Halo 4 Halofest panel

It's 10am on Sunday morning in Seattle, and the Paramount Theatre is absolutely packed - people have been queueing since 7am - with enough adoring Halo fans to outnumber the Flood 4:1. They're here to see the Halo 4 panel at PAX 2011, desperately hoping to find out a few juicy tidbits about the start of the next trilogy of Halo titles - and the first to be developed without support from Bungie. At the very least they'll want to know how Master Chief mysteriously got that jetpack in the Halo 4 announcement trailer.

On the panel is franchise director Frank O'Connor, art director Kenneth Scott, executive producer Kiki Wolfkill, creative director Josh Holmes, and audio director Sotaro Tojima. Chairing the discussion is David Elis.

For the record, I am paraphrasing the discussion as I cannot type quickly enough to capture speech. Sorry.

Q: Can Frank talk about the history of 343? Why was it created? What was it like to stay quiet all this time?

Frank is saying the studio was formed about three years ago to continue the Halo franchise. Most of the people here today were the core group around which the studio formed. 200 or so people are working on Halo 4 and have been for almost two years. Today is the debut of the studio.

Q: Why did the team announce three games instead of one?

Josh is saying it's important to tell the community the breadth of the story - he calls it the Reclaimer trilogy. This trilogy is focused on exploring Master Chief and what it means to bring him back. The idea is to get closer to John-117, which exists in the other fiction, and explore that in the games. Evolve him as a character and a man.

Q: What was it like building the team at 343? What's the culture?

Kiki says one of the goals was to lay a foundation for a studio, and finding the level of technical and creative expertise to execute the legacy of the Halo series. And the guts to actually take on the franchise in the first place. From a studio and culture perspective, 343 needed to find the deep talent - a craftsman approach - to build a studio for the long term. And passion for what Halo could be, not just what it has been. They want to breathe a different life into the game.

Q: To Frank, what's it like for 343 to look after the entire franchise?

Frank is saying that while Halo 4 is the game we're here to talk about, 343 has complete control over the entire franchise - toys, comic books, action figures. Everything in the universe pours into Halo 4 eventually, and 343 wants to make it richer.

Q: The visual style is important. How did 343 bring Halo back to life?

Kenneth says 343 had a deep love for the fiction, and the team was working on developing the emotional tone and distinct look. Fans have been in the universe for ten years now, and they've grown up but the series needs to mature too.

Q: What's up with the Chief’s armour?

Kenneth is saying the Chief you saw in the teaser is NOT the final Chief. They're on the fourth iteration of the Chief right now - they want to make him the best he can be. He wants players to actually feel like they're playing as the Chief.

Q: What kind of places will players be visiting in the Reclaimer trilogy?

Kenneth: there's a wonderful palette to deal with, and the studio is investing heavily in the look and feel of Forerunner - does this mean the Reclaimer trilogy is going to be dealing with the Forerunners? He wants the players to feel discovery again, and the team is trying to move the Forerunner look forward.

Frank: Players have lived with abandoned Forerunner structures for 10 years, and it's going to be interesting when players are dealing with the structures when they're alive and not inert.

Q: How do you plan on helping the player in the story with music?

Tojima says Halo has fascinated him for a long time, and he's excited for the challenge. His main goal is to achieve music and audio design with a deep Halo story. He started audio production by plotting the emotional curve of the story, and how to match the audio with both Master Chief's emotions in the story and the player's emotions with the story. He wants to make players feel the tension, and even cry.

Kiki says both Kenneth and Tojima are both extraordinary storytellers. Every piece of story needs to tell a story.

David adds that he feels surprised (and even disturbed) when he walks past Tojima's office in the studio.

Tojima wants to deliver a believable sci-fi story to the Halo universe, and the audio has to match. Master Chief's sound needs to be different to the original trilogy, and he even wanted to record sounds in outer space - but it was hard to get money for that. Recording has happened in places like Tazmania, and the team has worked in dangerous conditions to get the best sound.

There's a video of the audio team firing potato cannons and making big explosions.

Q: How is Halo 4 going to play?

It plays like Halo, says Josh. That's what was really important. But it's important to take risks - it's a question of balance that the team is wrestling with. How does the team maintain the core of Halo while at the same time adding new weapons, abilities, and experiences? But at its core it feels like Halo - the team is committed to maintaining the sandbox style of former games.

Q: What role will Cortana have in the new game?

She's definitely got an important role in the game, says Josh. Even if Halo 4 is about John, the relationship between Cortana and Chief was integral to the series.

Kiki says there's a relationship between the two that we haven't seen in other games.

Q: Do you ever find yourself holding back on new ideas?

Josh is stressing how the team is also all fans of the series - how far can 343 push Halo while remaining true? Community opinions are taken into perspective at all times.

The team has prototyped things, says Frank, that were good, but were later removed because they weren't Halo. While some things are awesome, they weren't Halo awesome.

Halo has done so much and done it so well, says Josh, that the team has explored a ton of different ideas and had the time to work out what the right things to do actually are.

Q: Will Halo 4 multiplayer cater to the competitive or the casual?

Josh says the Halo 4 community is incredibly diverse, and the team needs to cater to all playstyles and strike the right balance and give them the right experience.

The diversity between types of players is reflected in the team itself, says Kiki. There's debate over all the features, and that mix is really valuable for 343.

[David opens the panel to public questions]

Q: What type of story will we see in Halo 4?

Frank says it's a direct continuation, in a way, of the events of Halo 3. It will deal with the fate of John and the fate of Cortana - there's a lot of speculation between the state of Cortana's mind - and 343 is focusing very strongly on the characters. Halo has always been about enigma, exploration, wonder and scale. The story has scope and granduer. The luxury of coming into a trilogy right from the start helps 343 plan the story in a different way. It's able to build a big, epic story.

Q: The community has been fostered by Bungie, but the Halo modding community has been overlooked. Will this be different with Halo 4?

Frank says, to be honest, Halo is a console game and that's its direction. Internally the team has had discussions about opening up Halo to the community, and while he won't commit to anything he can say the discussions

Q: Is Chief going to have more dialog in this game?

Josh hints that there's more opportunity to gain an insight into John's mind, but stresses how it's important to strike the right balance. John is a man of few words, and they're not going to change that, but they want to give the players more opportunity to experience the character.

Frank wants to make sure the physicality of Chief needs to be delivered on.

Josh says the team wants to make players understand what it means to BE a Spartan. A visceral and tactile experience.

Q: Are there any plans for an offshoot story like ODST in the future?

Frank says there's an offshoot side story in Halo: Anniversary, with the Terminal sequences, but the team is working on Halo 4 right now.

Q: With the Chief on his own, without the marines or the Covenant, will the Chief be working with new factions?

Josh won't say anything about this, but promises to reveal all in time.

Q: Is there going to be access to the Halo 4 multiplayer beta with the Anniversary disc?

Frank says definitely not, but won't confirm if the team will do a Halo 4 beta.

Q: Is the team working on entirely new weapons and vehicles?

Josh says the team looks across the entire trilogy for inspiration, and you will see things familiar from past games, but also things that are new.

Q: Is Jen Taylor going to return as Cortana?

Frank says there's a bunch of stuff that's story and audition related, and can't talk about casting right now. 343 can't talk about it directly because of spoilers.

Q: Will the team make other players in co-op get acknowledged?

Co-op is a big part of the Halo experience, says Josh, and it's something they think about when crafting the campaign. That's all he will say.

Q: Will the music from the Halofest trailer be used in the game?

David says the music wasn't done in-house, so you won't see it again.

Q: Will there be innovations to Forge in Halo 4?

Josh says Forge has been an engine for the community, and it's something the studio believes very very strongly in. The team is continuing to invest in that toolset. Forge will be a big part of what 343 does with Halo 4.

Q: Will there be Forerunner weapons and vehicles in the game?

When you're building a sequel, says Frank, you have to evolve things. As the team thinks about adding things to the game. Halo 4 takes place after the discovery of Forerunner technology. The Glasslands novels will touch on how humanity can advance its technology after the Covenant war.

Q: What's been the biggest challenge in the transition from Bungie to 343?

Frank says industrial strength toilets needed to be added. Kiki says the team was built from scratch, and making sure the team could build a Halo game together. The hardest part was taking the team from different backgrounds and bringing them all together.

Frank says everyone in the studio came to 343 specifically to build Halo.

Q: Will Halo 4 touch upon John's origin?

Frank says there's 8 million Halo players that are completely unaware of John's origin, but that everyone in this room knows it inside out. He's a very tragic figure in some ways, and the team wants to explore it, but won't commit on whether this is in Halo 4.

Q: Will we see the ODST's and the Arbiter again?

Frank says yes, and points to the upcoming Glasslands novels.