell it out.
I think the beetles were supposed to reference the Drones- as to why though I don’t know. If this is during the Writ of Union it couldn’t be them… I think- I don’t know when the Drones/Yanme’e were brought into the Covenant. The Scarab reference could be it if the Scarab was based on the design of a forerunner excavation device- but if it wasn’t then I doubt it because of this is during the Writ of Union the Lekgolo wouldn’t have been tamed yet.
Possibility 4: The Covenant didn't know the difference between the monitor or index? If they planned such a thing it would make sense in universe that the covenant aren't fully aware of the mechanics. They've only visited one Halo before. Idk maybe, it was what my mind first jumped to
For real, I despise most of 343's additions and their version of the lore, but I remember Broken Circle being really good, especially by 343 standards.
Honestly I don't really think that's a continuity problem. Maybe the Council issued the threat but feeling that he could be a middle ground in the issue they have Rtas ask the Prophets once again and now he's delivering them the answer.
At 5:03 we see the prophets and elites at top, and under that is a jackal, grunt, hunter, drone, and brute, but what’s that first one? Is it the Drinol/Sharquoi?
Their war machines are all seemingly stylized after beetles, it shouldn’t astonish you that they worshipped them. Jokes aside, what if the beetles symbolize the drones because they had a bigger legacy in the Covenant in this H2 script? Please, refrain from mocking and insulting cut content (talking about the intro). It’s not unheard of for a developer to be embarrassed by discarded work. You could do it if the developers have also made fun of it or I guess some light jabs wouldn’t be too bad.
