Halo: Reach Forum
This topic has moved here: Subject: Ideas on how enemies should look
  • Subject: Ideas on how enemies should look
Subject: Ideas on how enemies should look

I wish I was still legendary.

Yes, another thread on what some guy thinks this game should look like. Bear with me, because these are (IMO) relatively plausible.

Currently Halo has a REALLY very cartoony feel to it. This works fine...except the enemies. Where an elite should be a regal, disciplined warrior, he's a hunchbacked smily dinosaur. Where brutes should look primitive, they look like heavily armoured knights with carefully groomed faces. Jackals, i.e. space pirates, look like retarded birds. Hunters look...well, not very dangerous.

here's what I think should change:

Brutes currently are too disciplined looking, too much like they have a sense of honour. From what the bestarium says, they are a MUCH more primitive and violent society then one that has a rigid class system without conflict, grooms their faces and cooperates with others.. They should have much rougher armour, held together by leather straps. For example, Brute minors would have little more than a headpiece and a shoulderpad. Bodyguards would have armour made from painted metal plates, held together by leather. Chieftans would have primitive, but still more ornate armour. Any of them with shields would, to put it simply, have a visible shield emitter somewhere on their armour. Not a big one, possibly just something that looks similar to a Jackal's gauntlet strapped around their arm.

Hunters are basically a shiny bunch of worms that look like they just came off a factory line. All that's really needed here is more worn, damaged looking armour. Something like scratches and scorch marks.

Elites are splitfaced, hunchbacked dinosaurs. They should reflect their sense of honour, pride and courage more - standing tall, commanding large amounts of units in battle. Zealots and commanders could have subtly different armour. What we had in Halo 3 was a crappy excuse for an Elite.

Grunts should have armour that actually looks plated on more, that sound more like how they were described in the books. They'd shuffle around and make a few less funny comments, with a slightly deeper pitch. They would be seen in situations OUTSIDE of standing behind an elite for no reason - maybe pre-defined animations for certain areas, like a grunt carrying a motion scanner or a couple scouting through some trees on their own. They'd still be cowards, but wouldn't hesitate to try and kill you from a distance.

Jackals that are actually scary, and somehow reflect their mercenary heritage - maybe they could have a belt or bandolier with grenades or an energy garrotte on it. I'm reasonably sure that as mercenaries, they must have weapons OTHER than the covenant plasma pistols and needlers as well...Their armour would likely look slightly different as well.

Prophets that looked more sinister then they currently do, but still regal - for example, Truth didn't look evil as such in Halo 3. He just looked like another alien. they could have gaunter faces or something, I don't really know.

Drones that act like a proper hive mind rather then independent creatures, and have armour of sorts that looks more like natural plating - the shield generator thingies would have cracks and stuff around them, to look like they were placed into the armour by force

. Look at them in Halo 3: they NEVER act like a hive. There's just a whole pile of them at once shooting aimlessly. As a hive, they would either split into groups targeting specific people, or all attack the most dangerous enemy nearby, rather then one of them flying up to you whilst the rest fly around aimlessly attacking everything.

so yeah, that's pretty much it.

  • 08.15.2009 3:58 PM PDT

While I agree with most (not all, however) of your points, the game behaviour changes are pretty much out of the question. If Reach gameplay is gonna be like the previous three games, and ODST of course, then most of the non-design changes (Drones all converging on one enemy, Grunts scanning etc.) you want won't happen, as they'd screw with the gameplay too much. Especially the drones. It would make them much too hard to defeat, and probably shunt them to bosses.. The aesthetic though, I agree, should be changed. Especially if the Brutes are gonna be the same as they were before the Schism, then it would be understandable.

But the thing you're forgetting, is that the Covenant are a very powerful society. They can afford to keep the Brutes in armour that looks pristine at all times in Halo 3, especially since they are the Covenant's main soldiers. As for the Brutes grooming themselves, I'm fairly sure they're doing it to honour Tarturus.

The Brutes weren't as primitive as you're implying they are, either. They were roughly on par with Humans (in 2500s I mean) before they were assimilated into the Covenant, and they had been in there for at least thirty, forty years, so they'd obviously picked up some traits of the Covenant.

Grunts should be more... animalistic. It would be good if, every now and then, some less than intelligent Grunts were thrown at you, just yelling animalistically and trying to beat on you, as described at the start of Fall of Reach. But they'd probably act too much like Wretches from Gears I guess.

As for everything looking prestine, I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that the armour that the Hunters use (and likely, though thinner) is the same that the Covenant use on their ships. Which is really resilliant, and likely would only get a few dents and such from bullets, if they survived. But whatever. There's my two cents anyway.

  • 08.15.2009 4:10 PM PDT
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I agree with the enemies needing to look more threatening, although i think putting shields on drones and grunts would mess with the gameplay a little. You could take that new, more menacing look even further and make the weapons look better too, the assault rifle looks like a toy when you shoot it

[Edited on 08.15.2009 4:13 PM PDT]

  • 08.15.2009 4:12 PM PDT

i don't think hunter armor should have scratches because of how strong it is. i agree with everything else though.

[Edited on 08.15.2009 4:13 PM PDT]

  • 08.15.2009 4:13 PM PDT

I mainly want the enemies to look scary. And I totally agree Halo 3 looks like a cartoon.

  • 08.15.2009 4:14 PM PDT

I wish I was still legendary.

Posted by: Fender19

I agree with the enemies needing to look more threatening, although i think putting shields on drones and grunts would mess with the gameplay a little. You could take that new, more menacing look even further and make the weapons look better too, the assault rifle looks like a toy when you shoot it



Drones in ODST have shields, at least some of them. and yes, whilst weapons need some degree of changing if this sort of art style was followed, that's another topic for another time.

*writes up epic weapon thread*

  • 08.15.2009 4:19 PM PDT

I wish I was still legendary.

Posted by: Jatc93
If Reach gameplay is gonna be like the previous three games, and ODST of course, then most of the non-design changes (Drones all converging on one enemy, Grunts scanning etc.) you want won't happen, as they'd screw with the gameplay too much. Especially the drones. It would make them much too hard to defeat, and probably shunt them to bosses.. The aesthetic though, I agree, should be changed. Especially if the Brutes are gonna be the same as they were before the Schism, then it would be understandable.


The Brutes weren't as primitive as you're implying they are, either. They were roughly on par with Humans (in 2500s I mean) before they were assimilated into the Covenant, and they had been in there for at least thirty, forty years, so they'd obviously picked up some traits of the Covenant.

Grunts should be more... animalistic. It would be good if, every now and then, some less than intelligent Grunts were thrown at you, just yelling animalistically and trying to beat on you, as described at the start of Fall of Reach. But they'd probably act too much like Wretches from Gears I guess.

As for everything looking prestine, I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that the armour that the Hunters use (and likely, though thinner) is the same that the Covenant use on their ships. Which is really resilliant, and likely would only get a few dents and such from bullets, if they survived. But whatever. There's my two cents anyway.


I will agree that I may have overstated the bit about drones. The shield generators in Halo 3 are just there for aesthetics mostly anyway (you know, the little metal bits on their armour pads), and would likely be aesthetic still.

As for the enemy behaviours bit...well, I should have clarified better. Stuff like a pair of grunts wandering through threes with a motion tracker, or a grunt waiting outside a covenant-controlled area with a vehicle scanner thing, would be predefined and end as soon as they saw you. Sort of like the end of Sierra 117 - just immersion into the world.

As for the brutes...well, to be fair look at them in Halo 2. They had the metal plating armour then if you look (e.g. skullcaps). And whilst they may be on par with humanity in terms of technology, they definitely are NOT on par in terms of intelligence or behaviour, or aesthetic style. ALL their stuff except their armour in Halo 3 looks like it was crudely built - why not the armour as well?

  • 08.15.2009 4:26 PM PDT