Hello, Linux.
Posted on 11/08/2004 2:01:36 PM PST by Republican Radio™
Halo 2, the sequel to the top selling game for Microsoft's Xbox, will be released on November 9th.
Joe Staten, the Microsoft employee and writer responsible for the storyline of both games, will use the new game (targeted at teens) as a political protest against the Bush Administration.
For those who don't know story of the Halo games, it takes place in the future when vicious and radically religious alien forces called "The Covenant" are in a war with the human race and have trapped a lone human warship light years from Earth near the heretofore unknown Halo, a huge ring-like world manufactured and abandoned millennia ago by a powerful race. Unfortunately, Halo is still inhabited and activating its immense power will bring forth "The Flood," a bio-mechanical army that will wipe out all human and Covenant life in the universe. Your mission a genetically-modified human soldier in the game of Halowas to fight the Covenant, the Flood, and destroy Halo before it is activated and all life as we know it ceases to exist.
Halo scribe and Microsoft employee Joe Staten was interviewed in the November 5, 2004 issue of Entertainment Weekly (subscription required) about the new game. In the interview Staten says the Halo 2 story follows the Covenant "holy war" invasion of Earth brought on by the fact that Earth military forces destroyed Halo at the end of the first game. Unlike in the first game where Halo was a life-destroying superweapon, in Halo 2 we are now told that Halo was one of many and are "utopias, safe havens in a universe filled with terror." Halo 2, according to Staten, will show the story from "both the humans and aliens" and makes militant Earthlings into the imperialist bad guys against the religious Covenant aliens who consider Halo as a religous relic. "You could look at it," Staten says of his Halo 2 storyline "as a damning condemnation of the Bush Administration’s adventure in the Middle East." Microsoft has taken a straightforward action game classic in the original Halo and decided to make a political statement with Halo 2.
It begs the question: Why would a gamer or the parent of a gamer pay $50 to play a game that will force the player to shoot hundreds of "bad aliens" for hours to advance in the game and then at the end of it admonish the player for shooting the bad aliens? "These aliens weren’t really ‘bad’—they were just misunderstood and we awful human beings had no business ever leaving our little corner of the universe. You, and all humans like you, are violent and bad but the aliens are more highly-evolved, peaceful, caring beings that we should have respected and loved rather than murdered."
If Joe Staten and Microsoft want to make a political statement (and as anyone living near Microsoft HQ in Redmond, WA will tell you, the overwhelming majority of their employees in Redmond, WA are violently anti-Republican), they can do it without my money funding their next political statement. It will be a drop in the bucket, of course: Halo 2 has a rabid fanbase clamoring for the product and over $50 million is pre-order sales means the game is already massively profitable prior to its retail release.
To the gamers that will say "I’m going to play it because it’ll be fun and I can see past the politics to enjoy myself"—fine, that’s their right. However, I urge those concerned about the rot in American pop culture to spread the word about Halo 2 and Microsoft's hateful view of the Bush Administration.
Lousy Demondrats!
Joe Staten? I believe they mispelled his name, isn't it Stalin?
When GWB revises the tax code he ought to get even with Bill Gates for this crap
jeepers, creepers..this guy needs to read Laura Ingraham's book and Laura should add a new chapter "Shut Up and Code".
I think the aliens, with their superior technology, should find away to eradicate the violent and xenophobic humans without causing casualties. Isn't there a intergalactic organization that will mediate? Can't we find a solution?
Hello, Linux.
By their very nature, video games are conservative - better players score higher and win more. Also, any shoot-em-up implicitly supports RKBA. Let them play.
im playing that tonight,HALO 1 was awesome,loads of fun
Next you're going to tell me Ender's Game is also a slight towards W, even though Card has been outspoken in his support of our President.
I'm not a fan of FPS games so this is a non-issue for me, but it occurs that if this Mr. Staten thinks he's making a big statement that he's a) loopy and b) going to be ignored by 99.99% of purchasers, who will see the ability to play as the aliens as a fun multiplayer option.
Too late. Bush has already won.
And I won't be buying Age of Empires III if it comes out.
Uh, bud, how about a little perspective here, it's just a video game. Most of the school kids I know are clueless bozos. They wouldn't know a civics lesson from a bicycle seat.
Hey Microsoft. How dumb are you people? Who was it that tried to break you up? Who wouldn't accept the settlement deal? How much have you fools been bothered in the last 4 years? Fools!
Just wanted to get that out there before we have another silly boycott call.
I'm not sure how he distinguishes his version of "Bush hate" from the Islamic jihad. Based on this article, I might interpret it as a condemnation of Islam.
Believe me I see way beyond the politics of this game. My kids love it and It really doesn't matter to them if the aliens are good guys or bad guys... People read way too much into things... If an Alien shoots at me I am not going to try and reason with it.... see I am not a liberal and neither is the alien.
Ridiculous! My son was a beta tester for this game and MS wouldn't do something as stupid as this.
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