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Subject: Why are so many people hating on Halo: Glasslands? *SPOILERS*

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Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: GnadeMasta

Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: Xd00999

Posted by: atcommando94

A lot of your arguments don't even make sense. Fred, Linda, Kelly, Tom, Olivia and Ash just werent focused on, that doesn't mean they aren't characters. The ODSTs are a little shallow, but they are just ODSTs. And either way, they don't really seem shallow to me. Lucy is a good character and very human, which completely contradicts what you said. What does Halsey stealing the spartans have anything to do with proving she has no guilt? And Mendez view was ok for me. The spartan training is the skeleton in his closet.

Suddenly demoting a half-dozen major characters into minor ones is okay?
Olivia and Ash were never really "Main characters" and for the purpose of Glasslands, yes, having Fred, Linda, Kelly, and Tom be somewhat lesser characters is fine. This story wasn't focused on them. Its hard to tell a story, especially a story with three main plot lines, if you have more than like 6 main characters. And that number was being pushed already.


Halsey stealing the Spartans away proves that she has come to terms with herself. She wouldn't do something like that without knowing exactly what she was doing. And then all of a sudden she says "herp, we gotta get outta here." Traviss completely demolished Halsey and rebuilt her from the ground up. Fred (who would have taken charge of the whole damn thing) is left a bumbling idiot, just following Halsey around.

"Just ODST's?" You're as bad as Traviss. She gives us these characters and does -blam!- to flesh them out. Their only purpose is to BE there. Fillers. That's stupid.

At the end of GoO, I thought it was blatently obvious Ash was going to become a main character. Olivia, obviously not, but Ash was getting some serious face-time.'

How many lines did Kelly get? Linda? Olivia? Hell, Prone To Drift has more characterization than them.

More than six main characters is difficult? lol. Epic lol. It took me TWO HOURS to read Glasslands. That's a joke.

Halsey was stealing the spartans to try and save what soul she had left. She wanted to get out only when she found technology that would help the UNSC.

And how could Fred take charge? They are in a forerunner constructed world, how would Fred know anything of what to do. Following Halsey was the right thing since she had the most knowledge on the matter.

The ODSTs are just ODSTs, but Vaz had good characterization and relations with other characters. The other two ODSTs weren't focused on at all.

I never even noticed anything saying Ash would be a main character in GoO. He was just a character that was somewhat more in the spotlight.

Prone had more lines because he actually mattered to the story at hand. None of the Spartans other than Naomi and Lucy NEEDED any lines. They weren't essential to what the story was expressing. My favorite character was Kelly in the Nylund books and I was bummed that she wasn't in it more. But It still was a very good book. Its like your saying LOTR The Third Age sucked for the single reason that it wasn't focused on the characters of the books/movies.

And what does you reading it in two hours have anything to do with the amount of characters? Its difficult writing a cohesive novel with six main characters in less than 500 pages. I personally don't care how long it took you to read the book.


Exactly. Halsey knew exactly what she was doing, and why. There's no need for her to spazz out, unless she was having power surges up the yin-yang. Finding the Forerunner tech still shouldn't have shaken her that much. The Covenant was at Earth. She would have figured that they were done for.

They were in a survival situation. Spartans are trained for that. Instead, they just get led around, poking into rooms randomly, taking insanely stupid risks, et cetera.

These characters need fleshing out. Traviss could have easily waited longer, written a longer book with far more characterization. Instead, she decided to throw away most of the events of previous books and canon in some whimsical "lol humans are bad kill them before they kill us and the brutes are waaaay better and more loyal" and "lol let's totally prove this right".

I was saying with "I read it in two hours" that it could have AND SHOULD HAVE been longer, more developed, and more researched.

  • 11.06.2011 2:51 PM PDT


Posted by: GnadeMasta

Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: GnadeMasta

Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: Xd00999


Suddenly demoting a half-dozen major characters into minor ones is okay?
Olivia and Ash were never really "Main characters" and for the purpose of Glasslands, yes, having Fred, Linda, Kelly, and Tom be somewhat lesser characters is fine. This story wasn't focused on them. Its hard to tell a story, especially a story with three main plot lines, if you have more than like 6 main characters. And that number was being pushed already.


Halsey stealing the Spartans away proves that she has come to terms with herself. She wouldn't do something like that without knowing exactly what she was doing. And then all of a sudden she says "herp, we gotta get outta here." Traviss completely demolished Halsey and rebuilt her from the ground up. Fred (who would have taken charge of the whole damn thing) is left a bumbling idiot, just following Halsey around.

"Just ODST's?" You're as bad as Traviss. She gives us these characters and does -blam!- to flesh them out. Their only purpose is to BE there. Fillers. That's stupid.

At the end of GoO, I thought it was blatently obvious Ash was going to become a main character. Olivia, obviously not, but Ash was getting some serious face-time.'

How many lines did Kelly get? Linda? Olivia? Hell, Prone To Drift has more characterization than them.

More than six main characters is difficult? lol. Epic lol. It took me TWO HOURS to read Glasslands. That's a joke.

Halsey was stealing the spartans to try and save what soul she had left. She wanted to get out only when she found technology that would help the UNSC.

And how could Fred take charge? They are in a forerunner constructed world, how would Fred know anything of what to do. Following Halsey was the right thing since she had the most knowledge on the matter.

The ODSTs are just ODSTs, but Vaz had good characterization and relations with other characters. The other two ODSTs weren't focused on at all.

I never even noticed anything saying Ash would be a main character in GoO. He was just a character that was somewhat more in the spotlight.

Prone had more lines because he actually mattered to the story at hand. None of the Spartans other than Naomi and Lucy NEEDED any lines. They weren't essential to what the story was expressing. My favorite character was Kelly in the Nylund books and I was bummed that she wasn't in it more. But It still was a very good book. Its like your saying LOTR The Third Age sucked for the single reason that it wasn't focused on the characters of the books/movies.

And what does you reading it in two hours have anything to do with the amount of characters? Its difficult writing a cohesive novel with six main characters in less than 500 pages. I personally don't care how long it took you to read the book.


Exactly. Halsey knew exactly what she was doing, and why. There's no need for her to spazz out, unless she was having power surges up the yin-yang. Finding the Forerunner tech still shouldn't have shaken her that much. The Covenant was at Earth. She would have figured that they were done for.

They were in a survival situation. Spartans are trained for that. Instead, they just get led around, poking into rooms randomly, taking insanely stupid risks, et cetera.

These characters need fleshing out. Traviss could have easily waited longer, written a longer book with far more characterization. Instead, she decided to throw away most of the events of previous books and canon in some whimsical "lol humans are bad kill them before they kill us and the brutes are waaaay better and more loyal" and "lol let's totally prove this right".

I was saying with "I read it in two hours" that it could have AND SHOULD HAVE been longer, more developed, and more researched.

I really can't take you seriously because you thought processes just seem so flawed on cohesive story telling and real life situations. And also, spelling out et cetera does not make you sound any smarter. Just saying that etc. is a much quicker and less pretentious way of saying it.

[Edited on 11.06.2011 3:03 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 3:01 PM PDT
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Posted by: DecepticonCobra

We are all going to get banned aren't we?


Posted by: atcommando94
Now I loved the Republic Commando novels by Karen Traviss and all the Halo novels by Eric Nylund.

Many people are whining about how Halsey is being viewed as a war criminal and a monster by some. Well, she did essentially kidnap a bunch of 6 year old children and indoctrinate them, experiment on them, and essentially kill some of them. Plus replaced them with flash clones that had an extremely high chance of death.


Then there is the branching character POVs and storylines. First off, why can't people stay with the branching storyline style? Its only three separate main stories. In which it follows many characters showing their views on the situation. The only parts I found dull were the Sangheili parts having to do with politics, which even though dull had their place in the story.



1. Was their any significance for you saying you like all the 3 books Eric did out of the ten or so halo books? Because naturally you are going to get flak for saying something stupid as that because normally people who don't know anything about halo say crap like that. Then again this was just another irrelevant part of your post.


2. Did you forget the part were Halesy did every lick of that minus the clones with government permission and funding? Not to mention this was done to combat the innies who were nuking citys and bombing everything in site. You love Eric's books but don't remember the content im them. funny.

3. You hate the elite part because it isn't action orientated like Eric's novels? go figure.

  • 11.06.2011 3:11 PM PDT


Posted by: grey101

Posted by: atcommando94
Now I loved the Republic Commando novels by Karen Traviss and all the Halo novels by Eric Nylund.

Many people are whining about how Halsey is being viewed as a war criminal and a monster by some. Well, she did essentially kidnap a bunch of 6 year old children and indoctrinate them, experiment on them, and essentially kill some of them. Plus replaced them with flash clones that had an extremely high chance of death.


Then there is the branching character POVs and storylines. First off, why can't people stay with the branching storyline style? Its only three separate main stories. In which it follows many characters showing their views on the situation. The only parts I found dull were the Sangheili parts having to do with politics, which even though dull had their place in the story.



1. Was their any significance for you saying you like all the 3 books Eric did out of the ten or so halo books? Because naturally you are going to get flak for saying something stupid as that because normally people who don't know anything about halo say crap like that. Then again this was just another irrelevant part of your post.


2. Did you forget the part were Halesy did every lick of that minus the clones with government permission and funding? Not to mention this was done to combat the innies who were nuking citys and bombing everything in site. You love Eric's books but don't remember the content im them. funny.

3. You hate the elite part because it isn't action orientated like Eric's novels? go figure.

What is your problem? I'm not looking for you approval of what I said. Why not actually contribute to the thread instead of berating me for no reason. But I will humor you.

1. I said it because Glasslands is more a direct sequel to Nylund's novels than any of the other Halo novels. I know quite a bit about Halo and have read many of the other books, but I didn't find it necessary to mention those because they are completely irrelevant, unlike the Nylund statement which I found somewhat relevant.

2. I'm sorry I didn't mention that? I remembered it, but wasn't really writing every little specific. With what I actually said I'd think would be enough to get my point across. I love Nylund's books and remember the vast majority of the content, so who are you to judge from one post?

3. Did I say I hate the Elite part? Nope. I didn't. I said I found them dull. That by no means translates to hate. I found the movie The Godfather dull, but it is still one of the best movies I have ever seen. Dull just means not very intriguing or exciting.

Seriously, it sounds like you are a tough guy trying to start a fight. Take it somewhere else.

EDIT: It also seems that you are implying I didn't like Glasslands, when I did like it very much so.

[Edited on 11.06.2011 3:25 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 3:22 PM PDT

United Armed Forces


Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: GnadeMasta

Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: GnadeMasta

Posted by: atcommando94
Olivia and Ash were never really "Main characters" and for the purpose of Glasslands, yes, having Fred, Linda, Kelly, and Tom be somewhat lesser characters is fine. This story wasn't focused on them. Its hard to tell a story, especially a story with three main plot lines, if you have more than like 6 main characters. And that number was being pushed already.


Halsey stealing the Spartans away proves that she has come to terms with herself. She wouldn't do something like that without knowing exactly what she was doing. And then all of a sudden she says "herp, we gotta get outta here." Traviss completely demolished Halsey and rebuilt her from the ground up. Fred (who would have taken charge of the whole damn thing) is left a bumbling idiot, just following Halsey around.

"Just ODST's?" You're as bad as Traviss. She gives us these characters and does -blam!- to flesh them out. Their only purpose is to BE there. Fillers. That's stupid.

At the end of GoO, I thought it was blatently obvious Ash was going to become a main character. Olivia, obviously not, but Ash was getting some serious face-time.'

How many lines did Kelly get? Linda? Olivia? Hell, Prone To Drift has more characterization than them.

More than six main characters is difficult? lol. Epic lol. It took me TWO HOURS to read Glasslands. That's a joke.

Halsey was stealing the spartans to try and save what soul she had left. She wanted to get out only when she found technology that would help the UNSC.

And how could Fred take charge? They are in a forerunner constructed world, how would Fred know anything of what to do. Following Halsey was the right thing since she had the most knowledge on the matter.

The ODSTs are just ODSTs, but Vaz had good characterization and relations with other characters. The other two ODSTs weren't focused on at all.

I never even noticed anything saying Ash would be a main character in GoO. He was just a character that was somewhat more in the spotlight.

Prone had more lines because he actually mattered to the story at hand. None of the Spartans other than Naomi and Lucy NEEDED any lines. They weren't essential to what the story was expressing. My favorite character was Kelly in the Nylund books and I was bummed that she wasn't in it more. But It still was a very good book. Its like your saying LOTR The Third Age sucked for the single reason that it wasn't focused on the characters of the books/movies.

And what does you reading it in two hours have anything to do with the amount of characters? Its difficult writing a cohesive novel with six main characters in less than 500 pages. I personally don't care how long it took you to read the book.


Exactly. Halsey knew exactly what she was doing, and why. There's no need for her to spazz out, unless she was having power surges up the yin-yang. Finding the Forerunner tech still shouldn't have shaken her that much. The Covenant was at Earth. She would have figured that they were done for.

They were in a survival situation. Spartans are trained for that. Instead, they just get led around, poking into rooms randomly, taking insanely stupid risks, et cetera.

These characters need fleshing out. Traviss could have easily waited longer, written a longer book with far more characterization. Instead, she decided to throw away most of the events of previous books and canon in some whimsical "lol humans are bad kill them before they kill us and the brutes are waaaay better and more loyal" and "lol let's totally prove this right".

I was saying with "I read it in two hours" that it could have AND SHOULD HAVE been longer, more developed, and more researched.

I really can't take you seriously because you thought processes just seem so flawed on cohesive story telling and real life situations. And also, spelling out et cetera does not make you sound any smarter. Just saying that etc. is a much quicker and less pretentious way of saying it.


I'm sorry if you think that.

Oh, and I always spell it "et cetera." Habit. Nothing else. I'm sorry if you think I'm being "pretentious".

  • 11.06.2011 3:29 PM PDT
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Posted by: DecepticonCobra

We are all going to get banned aren't we?


Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: grey101

Posted by: atcommando94
Now I loved the Republic Commando novels by Karen Traviss and all the Halo novels by Eric Nylund.

Many people are whining about how Halsey is being viewed as a war criminal and a monster by some. Well, she did essentially kidnap a bunch of 6 year old children and indoctrinate them, experiment on them, and essentially kill some of them. Plus replaced them with flash clones that had an extremely high chance of death.


Then there is the branching character POVs and storylines. First off, why can't people stay with the branching storyline style? Its only three separate main stories. In which it follows many characters showing their views on the situation. The only parts I found dull were the Sangheili parts having to do with politics, which even though dull had their place in the story.



1. Was their any significance for you saying you like all the 3 books Eric did out of the ten or so halo books? Because naturally you are going to get flak for saying something stupid as that because normally people who don't know anything about halo say crap like that. Then again this was just another irrelevant part of your post.


2. Did you forget the part were Halesy did every lick of that minus the clones with government permission and funding? Not to mention this was done to combat the innies who were nuking citys and bombing everything in site. You love Eric's books but don't remember the content im them. funny.

3. You hate the elite part because it isn't action orientated like Eric's novels? go figure.

What is your problem? I'm not looking for you approval of what I said. Why not actually contribute to the thread instead of berating me for no reason. But I will humor you.

1. I said it because Glasslands is more a direct sequel to Nylund's novels than any of the other Halo novels. I know quite a bit about Halo and have read many of the other books, but I didn't find it necessary to mention those because they are completely irrelevant, unlike the Nylund statement which I found somewhat relevant.

2. I'm sorry I didn't mention that? I remembered it, but wasn't really writing every little specific. With what I actually said I'd think would be enough to get my point across. I love Nylund's books and remember the vast majority of the content, so who are you to judge from one post?

3. Did I say I hate the Elite part? Nope. I didn't. I said I found them dull. That by no means translates to hate. I found the movie The Godfather dull, but it is still one of the best movies I have ever seen. Dull just means not very intriguing or exciting.

Seriously, it sounds like you are a tough guy trying to start a fight. Take it somewhere else.

EDIT: It also seems that you are implying I didn't like Glasslands, which I did very much so.


1. please elaborate on how Glasslands was "a direct sequel" to Eric's novels when this a direct sequel to GoO set in the post-war timeframe.

2.This isn't relevant to your question whatsoever.This is like saying you like powerpuff girls and then asking how to fix a plasma tv.


3.Your point? The only thing in this post that is relevant whatsoever is your statements on halesy. Even then anybody that has read the main books,GoO and Glasslands should understand what is going on here.

The issue with the book is that instead of showing both sides of the "moral" dilemma we are shown one side which is all based on the fact that halesy cloned kids.


You should clean up the OP because nothing in it really serves a purpose.

  • 11.06.2011 3:31 PM PDT


Posted by: grey101

Posted by: atcommando94

Posted by: grey101

Posted by: atcommando94
Now I loved the Republic Commando novels by Karen Traviss and all the Halo novels by Eric Nylund.

Many people are whining about how Halsey is being viewed as a war criminal and a monster by some. Well, she did essentially kidnap a bunch of 6 year old children and indoctrinate them, experiment on them, and essentially kill some of them. Plus replaced them with flash clones that had an extremely high chance of death.


Then there is the branching character POVs and storylines. First off, why can't people stay with the branching storyline style? Its only three separate main stories. In which it follows many characters showing their views on the situation. The only parts I found dull were the Sangheili parts having to do with politics, which even though dull had their place in the story.



1. Was their any significance for you saying you like all the 3 books Eric did out of the ten or so halo books? Because naturally you are going to get flak for saying something stupid as that because normally people who don't know anything about halo say crap like that. Then again this was just another irrelevant part of your post.


2. Did you forget the part were Halesy did every lick of that minus the clones with government permission and funding? Not to mention this was done to combat the innies who were nuking citys and bombing everything in site. You love Eric's books but don't remember the content im them. funny.

3. You hate the elite part because it isn't action orientated like Eric's novels? go figure.

What is your problem? I'm not looking for you approval of what I said. Why not actually contribute to the thread instead of berating me for no reason. But I will humor you.

1. I said it because Glasslands is more a direct sequel to Nylund's novels than any of the other Halo novels. I know quite a bit about Halo and have read many of the other books, but I didn't find it necessary to mention those because they are completely irrelevant, unlike the Nylund statement which I found somewhat relevant.

2. I'm sorry I didn't mention that? I remembered it, but wasn't really writing every little specific. With what I actually said I'd think would be enough to get my point across. I love Nylund's books and remember the vast majority of the content, so who are you to judge from one post?

3. Did I say I hate the Elite part? Nope. I didn't. I said I found them dull. That by no means translates to hate. I found the movie The Godfather dull, but it is still one of the best movies I have ever seen. Dull just means not very intriguing or exciting.

Seriously, it sounds like you are a tough guy trying to start a fight. Take it somewhere else.

EDIT: It also seems that you are implying I didn't like Glasslands, which I did very much so.


1. please elaborate on how Glasslands was "a direct sequel" to Eric's novels when this a direct sequel to GoO set in the post-war timeframe.

2.This isn't relevant to your question whatsoever.This is like saying you like powerpuff girls and then asking how to fix a plasma tv.


3.Your point? The only thing in this post that is relevant whatsoever is your statements on halesy. Even then anybody that has read the main books,GoO and Glasslands should understand what is going on here.

The issue with the book is that instead of showing both sides of the "moral" dilemma we are shown one side which is all based on the fact that halesy cloned kids.


You should clean up the OP because nothing in it really serves a purpose.


1. Eric Nylund wrote GoO. Therefor a sequel to his book.

2. I stated it because it is one of the main things people are whining about who don't like the book. Completely relevant.

3. Your the one who came at me in a hostile manner about what I said about the Elite thing. Now you are saying its not relevant and has no point?

And to the rest of your post, ok? Thanks for your opinion. Thats all that this thread was asking for and it took two posts of berating nothing to get there. You can leave now.

And everything I said in the OP was just talking about the main problems most people seem to have with the novel, which I find completely relevant.


[Edited on 11.06.2011 3:43 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 3:41 PM PDT
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Posted by: DecepticonCobra

We are all going to get banned aren't we?

I wasn't being hostile at all, you just chose to stuck with it and complain about that rather than focus on my answers.


Again. the issue with halesy was completely stupid and forced down our throats and nobody likes how the elites are portrayed as a whole. Especially them still liking the "loyal brutes" despite the fact there was suppose to be a "deep hatred", They killed off alot of the Sangheili council, and they Ate the Sangheili.

So why is it that the Elites are fine with them but not the humans that stood by them in the last hours?


The "Loyal Brute" idea isn't a bad one but just like the Brutes taking the Elites role and failing in halo 3 they are taking the Lekgolo's role and failing.

  • 11.06.2011 3:49 PM PDT


Posted by: grey101
I wasn't being hostile at all, you just chose to stuck with it and complain about that rather than focus on my answers.


Again. the issue with halesy was completely stupid and forced down our throats and nobody likes how the elites are portrayed as a whole. Especially them still liking the "loyal brutes" despite the fact there was suppose to be a "deep hatred", They killed off alot of the Sangheili council, and they Ate the Sangheili.

So why is it that the Elites are fine with them but not the humans that stood by them in the last hours?


The "Loyal Brute" idea isn't a bad one but just like the Brutes taking the Elites role and failing in halo 3 they are taking the Lekgolo's role and failing.

Id say "You hate the elite part because it isn't action orientated like Eric's novels? go figure." is pretty hostile. And ok to the rest of the post.

If you actually want me to answer that question, the humans and Elites were fighting for some 20 years. You cant forget bad blood like that over a single peace treaty. Its like saying World War 2 went on for the same amount of time and at the very end everyone wants to make peace out of thin air.

[Edited on 11.06.2011 4:02 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 3:59 PM PDT
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Posted by: DecepticonCobra

We are all going to get banned aren't we?

Stop whining about whether i am being hostile or not and just discuss.


That isn't what it is about though and if you read what i said you would see that. The Elites and Brutes hated Each other for far longer than the war went on yet they are going to turn to them? Along with the fact for some reason "all" elites think we are liars and can never be trusted.

I am for new perspectives but the Elite hate stems from the fact they now have to depend on themselves rather than the covenant and hate humanity for making them work.
This is supported by the Elites not wanting us to colonize because we are "vermin" and they think we will infest the galaxy.
Which is odd because we only had a few hundreds worlds which would equate to only a dozen or so systems. Yet they were spacefaring Eons before us and should have thousands of planets.


So The logic is "We hate you because we couldn't find your worlds and destroy you. Since we couldn't this is the price we have to pay yet if we did the grunts would be plowing our fields now.".

Which is completely stupid and irrational.

  • 11.06.2011 4:14 PM PDT
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Posted by: DecepticonCobra
*One-dimensional characters/factions
*A big middle finger to the Great Schism
*Huge technological leaps 3 months after a 20+ year war because we got Forerunner technology!

We've explained this all in multiple threads. If it's that hard to understand, then you'll never get it.


I'll give my own explanation for this, may as well share my thoughts with you guys.

I didn't think the characters or the factions were one dimensional at all. Characters like Vaz and Naomi have so much depth to them. Even the Radical Elite faction at many times showed a bit more depth.

Moreover, its a trilogy and you can clearly see the stuff hidden for the next 2 books to unravel.

As to the Great Schism being ruined, I don't think so. At the start of the Civil War, there was no grand scale order issued to every Brute alive to kill their nearest Elite. Its all trust and who you take your orders from, just like every real world war. The Brutes under the Prophets and some of the Brutes under those guys fought the Elites. After the Elites came out as the dominant force and win, we have 2 scenarios

1. There are still antagonistic Brute forces out there that the Elites are slowly wiping out.
2. There are Brutes who were either loyal to their Elites from the beginning of the Covenant, or surrendered after the Schism, or seeing the outcome of the Schism, were too afraid to rebel against the Elites. The Elites made use of these guys for their labor.

All this is clearly spelt out in the book and its an acceptable outcome because more or less, that's what happens after a war here on Earth as well. There are always stragglers in the enemy, and there's always a few of the enemy who begin to cooperate with former enemies out of fear, self-defense, or a little bit of both.

Technological leaps and stuff? Sure maybe its a bit tough to accept at first but you got to remember two things:

1. All these technological improvements were already being worked on during the war itself. No one waits for the war to end before applying new stuff. They start work on it during the war in hopes that it might give them an upper hand. Examples of advancements in technology during the war due to Covenant and Forerunner findings would include the Spartan Laser as well as the energy shielding for the Spartans' armor. After a war, the rate of these improvements are more than likely to increase and with newfound Forerunner expertise, it'll be faster than ever.

And then there's ONI. I'd bet ONI's been doing their own R&D for a while now. Hell, the Infinity was in slow development throughout the entire war and no one knew. Suffice to say, humanity's technological leaps came, in some form, from ONI's secret dealings and technology as well.

ONI was also in possession of one other Engineer before the events of Glasslands: The Engineer from Halo 3: ODST that Buck's squad recovered. Maybe not explicitly mentioned in the novel, and maybe it never will, but that's one way humanity's technology has been improving so rapidly.

2. The Halo fiction has gone a long way to establish that Humanity adapts very fast. Very simple.

There.

EDIT: To add onto the earlier discussion as to why Buck's squad from ODST was not used, I think it was to prevent any discussion on morals among the fanbase. Buck's Squad has had interaction with the Engineers and hence probably have a soft spot for those guys. You put them in a scenario where they encounter Engineers again and have to consider giving it back to ONI, or killing it, morally it puts them in a tough spot. Also, Karen Traviss didn't want the entire squad so she didn't wanna split the team up, maybe? The ODSTs in Buck's squad also aren't so much well-defined characters. Sure they have a backstory and all that, but Karen Traviss makes it a point to not play the games she writes, so chances are she didn't know those characters enough to even consider putting them in over her own original creations, with whom she would have no limits to expand to her own liking. Using the established ODST characters would mean that at some point, some crazy is gonna stand up and make a big fuss about how he doesn't like the characterization of Romeo in the book, leading to a bunch of other problems. I guess 343 and Karen just wanted to avoid all that.

[Edited on 11.06.2011 5:23 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 5:14 PM PDT

Welcome to bungie, you have no rights. play nice!
CLICK!

Finally some reinforcements!

  • 11.06.2011 5:33 PM PDT


Posted by: Sanjeev

Posted by: DecepticonCobra
*One-dimensional characters/factions
*A big middle finger to the Great Schism
*Huge technological leaps 3 months after a 20+ year war because we got Forerunner technology!

We've explained this all in multiple threads. If it's that hard to understand, then you'll never get it.


I'll give my own explanation for this, may as well share my thoughts with you guys.

I didn't think the characters or the factions were one dimensional at all. Characters like Vaz and Naomi have so much depth to them. Even the Radical Elite faction at many times showed a bit more depth.

Moreover, its a trilogy and you can clearly see the stuff hidden for the next 2 books to unravel.

As to the Great Schism being ruined, I don't think so. At the start of the Civil War, there was no grand scale order issued to every Brute alive to kill their nearest Elite. Its all trust and who you take your orders from, just like every real world war. The Brutes under the Prophets and some of the Brutes under those guys fought the Elites. After the Elites came out as the dominant force and win, we have 2 scenarios

1. There are still antagonistic Brute forces out there that the Elites are slowly wiping out.
2. There are Brutes who were either loyal to their Elites from the beginning of the Covenant, or surrendered after the Schism, or seeing the outcome of the Schism, were too afraid to rebel against the Elites. The Elites made use of these guys for their labor.

All this is clearly spelt out in the book and its an acceptable outcome because more or less, that's what happens after a war here on Earth as well. There are always stragglers in the enemy, and there's always a few of the enemy who begin to cooperate with former enemies out of fear, self-defense, or a little bit of both.

Technological leaps and stuff? Sure maybe its a bit tough to accept at first but you got to remember two things:

1. All these technological improvements were already being worked on during the war itself. No one waits for the war to end before applying new stuff. They start work on it during the war in hopes that it might give them an upper hand. Examples of advancements in technology during the war due to Covenant and Forerunner findings would include the Spartan Laser as well as the energy shielding for the Spartans' armor. After a war, the rate of these improvements are more than likely to increase and with newfound Forerunner expertise, it'll be faster than ever.

And then there's ONI. I'd bet ONI's been doing their own R&D for a while now. Hell, the Infinity was in slow development throughout the entire war and no one knew. Suffice to say, humanity's technological leaps came, in some form, from ONI's secret dealings and technology as well.

ONI was also in possession of one other Engineer before the events of Glasslands: The Engineer from Halo 3: ODST that Buck's squad recovered. Maybe not explicitly mentioned in the novel, and maybe it never will, but that's one way humanity's technology has been improving so rapidly.

2. The Halo fiction has gone a long way to establish that Humanity adapts very fast. Very simple.

There.

EDIT: To add onto the earlier discussion as to why Buck's squad from ODST was not used, I think it was to prevent any discussion on morals among the fanbase. Buck's Squad has had interaction with the Engineers and hence probably have a soft spot for those guys. You put them in a scenario where they encounter Engineers again and have to consider giving it back to ONI, or killing it, morally it puts them in a tough spot. Also, Karen Traviss didn't want the entire squad so she didn't wanna split the team up, maybe? The ODSTs in Buck's squad also aren't so much well-defined characters. Sure they have a backstory and all that, but Karen Traviss makes it a point to not play the games she writes, so chances are she didn't know those characters enough to even consider putting them in over her own original creations, with whom she would have no limits to expand to her own liking. Using the established ODST characters would mean that at some point, some crazy is gonna stand up and make a big fuss about how he doesn't like the characterization of Romeo in the book, leading to a bunch of other problems. I guess 343 and Karen just wanted to avoid all that.

Thank you sir. Pretty much what I've been getting at piece by piece all put together with a nice bow on top.

  • 11.06.2011 6:46 PM PDT

It seems that you sycophants from Halo Waypoint really love to muck trash.

Normally, Halo books do pretty well on Amazon, but after two dozen reviews, Traviss' book is getting trashed.I've never seen a Halo novel get this much bad press within a week of its release. But for good reasons of course, Traviss has done to Halo what she has done to Star Wars. It's a trend people,she's done this before. And if she's nice enough, she'll give you the same rude replies she gave Star Wars readers.

Hell, here's the best review I found on Amazon:
Karen Traviss has a rather interesting history writing tie-in novels for a number of well-respected science fiction properties, from the wildly popular like Star Wars, to testosterone-laden splatterfests like Gears of War. She is known for ignoring important details from the canon and basically creating things from whole cloth to fill the gaps, out of fear of becoming too fond of and familiar with the universe she's writing books for and proceeding to coddle it lovingly or something dreadful like that.

I almost don't know where to begin. Some fans - me among them - say that Eric Nylund set the bar high with his neutral, technical-sounding tone and jargon-laden narrative and dialogue. In contrast, Karen Traviss's writing style is typical liberal arts major stuff, and hardly belongs anywhere near a work of military science fiction. Writers of her caliber have a tendency to turn grizzled soldiers into the Brady Bunch, making them seem like less of an actual military force and more of a family. You go from Nylund's books to Traviss's, and suddenly, all the characters have forgotten military hand signals, the NATO phonetic alphabet, call signs and the chain of command.

The early parts of the book deal with the formation of an ONI team to disrupt Elite society (or Sangheili, if you prefer; they're the big alien dudes with the four mandibles we all know and love from the games) by supplying arms to separatists and religious fundamentalists. That's interesting in and of itself, but there's more. The team is being led by an incredibly imposing woman named Serin Osman who could very well have ended up being a SPARTAN-II, but washed out of the program at the augmentation stage due to her body rejecting the surgery. They are accompanied by a SPARTAN-II (Naomi), three eminently forgettable Orbital Drop Shock Troopers (Mal Geffen, Vasily Beloi and Lian Deveraux), a civilian anthropologist (Evan Phillips) with an interest in Sangheili society who acts as their interpreter (probably the most unique and compelling character out of the entire cast), and an AI (named Black-Box) who prefers to manifest itself as a hologram of a box instead of the more anthropomorphic forms favored by most other AIs. I liked the AI quite a bit. His gibes and cynical comments got a chuckle out of me.

We follow Captain Osman and her ensemble as they sow discord in the ranks of the Sangheili, capitalizing on their differences in order to greatly reduce the threat they presented to humanity. She does it all at the behest of her mentor, the shady Admiral Margaret Parangosky (one of Nylund's characters from Ghosts of Onyx; basically like a mash-up of Margaret Thatcher and John Parangosky, if you can imagine something so terrifying), head of the UNSC's much-feared Office of Naval Intelligence (think CIA, but about ten times more unethical). The book also provides a few intriguing looks at Sangheili society, as well as how poorly they're faring after the dissolution of the Covenant's command structure near the end of the war. Their society had specialized themselves in fighting and fighting alone, leaving the other more mundane tasks to the other client races of the Covenant, who they employed as servants. Now that they couldn't rely on the other client races, they soon came to the horrific realization that they simply didn't have enough scientists and engineers to keep their civilization afloat. This ends up being far more interesting than anything else in the book.

The story also follows up on Catherine E. Halsey (the head of the SPARTAN-II program), CPO Mendez (the guy who trained the SPARTAN-IIs and IIIs) and a few SPARTAN-IIs and IIIs that escaped into the Forerunner Shield World at the end of Ghosts of Onyx, which is a massive Dyson Sphere contained within a dimensional bubble. Think of a giant panic room, and you get the picture. Well, to make a long story short, it's loaded with Forerunner technology. They sure stumbled on a real goldmine, they did.

By about the middle of the book, things start going pear-shaped. Serin Osman - who still carries a bit of a grudge against Halsey due to washing out of the SPARTAN-II program and later coming to understand Halsey's twisted, antisocial personality for what it was - starts spilling the beans on the program's details to the ODSTs and even the civilian specialist they brought along, who are understandably quite horrified.

Though the results of the program are difficult to argue with, the details would indeed sicken anybody. I can't imagine what it would be like to live in that world and learn that these power-armored men and women were abducted at age six, put through brutal training and experiments, and sent to fight an insurrection. Not the Covenant, but other human beings. That's just plain grotesque, as I'm sure you'll agree.

However, this is the point where my willing suspension of disbelief was obliterated. That's classified information she's spreading to unprivileged ears. Nobody talks about the SPARTAN-II program to anybody outside the ONI's circle of trust, which doesn't extend very far. The program was created with the tacit - if not explicit - approval of ONI, Parangosky, and every member of the Reach military brass involved in it. Here, Traviss pretends that Halsey was the only one who knew anything about the program's gory details, and that everyone else in the Office of Naval Intelligence was just an unwitting bystander. Nylund's version of Halsey was given carte blanche to do whatever it took to stop the rebellion in its tracks, and she delivered on that mandate with the wildly-unethical SPARTAN-II program. In a way, the results of the program were something to be admired; humans that could sprint at up to sixty kilometers an hour and pound a motorcycle in half with their bare hands, to say nothing of what they'd do to the not-so-fortunate individuals - human or alien - who stood between them and the completion of their orders.

When Nylund was writing, he gave you the impression that what Halsey did was indeed wrong, but left the audience to form their own opinions. Traviss does not. She almost immediately starts in by literally using her own characters as mouthpieces to compare Halsey to Mengele. I'm not joking; we're talking actual LITERAL Mengele references. It makes the book read less like a book and more like a forum debate between fans, or a piece of criticism on prior works in the series. Clearly, Traviss has some ideological differences with the character in question and felt the need to use her writing to slag off on and otherwise beat the tar out of Halsey with one indignity after another. Furthermore, she goes out of her way to depict the SPARTAN-IIs and IIIs as a league of damaged man-children and shrinking violets instead of the hardened, stoic, veteran super-soldiers Nylund gave us. Typical bleeding-heart stuff.

In many ways, this is where me and Karen Traviss differ on how the plot should be handled. Let me give it to you straight; I don't much buy into all that idealism crap. The world we live in is not ideal. It's full of sociopaths who get off scott-free doing horrible things to other people, leaving others none the wiser. Halo always struck me as one of those sorts of stories; the ones where the idea of karma didn't exist, and we weren't force-fed a bunch of annoying, preachy mumbo-jumbo that was clearly written just to satisfy the author's own conscience.

Traviss also uses more contemporary jargon. They use credits. She uses dollars. They say holo-vids. She says movies. They say Smart AI. She just shortens it to AI. She also has the Sangheili occasionally using human phrases and expressions and verbally calling attention to the fact that they're using human phrases and expressions. That's downright cringe-worthy.

In summary, I probably would have had a much higher opinion of this book if it weren't a Halo novel. Traviss's writing style is actually not that bad. It's quite engaging in places. On the other hand, I could barely shake off the urge to vomit at what she - and others like her - are doing to the Halo universe. They're taking a series that prided itself on its utilitarian, ends-justify-the-means aesthetic, and trying to turn it into literature meant to be "read by grownups" (whatever that's supposed to mean), as Traviss put it in her Twitter feed when she rebuffed a Halo fan's criticism. If you're reading this, Karen, I hope you understand that I find your treatment of the work to be infinitely more stomach-churning than anything Halsey ever did.






[Edited on 11.06.2011 8:28 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 8:24 PM PDT

Posted by: Ushan
Because Muslims surgically implant organic bombs in their testicles, which in turn will be injected into women during sex, which will grow into BABY BOMBS!

@Post above

That's just plain heavy criticism, although I do see the critics points about some of it such as Halsey's attitude and the lack of specific military/technological jargon that Nylund uses but I'm still enjoying the book a lot. I also quite like how Kilo Five often joke around together, it makes them seem more human.

This is not an English lecture and we are not writing critical essays about the story. People should simply enjoy the story and not nitpick over some things.

[Edited on 11.06.2011 9:05 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 9:04 PM PDT


Posted by: Tucker 051
@Post above

This is not an English lecture and we are not writing critical essays about the story. People should simply enjoy the story and not nitpick over some things.


So there are no standards for writing then? It's no wonder that people like Spartan 100 exist.

There's such a thing called quality writing and competent storytelling (which entails researching source material and reading your predecessor's works)



[Edited on 11.06.2011 9:25 PM PST]

  • 11.06.2011 9:23 PM PDT

I read the first few chapters in and issue of OXM... I liked it. Can't wait to get the full novel.

  • 11.06.2011 10:19 PM PDT


Posted by: A Puzzled Mind

Posted by: Tucker 051
@Post above

This is not an English lecture and we are not writing critical essays about the story. People should simply enjoy the story and not nitpick over some things.


So there are no standards for writing then? It's no wonder that people like Spartan 100 exist.

There's such a thing called quality writing and competent storytelling (which entails researching source material and reading your predecessor's works)


And Glasslands is a quality story with competent storytelling IMO.

And Spartan 100?

[Edited on 11.07.2011 1:20 PM PST]

  • 11.07.2011 1:20 PM PDT

Posted by: Ushan
Because Muslims surgically implant organic bombs in their testicles, which in turn will be injected into women during sex, which will grow into BABY BOMBS!

Posted by: atcommando94
And Spartan 100?
He's referring to one of the members here. He posted up top somewhere.

  • 11.07.2011 1:28 PM PDT


Posted by: Tucker 051
Posted by: atcommando94
And Spartan 100?
He's referring to one of the members here. He posted up top somewhere.

Ah. I thought he was talking about a character in Halo canon I may never have heard of.

[Edited on 11.07.2011 1:32 PM PST]

  • 11.07.2011 1:32 PM PDT

@spaboolly

I think one of the biggest issues, which goes along with what some others have said about the Spartans' characters being completely slashed, is the way the book was written. At any given time, it is confined to one perspective of a much-larger, character-dense issue. Not once, in the entire book, was the situation shown from a Spartan perspective. The one exception is Lucy, because in her case there was no other alternative. You could say Osman's an exception, but she's not really a part of the Spartan program, so I wouldn't consider her to be able to show the Spartan mindset.

This, to me, says that Traviss did not consider the Spartans important characters. And if she wanted to write a book that got away from Spartans, she should have written a different story that didn't involve them. The Spartans are made to look like children most of the time. She even acknowledges that in the book when Vaz (I think) is caught up in how they only have first names.

The shouting matches between Mendez and Halsey got old pretty quick. It might have been different if she had shown them from a different point of view some of the time, but it was always tunnel-visioned on Halsey and Mendez. The others didn't even seem to find it especially important. Fred I think said something once (in one of his maybe 6 lines), but nothing important.

I think criminalizing Halsey was justified, but the way in which it was shown was somewhat farfetched and even anticlimactic.

The ODST's, Naomi, and some of the Sangheili were so bland and generic that I didn't even feel compelled to pay attention to which one was doing what. Just extra characters. And Phillips... I got the impression Traviss had no idea what she wanted to do with him half the time. His (for lack of a better word) personality seemed to be all over the place. Osman's too. In the beginning, she seemed cold and calculating. Strictly loyal to ONI and never did anything without a reason. But then she just goes throwing around classified information (basically just to enhance the "let's all hate on Halsey" theme).

The Sangheili are far too human. You could tell that their parts were not considered from an alien perspective. Had I read a book about the end of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War, it would have been exactly the same. Without the spaceships. Also, it didn't have much of a scifi feel to it at all. There was not much creativity as far as the cultures, characters, settings, etc.

I knew long before the book came out that I probably wouldn't like it. And my reason for that is the same as my explanation for the points I've made above. I've met Karen Traviss. I was in the front row of the Halo Universe Fiction panel at PAX. And she said herself that she had gone into this completely blind. She didn't care about the characters. She didn't understand how a lot of Halo fans feel about them and about the universe in general and how it should be depicted. She simply found the concepts of ONI and Dr. Halsey interesting to tinker with.

Which, at the expense of forsaking the established and beloved characters, was exactly what she did. She did that pretty well, but I just don't think Glasslands was a fitting sequel to Ghosts of Onyx. Like I said earlier, if she wanted to write a book about ONI, she should have left the Ghosts of Onyx storyline alone as much as possible.

Edit: Didn't see it before cause it took awhile to type this, but I would completely agree with the review posted above. I think Traviss might have some juxtaposition issues with Halsey.

[Edited on 11.07.2011 6:53 PM PST]

  • 11.07.2011 6:44 PM PDT

I hate reading but its halo and that is worth reading.

  • 11.07.2011 6:50 PM PDT
  • gamertag: [none]
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Member of Bungie.net for nearly three years, still continuing!

Enjoy what you have and live on.

My gamertag is Elder Bias

OP. My opinion is that Glasslands sucked.

End of story. Cobra and Herr sums up what I am against the Glasslands.

  • 11.07.2011 6:53 PM PDT

"Find where the liar hides, so that I may place my boot between his gums!" - Rtas 'Vadum

Posted by: A Puzzled Mind
Hell, here's the best review I found on Amazon:

For interest's sake, the same dude who wrote that discusses it at length here, and Frankie chips in too about half way down.

[Edited on 11.07.2011 7:13 PM PST]

  • 11.07.2011 7:11 PM PDT


Posted by: atcommando94

TL: DR-

Why didn't people like Halo Glasslands?


Because it sucked.

  • 11.07.2011 7:17 PM PDT

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