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Subject: 343 GS Ideas. (some Marathon stuff too) Forerunners are NOT Humans?
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The theory that Humans are Forerunner has gained a lot of support,
and with good reason. I certainly don't disagree with the idea, so
what I'm about to propose is merely for the sake of argument.

First of all, I think 343 GS may be a human A.I. The Marathon Logo
is right on his "face," and the same logo is on Keye's jumpsuit, his
pipe, and the Pillar of Autumn itself. So, I think it's fairly obvious that
343 GS has something to do with humans. All the more reason to
go with the Forerunner=Human stance, right? Well, 343 is the
ONLY thing we find with the Marathon logo on Halo, and the logo
is most definitely a widespread human symobl. My point: 343 GS
may not have been created by the Forerunner.

IF the above is true, then what does it mean?
Since we're assuming that 343 is human, then it would explain
why he identifies humans as "reclaimers" because he seems to
have the sole objective of setting Halo off. I don't think this was
intended by his programmers, but more on that later. . .
It would also explain why he has to override so many codes to
get where he needs to go. A Forerunner A.I. probably wouldn't
have so much trouble getting the index and setting off Halo.
Another mystery this would clear up is why 343 GS is so
exited when he finds a record of our lost history.

Now, the problem I run into is this: How did 343 GS get on
Halo for 101,217 local years if he isn't Forerunner? Honestly, I
can't answer this, but I will say that Eagle 117 has found
considerable evidence that humans have been on Halo before
the events of the game take place, so a machine left by humans
to monitor it isn't far fetched, it's the 101,217 local years that
gets out of hand.

I forgot to throw in the possibility of 343 being rampant. While I think
he's just following his programming, it's strange that he is so obsessed
with his own genius. Maybe the cause of his rampancy (if he is indeed
rampant) is rooted in his programming. An A.I. in charge of a weapon
that could wipe out all senitent life in the galaxy has a huge moral
dilemma in front of him, and The Duke's idea that the Human's would
have questioned 343 as to whether or not he would do it might have
caused his rampancy. If you've seen 2001: A Space Odyssee or
read it, you'll probably remember that HAL's breakdown was caused
by the lie he had to tell to keep the mission secret. It ate at his
circuits until he was off of his rocker and killed the crew. (except
for Dave of course) A similar thing might have happened to 343
GS. (hence the name Guilty Spark)

Here's a 343 quote from the HSP.

The installation was specifically built to study and contain the Flood.
Their survival as a race was dependent upon it. I am grateful to see
that some of them survived to reproduce.


First of all, I would like to point out that this is the most ambiguous
line in the history of Man. With that said, I'll continue with what I think
it could mean.

If you look at the line from the perspective that 343 is a human
creation, then when 343 says "Their survival. . ." he probably means
Forerunner, but since he refers to another race, then humans
could not be the Forerunner. Although perhaps I assume too much.
I don't even know what race 343 sees the Chief as. If
my memory serves me well, there was a detail in the novel "The
Flood" where 343 refers to a normal Marine as "the other
reclaimer" or something like that. I haven't read the books yet,
but I remember reading that somewhere. This means that 343
identifies humans as the ones in charge of the ring, but that
doens't necessarily mean humans built it.

On a little bit of a tangent, I've done some recent pondering over
why the Master Cheif intuitively knows how to work the Panels
on Halo. Sure the Forerunner=Human theory gets a lot of cred
here, but I'm all about alternate possibilities.

Let's say that 343 GS is a human creation as I've asserted in
the above posts, and that the Humans are not Forerunner. How
could 117 know how to work the Panels? I say his genetics,
more specifically what was done to them. If the Humans have
been on Halo before, then they would have had access to many
technologies. Let's say the Spartan genetic enhancement
technology was Forerunner technology. 117 and the other
Spartans would then take on some properties of the Forerunner,
and maybe even some of their memories. If you look on the
Library Forum, it defines a Library as:
A collection of cloned DNA sequences whose location and
identity can be established by mapping the genome of a
particular organism. I also remember reading on these Forums
that a Spartan had memories of the Library. How very odd. . .

To support my argument further, I'd like to say that the Cyborg
from Marathon shares some of these traits. In the final screen
of Marathon: Infinity, the speaker says something like, "grafted
to machines your builders did not understand." Perhaps 117
shares a similar fate. Both Cyborgs are also Mjolnir Cyborgs.
The one from Marathon is a Mark IV instead of V however.
This gives more credit to the Jjaro=Forerunner theory as well.


  • 09.22.2004 12:29 PM PDT

Excellent thread!

One should notice that 343 GS states “local years,” and not just years. This is something worth pointing out, because 101,217 “local” years, as in Halo's yearly cycle, is likely not the same amount of time when compared to 101,217 Earth years. How long is a local year on Halo?

Also, when 343 GS uses the term “local” to describe his time on Halo, it suggest that he has knowledge of time, a yearly cycle, somewhere else;-)

-Eagle 117

[Edited on 9/22/2004 2:59:04 PM]

  • 09.22.2004 2:47 PM PDT
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Thanks Eagle.

And you're right about the local years. I did some research on stars
and turned up brown dwarfs.
Here's a Wikipedia article on them.

It's kind of hard for me to understand it with all the scientific jargon,
but it seems to me that a brown dwarf could easily be mistaken for a
star, or be considered a star depending on the circumstances. If Halo's
gas giant is a brown dwarf and is considered a star, then Halo's orbit
would be very short, possibly making a local year a matter of days.

EDIT: I just thought of this after I posted, but what about the last firing
of the ring? It seems like 343 GS was there, suggesting that Humans
experienced the firing of the Halo before. Also, in the sixth Cortana
letter, she talks about Human populations on other planets when we
first began interstellar travel. All of this evidence points to a local year
being rather long.

hmm.....

[Edited on 9/22/2004 4:44:08 PM]

  • 09.22.2004 4:40 PM PDT
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Yeah, vrery good topic. I just have a few things to raise though. What evidance do we have to say that 343GS even distinguishes between races. What if the peson who fired Halo last time, or of Halo even was fired last time, wasn't human? 343GS might think all sentient life could be a Reclaimer, which they could be. And with respect to all your research, how could this ever be proved? Bungie probably hasn't even planned anything of the Halo Universe except what is in the Halo Bible. It might prove that there is no connection at all between Humans and Forerunner.

Sorry if I sound harsh, but I just wanted to point out those things.

  • 09.23.2004 5:02 AM PDT
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I dunno, one of my pet theories is that the Forerunner are related to the J'aaro (who are an ancient and powerful race of aliens), who have messed/interacted with human history before- Oldest known incident was during WWII, and if I remember I remember corrrectly the Mjolnr Mark IV Cyborg had Jaaro technology implemented on him , allowing to be the super cyborg he was, even though he was designed by a human scientist (at least thought to be anyway...)- the jaaro technology let the cyborg interface with alien techs and etc.. as well as the human ones. Just something to think about....

[Edited on 9/23/2004 6:08:45 AM]

  • 09.23.2004 6:08 AM PDT
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Interesting ideas bronzemage - but 343GS did distinguish between races: he says that the other race on the ring is responsible for the release of the flood, and that they have been most persistant in attempting to access secure areas.

  • 09.23.2004 6:17 AM PDT
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I think that the forerunners are related to humans but not excactly humans. They have almost the look of humans but not the same. I also think that humans may be related to the covenant if you consider that the elites has arms, legs, eyes, a mouth, they're standing on to feet, they have a language, they are inteligent, fingers etc. Ofcorse this is a far relative but still they look very human compared to what they could have looked like. I mean aliens don't have to have arms and legs or look just a little human at all.
Well back to topic. The reason why I think that humans (in Halo ofcorse) are related to Forerunners are that Halo's environment looks almost the same as on earth. The Forerunners must have had a body that looked like ours if they should be able to walk thruogh the halls and interior of the buildings on Halo. The reason why I don't think that the Forerunners was humans is that humans through long time changes physichally wich is why it's impossible that the Forerunners were humans.

  • 09.23.2004 10:03 AM PDT
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Great discussion!

In response to Bronzemage,
About 343 GS distinguishing between races:
I did some thinking over this last night, and I think 343 GS recognizes
you as Human. When you first meet him he immediately begins
speaking English. . .with an accent! If 343 assumes humans are
Forerunner, he would have probably started speaking in that tongue,
and what's stranger is the accent. Why would an ancient A.I. know
an accent from a very specific place on Earth from thousands of
years ago? I see no other explanation for this fact other than he was
built by Humans. The reason I think Humans are not Forerunner is
the symbol on 343 GS. It's a Human symbol that you can plainly
see on the side of the PoA, Keyes' uniform, and his pipe. There
are also no human symbols on Halo whatsoever. (there are S'pht
ones however =) The weird part is how he got there 101,217 years
ago. This point was brought up to me in a PM, so I'll explain how
I see it here.

101,217+ years ago, the Humans discover Halo as well as
various Forerunner artifacts and technology. Their civilization
is at it's peak, but they accidentally release the Flood and
343 GS along with someone who was/is/looked like Spartan
117 fire the ring, restarting civilization across the galaxy. How
civilization would restart, I have no clue, but it would place 343 GS
and this mysterious orginal reclaimer there 101,217 years ago.
I said the person was or looked like 117 fired the ring before
because 343 GS talks about how 117 set off Halo and how he
would do the same.

My brains about to explode and B.net will be down shortly, so
I'll stop here. I'm looking forward to more excellent posts!



  • 09.23.2004 12:32 PM PDT
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This brings us back to the question, though, of why do the Covenant want to extinguish the human race? They worship the Forerunners, and use Forerunner technology. What if we find out that the Covenant know something about the humans, and are trying to prevent it from happening (like the humans accidentally releasing the flood to the entire galaxy or something). And then Master Chief finds out, and realizes the validity of the Covenant's Holy Wars?

[Edited on 9/23/2004 8:20:42 PM]

  • 09.23.2004 8:19 PM PDT

"Bother", said Pooh, as he chambered another round.

Ummm, want a cookie?

  • 09.23.2004 8:26 PM PDT
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With regard to the accent - maybe GS heard some spoken english before he meet with the MC? He could have visited the PoA before the last level as well, getting the data required to speak english among other things.

Also, if you shoot at GS, he says "Don't be so human". This implies many things, but it tells us that GS knows what a human is, and their possible behaviour. Does it imply that GS thinks the MC is more then human, or capable of becoming more?

  • 09.23.2004 8:27 PM PDT
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Another idea is that maybe the fore runner aren't human but humans have descended and evolved from the forerunner? (like degressed to monkeys or something and then became humans, or something) Inspirition for this Idea actually comes from Larry niven' ringworld universe. Which is this-

The ancient human ancestor "ape" was actually the Breeder phase of a lifecycle of an ancient and powerful race called the Pak, and to grow into full adulthood phase and become a protector (Which is when the person would become super intelligent, strong, exrtremely long living,and extremely protective of their offspring) requied a certain tuber, which was dubbed "Tree of life" by Human researchers. the Pak tried to colonize Earth, but even though the "tree of life" would grow, it was missing the vital element that turned the dumb brereders into the superbeing, Pak. After a very long time the Pak eventually died out, leaving only the Breeders, after thousands of years the breeders' descendants populate the earth, calling themselves, Humans.

Anyways, just another 2 cents to throw to try to put it into a different light...

PS Human Paks (humans that eat the tree of life, still become paks) are very powerful, tough, quick, and can "easily comprehend numbering every star in the unverse" sort of mental capacity. In short one does not cross these beings.

  • 09.24.2004 7:36 AM PDT
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The covenants refer to the forerunners as "the giants" at one time in First strike if I remember correctly. Also in FS, when Halsey and the spartans go down under the Section 3 complex to what seems to be forerunner tunnels, everything is really, really big. At one point they say something like you would be able to drive several scorpion tanks through the tunnels, and the room with the crystal seems to be absolutely huge (a couple of kilometers across).

So I'm thinking that the forerunners were some kind of really big creatures.
Yes, i know that most thing seems to be human sized on Halo, however for example The Library has enormous elevators, tunnels and gates.
And as 343 says, Halo was specifically built to contain and study the flood, the forerunners weren't meant to stay there.
And maybe the smaller tunnels were for AI's like 343...

  • 09.24.2004 8:35 AM PDT
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Posted by:Smeeisqualityfoo
With regard to the accent - maybe GS heard some spoken english before he meet with the MC? He could have visited the PoA before the last level as well, getting the data required to speak english among other things.

Also, if you shoot at GS, he says "Don't be so human". This implies many things, but it tells us that GS knows what a human is, and their possible behaviour. Does it imply that GS thinks the MC is more then human, or capable of becoming more?


Great points. I never thought of the explanation for the accent, and 343's
statement "don't be so human" has a lot of impact. I think 343 might
see 117 as more machine, and if my guess that 117 is genetically
altered by Forerunner technology, then he might see a little bit of
Forerunner in him too. If you remember in Marathon, there was also
a lot of speculation about whether or not Durandal saw the cyborg
as human or machine, so 343 could be in the same predicament.

The covenants refer to the forerunners as "the giants" at one time in First strike if I remember correctly. Also in FS, when Halsey and the spartans go down under the Section 3 complex to what seems to be forerunner tunnels, everything is really, really big. At one point they say something like you would be able to drive several scorpion tanks through the tunnels, and the room with the crystal seems to be absolutely huge (a couple of kilometers across).

Posted by: pringles
So I'm thinking that the forerunners were some kind of really big creatures.
Yes, i know that most thing seems to be human sized on Halo, however for example The Library has enormous elevators, tunnels and gates.
And as 343 says, Halo was specifically built to contain and study the flood, the forerunners weren't meant to stay there.
And maybe the smaller tunnels were for AI's like 343...

Interesting. Good point about the small tunnels, but how do you explain
the human symbol on his face? Why do the Sentinels and the Covenant
fight? If 343 and the Sentinels were Forerunner, then the Covenant
would not wish to fight them. Maybe 343 is based upon a Forerunner
A.I. that was designed for the smaller tunnels, or 343 was simply
designed by Humans to navigate them.

Posted by: Blackmarch
Another idea is that maybe the fore runner aren't human but humans have descended and evolved from the forerunner? (like degressed to monkeys or something and then became humans, or something) Inspirition for this Idea actually comes from Larry niven' ringworld universe. Which is this-

The ancient human ancestor "ape" was actually the Breeder phase of a lifecycle of an ancient and powerful race called the Pak, and to grow into full adulthood phase and become a protector (Which is when the person would become super intelligent, strong, exrtremely long living,and extremely protective of their offspring) requied a certain tuber, which was dubbed "Tree of life" by Human researchers. the Pak tried to colonize Earth, but even though the "tree of life" would grow, it was missing the vital element that turned the dumb brereders into the superbeing, Pak. After a very long time the Pak eventually died out, leaving only the Breeders, after thousands of years the breeders' descendants populate the earth, calling themselves, Humans.

Anyways, just another 2 cents to throw to try to put it into a different light...

PS Human Paks (humans that eat the tree of life, still become paks) are very powerful, tough, quick, and can "easily comprehend numbering every star in the unverse" sort of mental capacity. In short one does not cross these beings.

Very cool. I like that idea. Bungie has taken a lot of inspiration for great
science fiction novels, so you might not be far off.

  • 09.24.2004 5:02 PM PDT
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All very good points, but lets take some other things into account. Covenant worship forrunners. Covanant hate humans. Humans hate covenant. In the first book the spartans didnt have the super bad as MarkV they had those crappy (by comparison) little battle suit things like the ODST's wear. While on a mission MC steals a shield generator off a covenant body. Covenant armor and weaponry is derived from Forrunner technology. 343 is of forrunner origin being that he's been there on halo for 100k + years. Though not fully forrunner tech maybe the superior design over the covenant modifications to the forrunner tech makes 343 believe that MC is an improved forrunner, or maybe even a earlier version for that matter. For the matter of perfect engilish that 343 seems to spew forth, it would seem that a AI capible of controlling a planet killing war machine might just have the capacity to learn a trivial matter such as language. If you look back on the books, it was over a course of several days to even weeks before MC encountered 343 and with all the sensors and monitering equipment on Halo I'm sure that 343 simply listened in. I think also that while the covenant had superior numbers and better starships 343 being a logical computer weighed the options and saw the humans as more resiliant and chose MC and the other marine earlier as reclaimers. In reference to Giants I'd say this is more a metaphor for greatness, 343 wouldnt need all the "Human" sized doors to get around on small ducts and tubes which makes me believe that forrunners where at least human sized. The reason for the massive doors would be to get equipment around to the critical parts of the Halo sub-system. Anyways this whole situation is just a matter of perspective as of now no one will know for sure until more is given away in Halo2 and in the next set of novels. I think that the Prophets will at some point in Halo2 give some kind of background as the the forrunners in a situation such as MC holding a magnum to one of thier tiny skulls with 4 dead brutes lying on the floor beside him ^_^. Or its possible we're all reading a bit too much into this, but who cares its good fun

  • 09.24.2004 11:44 PM PDT
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Posted by: Psychosis
All very good points, but lets take some other things into account. Covenant worship forrunners. Covanant hate humans. Humans hate covenant. In the first book the spartans didnt have the super bad as MarkV they had those crappy (by comparison) little battle suit things like the ODST's wear. While on a mission MC steals a shield generator off a covenant body. Covenant armor and weaponry is derived from Forrunner technology. 343 is of forrunner origin being that he's been there on halo for 100k + years. Though not fully forrunner tech maybe the superior design over the covenant modifications to the forrunner tech makes 343 believe that MC is an improved forrunner, or maybe even a earlier version for that matter. For the matter of perfect engilish that 343 seems to spew forth, it would seem that a AI capible of controlling a planet killing war machine might just have the capacity to learn a trivial matter such as language. If you look back on the books, it was over a course of several days to even weeks before MC encountered 343 and with all the sensors and monitering equipment on Halo I'm sure that 343 simply listened in. I think also that while the covenant had superior numbers and better starships 343 being a logical computer weighed the options and saw the humans as more resiliant and chose MC and the other marine earlier as reclaimers. In reference to Giants I'd say this is more a metaphor for greatness, 343 wouldnt need all the "Human" sized doors to get around on small ducts and tubes which makes me believe that forrunners where at least human sized. The reason for the massive doors would be to get equipment around to the critical parts of the Halo sub-system. Anyways this whole situation is just a matter of perspective as of now no one will know for sure until more is given away in Halo2 and in the next set of novels. I think that the Prophets will at some point in Halo2 give some kind of background as the the forrunners in a situation such as MC holding a magnum to one of thier tiny skulls with 4 dead brutes lying on the floor beside him ^_^. Or its possible we're all reading a bit too much into this, but who cares its good fun

Nice post, but I think you need to flesh this point out more:
343 is of forrunner origin being that he's been there on halo for
100k + years.

There is a lot of evidence suggesting that Humans were on Halo 100k+
years ago. Eagle 117 brought up the anomaly of Rat Race having a
mining operation, and how difficult it would be for the Humans fighting
for their lives to setup a mining operation over the short period of time
that Halo takes place, and then there's the fact that 343 recognizes
117 himself, telling him that he would do the same. (as in setting off the
ring) And then there's the Human symbol on 343 himself, and the lack
of the same symbol, or any Human symbol, on the entire ring. With
all of this evidence, it's entirely possible for 343 to be a Human A.I.
left behind 101,217 years ago after the first outbreak of the Flood.

On the other hand, it's entirely possible for me to be wrong and 343
to be a Forerunner A.I., but in my opinion there is more evidence
leaning toward 343 being a Human creation so far. As you said
Psychosis, it's a matter of perspective =)

On a different note, I've been wondering what the Forerunner are
if they are not Human. After doing a bit of reading and thinking, I
think they're the S'pht. If you don't know what the S'pht are, take a
trip to the Marathon Story Page and read up. (what I'm writing is
almost pure guesswork, but it's fun!)

After the events of Marathon 2, Durandal leaves with his cyborg
S'pht "army" to intercept a rogue star that has been travelling thorugh
the galaxy for the last milennia. This rogue star is a common thread
in Bungie stories, including both Myth and Marathon. The legend has
it that in Myth, every thousand years the passing of a comet heralds
the arrival of a new hero. If you look at the Marathon timeline,
Many events that Durandal took part in are in thousand year
increments, beginning with the comet of 1811, (before Durandal)
and ending with Durandal's return to Earth in a Jjaro Dreadnought
called Manus Celer Dei. (the swift hand of God) The rogue star
that Durandal intercepted with his S'pht army may have had
loads of Jjaro technology that Durandal would be overjoyed to
find, but the details of what was on the rogue star may never be
known.

Anyway, Durandal and the S'pht begin to setup their plan for
escaping the closure of the universe with their new Jjaro toys.

Before I go any further, here's some things I'd like to point out
about the S'pht.
1.)They have a single consciousness
2.)They're about the size of a brain, probably a bit larger
3.)They have highly mutable genetic code
4.)Their sentience was brought upon them by Jjaro technology
(they're cyborgs essentially)

Okay, so now Durandal and the S'pht are hard at work making
Durandal's dream of eternity come true. While this is going
on, somehow the S'pht mutate. (explaining how would be
complete guesswork, and I'm guessing enough already)
They become the Flood. In response, Durandal builds the
Rings to study and contain them in order to bring them back
one day. The reason I think it never happened is because of
the possible mental link between Durandal and the Flood.
To say it plainly, Durandal is the Flood, the Forerunner,
and the S'pht. This makes 343 all the more mysterious
however, because you would think that he would be helping
Durandal ressurect the S'pht, (himself) but instead he
seems eager to starve the Flood to death.

What got me thinking in this direction is the physiology
of the Flood, and how similar it is to the S'pht.
1.) Both the Flood and S'pht have a singular conciousness.
2.) The Flood and the S'pht are about the same size and shape
in their "natural" form.
3.) The S'pht's genetic code appears to be easily changed. The
S'pht mutated from the F'lickta into the smaller, brain shaped
cyborgs, which is described as an absurd change in one of the
terminals. Absurd but probably true.
4.) The S'pht were not sentient beings before their assimilation
into cyborgs, and may not be considered sentient with Durandal
as their conciousness, making them immune to the pulse of
Halo.

There are also S'pht symbols all over Halo. If you look at
Waterloo Waterpark and the Forerunner symbols around Halo,
you'll see that they're very similar.



  • 09.26.2004 12:16 PM PDT
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What if Jjaaro = Fore Runner?

  • 09.27.2004 9:20 AM PDT
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I like the Jjaro=Forerunner theory a lot.

To support that idea of Jjaro=Forerunner, I think the character Yrro
could lend a lot of it.

In the S'pht terminals, we learn that Yrro's companion Pthia dies.
The word Yrro sound a lot like Jjarro, (duh) so maybe Pthia was
his female companion. On a metaphorical level, Pthia could have
been the whole female gender of the Jjaro. (maybe male, but
Yrro seems more masculine) There is also this terminal message:

~old
~imes
my old Pthia, lost, vacant, doubt
chaos, overpowering, underwhelming

two forces in balance
ancient endless balance
then nothing

This reminds me of what 343 says:

"The installation was specifically built to study and contain
the Flood. Their survival as a race was dependent upon it. I am
grateful to see that some of them survived to reproduce."

Could the Flood have been some kind of effort to resurrect a
female(male?) Jjaro/Forerunner so they could reproduce?
Or maybe the Flood was the only way the Forerunner could
reproduce. Either way it would definitely make the Forerunner's
(Jjaro's)survival dependent upon the Flood.

  • 09.27.2004 12:18 PM PDT
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A question:
Is there any information on how long a year *is* for Threshold? If humans were there before, it doesn't necessarily have to be our years, as has already been pointed out. But, then, how many of our years could it have been?

Also, I like the idea that 343 is a human AI. Maybe the reason MC can navigate the Halo consoles is because they're intuitive human designed consoles that AIs like Cortana can rationalize/decipher with very simple algorithms.

Added: Oh, and that could explain more of why the Prophets want us dead. They are the sole arbiters of the word of God and the forerunners, but then, all Covenent technology is imitative. If the forerunners were not humans from the UNSC pocket, but from a separate, more advanced group, and the prophets know this, it would mean that something closer to the forerunner than the prophets exists. Proof of the link between the Forerunner human group and MC et. al.'s could be the fact that we can reverse-engineer stolen forerunner tech and improve upon it. But I'm sure this has all be said before, right?

[Edited on 9/27/2004 1:01:13 PM]

  • 09.27.2004 12:49 PM PDT
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Posted by: Tweek178
A question:
Is there any information on how long a year *is* for Threshold? If humans were there before, it doesn't necessarily have to be our years, as has already been pointed out. But, then, how many of our years could it have been?

Also, I like the idea that 343 is a human AI. Maybe the reason MC can navigate the Halo consoles is because they're intuitive human designed consoles that AIs like Cortana can rationalize/decipher with very simple algorithms.

Added: Oh, and that could explain more of why the Prophets want us dead. They are the sole arbiters of the word of God and the forerunners, but then, all Covenent technology is imitative. If the forerunners were not humans from the UNSC pocket, but from a separate, more advanced group, and the prophets know this, it would mean that something closer to the forerunner than the prophets exists. Proof of the link between the Forerunner human group and MC et. al.'s could be the fact that we can reverse-engineer stolen forerunner tech and improve upon it. But I'm sure this has all be said before, right?


Probably, but I wouldn't know where it has been said though...

As for why MC can interface with forerunner tech- (an explanation) In Marathon, the Mjolnr Mark IV cyborg was able to interface with any technology, human or alien, because some of the cyborg implants and suit tech were Jjaaro (going off the Jjaaro= Forerunner or as a parallel, either way works) artifacts which were implanted even though they weren't fully understood... Perhaps something similar with MC?


As for 343 GS, yes and no- going back to the Jjaaro = Forerunner- The Jjaaro had frequent interaction with the human civilization through out their history...

Now what if at one of these interactions they had an interest in computer AI design or something, and either stole or duplicated one, and upgraded it vastly? Then either left it on Halo, or it was successful and productful (I hope that's the correct word) eneugh to warrant duplication/Production of these upgraded AIs.

That or they were able to predict/favored the human race, and knew that they would be the ones to unlock Halo?

Or back to square one; the Jjaaro/Forerunner are human(oid- since they would not be from earth they would not be humans technically, although they could be identical in physical makeup and appearance).

and the 343 GS is smart eneugh to extrapolate evolution of our languages (the previous knowledge gained from their interactions with the hman civilizations) or that they continued to 'interact/watch' our civilization, even to MCs time?


[Edited on 9/28/2004 7:22:30 AM]

  • 09.28.2004 7:21 AM PDT
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Though...if they were watching, why wouldn't they intervene at any time during such a critical span in human history (of Halo's timeline)?

Anyhoo, my main point in this post is, I see reference after reference to the Marathon universe, and I'm starting to believe that it really is all tied together. Unsubstantial circumstantial evidence could be one of the Bungie dudes commenting on a Halo 2 A-Z and saying they should leave "D" open. I missed any rampant speculation there was on that, but in all the Marathon references I've seen one of the first names I encountered was Durandal.
Lots of folks have been mentioning the Jjaro, as you have, as well as some other races from Marathon.
Others have said that Bungie expressly said they're different worlds/universes. The one distinct comment I've seen didn't say that and only suggested that the games are set in different universes. Instead, iirc, they simply said that Marathon and Halo are completely different "storylines." Yeah, but so were Marathon and Pathways Into Darkness, and these (were conceivably/were) set in the same universe, right?

[Edited on 9/28/2004 4:43:09 PM]

  • 09.28.2004 9:39 AM PDT
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True..

I'd like to find references to where official bungie people have said they are not related...

And if I remember correctly, Marathon and Pathways are connected (mainly by the Jjaaro and the Mjolnr Mark IV, who Durandal comments that you were the one who's died many times, and who was Hector or some other big greek warrior- so it seems that The Mjolnr mark IV and the Pathways Hero are one and the same person, but I digress..)

Whether or not they are in the same universe, they have many parallels between the two of them (although my money is on that they are in the same universe) which can help us understand a little of what might happen, or background of various things.

[Edited on 9/28/2004 9:56:22 AM]

  • 09.28.2004 9:55 AM PDT
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Posted by: Tweek178
Though...if they were watching, why wouldn't they intervene at any time during such a critical span in human history (of Halo's timeline)?


Well if the Forerunner are extremely powerful/godlike why couldn't they be doing stuff and still remain hidden? Why is MC and Cortana so wildly successful (considering that the covenants are supposed to have superior tech)? And going back to my that they are still around somewhere, but watching us/inteeracting but hidden theory, they might be letting us go through this as a test, or going off that, maybe humanity itself was an experiment of theirs. they could also update 343GS to know our language...

  • 09.29.2004 7:42 AM PDT
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i like that whole forerunners are watching us thing cause it would make sense.mabey the forerunners did build 343 guilty spark and used the human symbols so that when the human race found it they could recongnize it or something?but they gave guilty to much emotion in a AI making him kinda angry at those who created him.but the main reason forerunners built guilty cause they KNEW humans where gonna reach there sooner or later and 343 is supposed to warn them but he is angry.it would make sense cause the signs cortana said i think right before 343 guilty sparks level. the signs where there so that in case 343 failed they could try to tell the humans in some way but it would take a miracle to delay the flood witch makes sense to me at least. i feel like im talking gibberous.the symbols where not on halo because it wouldnt make sense to put symbols on it. why should the humans recongnize it? they should only recongnize the warning aka 343 so that the flood witch is some kind of expirement of the fore runner gone wrong would not take over the human race and anything else.but it puzzles me the forerunners left armour for the elites but why why why hwy why...mabey the covenent was another race they were investigating and made armor for them to see if they could over whelm the humans?oh well but im thinking now is the flood. mabey the forerunners wanted a speices who could reproduce eating food and then harness the creature for meals iteams leather and what not but incedently they mix up the foods making the flood have a taste of the living.i like that one.it reminds me that mosquitoes ate monkey blood until something disturbed them making them taste human blood for their first time making them switch their meals rapidly from monkey to human.the thing the flood might have eaten is proballe the covenent . seeing humans looking like covenent the flood started to eat the humans likeing both tastes witch equals the flood we have now. and now that the flood was let go 343 sought to this as to an advantage to sweep the area clean hopefully hitting his damn creatores who deserted him there.

  • 10.01.2004 3:20 AM PDT
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Alrighty...im going to do my best to cover everything i can, but I'll probably forget some stuff. I, for one support the "humans are genetic offshoots of the Forerunner" theory. This would explain (partially at least) why Halo has Earth normal gravity and an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere, and, while I'm not entirly sure of 343's origins, perhaps the reason the marathon symbol is only seen on him and not everything else in halo, is because it either didn't hold nearly as much significance to the Forerunner or it was somehow related to to Forerunner robotics systems. And to the person (i'm terrible with names, sorry) who suggested that perhaps threshold could have been a brown dwarf, wouldn't a brown dwarf be brown? After all isn't threshold purple? This may be stepping into super deep water or some analogy to that effect, according to the Wikipedia article that someone linked, a brown dwarf is roughly ~13-75 Jupiter masses, and we have no constant to guage Thresholds size in comparison to other known Brown Dwarves. Also, if it was a brown dwarf, wouldn't it still have rendered Halo uninhabitable due to its very close proximity to Threshold?

I'll try to give my opinions on 343 and other stuff now. I think 343 is the forerunner's 'candidate' to safeguard Halo and the Flood. As for how he knew english, perhaps it was the Forerunners Primary Language. I find that unlikely, due to the fact that here a language can't go like 500 years with no outside contact before it essentially becomes a new language. I think that he simply studied us after we landed and made translation lexicons or whatever to understand and speak english. Also, perhaps english somehow stayed disturbingly similar to the foreunner language despite those 100,000 years or however much it was. Another thing is, why else would 343 say " Human history is it? Oh to hav a record of all of our lost time!" if he was a human robot/A.I., wouldn't he say something more like " Our history...."? Well, thats all I can think of right now.

Edit- did underline istead of italic

[Edited on 10/1/2004 1:37:53 PM]

  • 10.01.2004 1:31 PM PDT

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