Halo: Reach Legendary Developer Commentary

The Halo: Reach Legendary Developer Commentary is an about 2 hours video commentary of Halo: Reach by the Bungie employees Steve Scott, Lee Wilson, Marcus Lehto and Martin O'Donnell. It is only available and viewable on Halo Waypoint to those who bought the Legendary Edition of Reach. The following section is a transcript of the video.

Transcript

Opening

• Martin O'Donnell: "Here it goes."

Screen begins with the opening of Reach:

®2010 Microsoft Corporation

• O'Donnell: "2010 Microsoft Corporation. Here we go."

Screen pans toward the Nebula cloud in Epsilon Eridani system.

• O'Donnell: "Watching Reach, and the four of us are all here, and we all worked on this game, and ee've been here for so many years..."

Screen fades and pans around the asteroid belt in the system.

• O'Donnell: "And who's the first one to introduce himself?"

• Steve Scott: "Uh, I am Steve Scott. I'm the, uh, FX lead here at Bungie."

• O'Donnell: "All the cool explosions, Steve."

Screen shows the Microsoft Logo, and then back to the camera panning over one of Reach's moon's surface.

• Scott: "My department."

{laughs}

• Scott: "There are, uh, four of us, uh, making effects for this game."

• Marcus Lehto: "It used to just be Steve."

• O'Donnell: "I know."

• Lehto: "Now, Steve has... (imitating wind blowing)"

The screen stops at the planet Reach just as Marcus Lehto makes the sound of wind blowing.

• Lehto: "...a glorified department. And Lee?"

• Lee Wilson: "I am Lee Wilson, and I was, er, story and cinematic lead on Reach."

• O'Donnell: "Nice job, Lee."

Noble Actual

Screen opens with the opening cutscene of the campaign level Noble Actual.

• O'Donnell: "Just a small team."

• Lehto: "I'm Marcus Lehto, the creative director for Reach, and errr... Yeah. We are here together with all four of us. Marty, you get to introduce yourself."

• O'Donnell: "I'm Marty O'Donnell, I'm the audio director and composer for Bungie and Reach."

Screen shows Reach's glassed surface.

• Lehto: "Reach. Half of the Covenant has dumped on it."

• Wilson: "There were, uh, a little goats, we imagine."

• Lehto: "From the beginning, you know the end."

Screen pans down to a Mark V[B] helmet

• O'Donnell: "You know..."

• Lehto: "...that it is glassed."

• O'Donnell: "It's glassed, and they're horrible."

• Lehto: "The sad, sad, helmet."

• O'Donnell: "Steve, I love that effect."

• Lehto: "The hue effect. It's one of the best effect in the game."

• O'Donnell: "The heat effect."

• Scott: (to Lehto) "I thought it was the Grunt Birthday Party."

{laughs}

The screen fades to white:

R E A C H

• Wilson: "So clean, so simple."

• Lehto: "A little boring."

{laughs}

Screen shows the first person view of SPARTAN-B312 looking into his helmet before wearing it.

• Scott: "I think it's pretty cool that we actually made that helmet dynamically change..."

• Lehto: "Yes."

• Scott: "...depending on what your selection is."

• O'Donnell: "Really?"

• Wilson: "It was surprisingly simple as well. Didn't cause many problems."

• Lehto: "Come on, Marty, I thought you played this."

• O'Donnell: "Well, I thought, I thought they burned out all of them, it was always like (gestures nothing)."

• Lehto & Scott: "What?

• Lehto: "Did you know how much labor in it?"

• Scott: "There's a destroyed version of every helmet."

Everyone speaks, making it hard to understand.

• Lehto: "Scott Shepherd came up with that."

• O'Donnell: "Wow, that's wonderful."

• Wilson: "What I like about this 'Hog is that we actually captured CJ driving it across the map. So he's skipping it right now."

• O'Donnell: "Oh really?"

• Wilson: "Yeah, it wasn't so, like, custom animated or anything like that."

At this point, the cutscene has already reach the part which Spartan-B312 has entered the UNSC camp and exited the Warthog.

• O'Donnell: "Now, you notice, guys, that this music is different from what we did in the original trailer. Because the original trailer is for audience, this is..."

• Lehto &O'Donnell: "...the game."

• Lehto: "The player experience."

• Wilson: "And Jun has his helmet off."

• Lehto: "Do you like his tattoo?"

• Wilson: "Oh, I love his tattoo."

• Lehto: "Alright."

• Wilson: "What is that tattoo?"

• Scott: "It's a fist, holding..."

• Lehto: "It's, er, spears."

• Wilson: "Okay, 'Tip of the Spears'."

• O'Donnell: "Think that was Scott Shepherd. Wasn't it?"

• Wilson: "I think so, yeah. I let him sole sculpture that-"

• Lehto: "No, wait no, it was, uh, Chris Alderson."

• Wilson: "Okay."

• Lehto: "I know Scott Shepherd said he was going to tattoo that on his head after this game is done."

• Wilson: "And he probably will."

• Lehto: "He is an open canvas."

• O'Donnell: "We should introduce our actors here."

• Lehto: "You go right ahead."

• O'Donnell: "Uh, Pat Duke, is, uh, Holland. Freddy Bosche is Carter. Um..."

In-game, Carter grabs his helmet from the table and turns to face B312.

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Lieutenant."

• SPARTAN-B312 (in-game): "Commander. Sir."

• O'Donnell: "Now, we're listening to male Six."

• Lehto: "Mhmm."

• Scott: "Now, what is his name?"

• Wilson: "Uhh, Philip Anthony-Rodriguez."

• O'Donnell: "Yes. Philip Anthony-Rodriguez. That's his name."

Noble One and Noble Six leaves the building, heading to their Falcon guarded by Jun.

• O'Donnell: "That's a great shot. Jun's is, err, Sunil."

• Lehto: "Sunil."

• O'Donnell: "Ummm... Kat is, er, Alona Tal."

• Wilson: "Yes."

• O'Donnell: "Great name."

• Lehto: "She'd kick your butt."

• O'Donnell: "She would, too. She was Israeli military. She's great. And who do we miss?"

• Scott & Lehto: "Jorge!"

• Scott: "Jorge's is Hakeem."

• O'Donnell: "Hakeem."

• Wilson: "We worked with him before."

• O'Donnell: "And Jamie Hector was Emile. He was also known as Marlo from The Wire."

• Wilson: "And we are complete fanboys around him."

• O'Donnell: "Totally. It was... He was so much fun to work with."

Winter Contingency

Screen shows the beginning cutscene of the campaign level Winter Contingency.

• O'Donnell: "Oh."

• Scott: "This was, uh, this was a ... Halo game had a couple first. One, you could play as a male or female Spartan. And, for the first time, you see the Spartans' face."

• Lehto: "Finally."

• Scott: "Finally."

• Lehto: "Get underneath that armor. It was one of the big mandates when we started this project. Understand a little about these characters were, make them a little bit more iconic than Master Chief ever could be."

• Scott: "Mhmm."

• Lehto: "It's cool. I think we pulled that off pretty good."

• O'Donnell: "Totally."

{Brief Pause}

• O'Donnell: "So here's a little of the, uh, trailer music just in case you're wondering."

• Lehto: "Yeah."

• O'Donnell: "Just a little sneak in, but in a different space."

{Brief Pause}

• O'Donnell: "So how much, what is the drawed distance?"

• Lehto: "Way, way further."

Screen enters gameplay, looking from Noble Six' HUD.

• O'Donnell: "Yeah? How did you worked that up? I mean, this is solely amazing in this."

• Lehto: "Yeah, we set out to increase the drawed distances, open up the battlefield, and pack them full of, like, four times more things we had ever been able to do in the past."

• O'Donnell: "So when we are flying in here, we are actually looking at the map we are playing around."

• Lehto: "Everything we wanted to do is what our engine could do. Coming out of Halo 3."

{laughs}

• Lehto: "So they had to rebuild nearly everything. As far as the engine is concerned."

• O'Donnell: "Is that why so many materials has changed a little bit?"

• Lehto: "Everything changed."

• O'Donnell: "I know."

• Lehto: "Yes."

• O'Donnell: "Okay. I accepted it."

The Falcons land.

• O'Donnell: "I want to hear myself crunching on the cabbages. They're when I..."

• Lehto: "Oh God, Marty."

{laughs}

• Wilson: "No one wants to test what they do. I went up and, uh, I meleed a cabbage."

• O'Donnell: "Did you hear a cabbage sound?"

• Wilson: "Um, I think one of the early test was a whip sound."

• O'Donnell: "A whip sound. Probably. There was wood just at every place for a while. Yeah."

• Wilson: "But there's a cabbage sound now?"

• O'Donnell: "No. That has to do with the material effects to be a little more..."

• Wilson: "Oh, okay."

• O'Donnell: "...global."

• Wilson: "Okay. So, when I go to supermarket to get a cabbage, if I melee it..."

Screen fades from the player walking down the hill to reach the Warthog wreckage site.

• O'Donnell: "Oh hey, look at that."

In-game, Emile inspects a broken pallet on the ground and removes a beacon from it. He tosses the beacon to Kat behind him.

• Emile-A239 (in-game): "Found the beacon."

• Wilson & O'Donnell: "Here we are."

• O'Donnell': "Here's the first vignette."

• Scott: "Huh, look at that."

• O'Donnell: "What is this called? The Thespians system?"

• Lehto: "Yes."

• O'Donnell: "What does that do, except for giving us headaches?

{laughs}

• Lehto: "Oh gosh, Marty, jeez. It allows us to bring, y'know, some of that thousand page script into the game."

{laughs}

Screen fades from the player walking slowly away from the wreckage site to the first bend leading to the first kiva. A Moa runs out.

The four, together, exclaims "Oh, oh, oh!" in excitement.

• O'Donnell: "Melee that thing!"

The player melees the the Moas, who both make dying chirps.

• O'Donnell: "It makes a fun noise when you melee it."

• Scott: "Isn't there an achievement for knocking down a bunch of those?"

• O'Donnell: "Walk through that yellow bush."

The player, obviously because played the game before recording it and having it commented by the four, does not walk on top of the bush.

• O'Donnell: "Aww, he didn't hear it. Yellow bushes make noise."

• Lehto: "Yes."

• Wilson & Lehto: "You're welcome."

• Wilson: "What are those ostriches called?"

• Lehto & O'Donnell: "Moas."

• Wilson: "And can we ride them?"

• Lehto: "We used to be able to."

• Wilson & O'Donnell: "Awww..."

• Lehto: "Sad days, I know."

• O'Donnell: "We should tell the fans that there was a joust game that was gonna happen.

• Lehto: "There was."

• O'Donnell: "You could ride the Moas and play joust."

• Lehto: "And it was actually working! For quite a while."

• Scott: "Sure was."

In-game, the player, Emile and Jorge meet a farmer outside a kiva.

• Scott: "Another first for Halo game: civilians.

• O'Donnell: "Civilians. Don't shoot the civilians."

• Lehto: "Reach is lousy with civilians. Awesome..."

• Wilson: "... that Jorge is speaking Hungarian here."

• O'Donnell: "And he understands Hungarian."

• Lehto: "Yes."

• Scott: "Wait. Are we revealing he's Hungarian?"

• O'Donnell: "Apparently."

• Lehto: "You just did. Did you know what he said?"

• Wilson: "Umm..."

• O'Donnell: "This is really translated Hungarian. And we had phonetically spoken dialogue to teach the actors."

• Jorge-052 (in-game): "Azt mondtam befelé!"

• O'Donnell: "'Befelé!', which means 'get back'. That's where he wants to belong."

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Noble Team, double-time."

In-game, Noble Team sprints to the building indicated by the navpoint.

• Lehto: "Press left button to Sprint! Go, go!"

The screen fades from the player sprinting across the bridge to the player reaching the indicated building.

• Wilson: "Wow, look at the rain!"

• Lehto: "I love the new rain system."

In-game, Carter, Kat and Noble Six enters the building, and discover corpses.

• Scott: "Look, you go inside and you don't see the rain anymore."

• O'Donnell: "You see the pity-patter pattern from the roof?"

• Lehto: "Mhmm. Sage did a good job with that."

• Scott: "A few buzzing flies..."

• Wilson: "I like the lighting too. It's creepy."

• O'Donnell: "It's messy. It's spooky."

Screen fades from the player walking down the adjacent corridor of the room to the player walking into the farm building.

• O'Donnell: "The Jackals are not there."

The other three muttered "Skirmisher", annoyed.

• Lehto: "Come on."

• O'Donnell: "Sorry. I meant Skirmisher."

• Jun-A266 (COM) (in-game): "Boss! I'm seeing movement. Outside your structure!"

• O'Donnell: "Here we go. First battle."

In-game, the player looks around the room, looking at Carter at the past room and then back in the room he is in, and sees Kat aiming her M6G Pistol at Covenant troops outside.

• O'Donnell: "Kat!"

The player switches to his M6G Pistol, zooms into the KFA-2 x2 scope and fires at the Skirmisher Major standing outside on the roof. The Skirmisher flinches a few times and fall behind cover.

• O'Donnell: "Ohh... Killed that one.

In-game, the player climbs down the stairs, moving down to he first floor of the farm building.

• Scott: "Hopefully we will get to see my, uh, my first appearance in a Halo game... as Falcon Pilot Number Two."

In-game, the player throws a frag grenade at the Skirmishers on the first floor.

• Lehto: "Yes!"

• Scott: "Oh wait, that was it! We missed it, awwww..."

{laughs}

In-game, the team move down to the ground floor and fire at the enemies coming into the building.

• Lehto: "This is one of my favorite areas. The exit out of this is, er, pioneer barn, out into the pastor. It's a great Firefight map too. This is so cool, we integrated all the multiplayer and Firefight spaces into the campaign."

Screen fades from the player exiting in the structure to outside in the yard.

• Lehto: "There was a big pain in the butt, I don't know if we do it again, if we do this game over, uh, but I think overall, it served its, uh, purpose well here."

• Scott: "Field's great to me. 'cause you, you see all these spaces and several different kinds of effects. It's just really cool."

• Lehto: "Hey, you get to play through the daytime here when it's raining. And then in Firefight, we can turn the rain off, we can brighten up. We did that a lot for the multiplayer maps. Thank goodness I had help in this project, because we had so many water features in the game."

• O'Donnell: "You did the first waterfall on Halo, in Halo 1. "

• Lehto: "That's right."

• O'Donnell: "I remember that. (Unintelligible) It took only falls. As soon as you moved out to Seattle, you started using the Seattle floors."

• Lehto: "Hey, hey, hey. (Marty laughs) You gotta get inspired!"

In-game, the team eliminated the lance of Covenant dropped by a Spirit. The player passes by a few dropped plasma grenades.

• Wilson: "Oh, pick up those plasmas!"

• Scott: "We probably had more waterfalls in this game than all the other Halo games..."

• Lehto & Scott: "Combined."

• Lehto: "Yes, we did."

• Scott: "We had, uh, FX artist Jeff Palmer do a lot of the particle side..."

• Lehto: "Yeah, the effects are amazing. I loved the stuffs that he did. With the water particles coming down, they look amazing. "

• O'Donnell: "Yeah, they look so cool. And if you stand up in the..."

{Unintelligible}

In-game, the Spartans cross a river to continue eliminate Covenant troops.

• Lehto: "My favorite part about this is that the engineers made some changes to physics, so when they, uh, when all the Spartans run in the water, they all got swept away. Down the river."

{laughs}

• Scott: "There was this point you can't even go against the current."

• Lehto: "Yeah. Just getting..."

• Scott & Lehto: "...sweep away."

• Lehto: "Killed the mission every time."

• O'Donnell: "There's patching fog."

• Lehto: "Man, what a great atmosphere."

In-game, 3 Ultra Elites enter the battlefield.

• Lehto: "The Elites!"

• O'Donnell: "This is the first game we had a, you guys probably don't even notice this, but a balance between combat dialogue and mission dialogue and cinematic dialogue. And the way they all flows together. Volume balance is as good as we ever done. Better than we ever done."

In-game, the last Ultra Elite lost its energy shielding and puts up his hands as he roars furiously.

• Scott: "He's really angry about it."

• O'Donnell: "Finally learning."

In-game, Noble Team regroup as the the Ultra Elite is killed.

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Stand down, Noble, stand down. Contacts neutralized."

• Jorge-052 (in-game): "Contacts? It's the damn Covenant!"

• Lehto: "'It's the damn Covenant.'"

• O'Donnell: "Marcus... I'm scared..."

• Lehto: "More Moas..."

• O'Donnell: "Ride them! Why don't we hit the Moas? Y'know, most people will melee the Moas as soon as they see them. It's impossible to not to. {Brief Pause} Y'know, for a while, every time you kill a Moa, Kat would laugh, 'cause she had a, uh, little response when killing an alien. So sometimes you hear this bug, that we were..."

• Lehto: "Why did you take that out?"

• Wilson: "...that she was kinda cruel."

• O'Donnell: "So we actually had to take that out."

• Lehto: "Aww… Bummer. "

• O'Donnell: "As soon as I heard it they did a saved film of her laughing when you kill a Moa, it was so good, I wanted to keep it."

• Lehto: "I like the bug where you can kill Kat and she'd come back as a zombie. She would come back with that (imitates zombie moan, others laugh) voice and just go follow you around with that (imitates zombie moan)."

Screen fades from the player entering the canyon in the truck to the player finding the troopers at one of the kivas.

• Scott: "I missed that one."

• Lehto: "The best thing ever."

• Travis (COM) (in-game): "The Covenant is on Reach. I repeat: the Covenant is on Reach.""

• O'Donnell: "Oh! That's Ron Livingston! From Office Space!"

• Lehto: "What?"

• Wilson & O'Donnell: "Yeah."

• O'Donnell: "The guy we just heard."

• Lehto: "Thanks."

• O'Donnell: "But better than Office Space was Band of Brothers."

In-game, the player, with the help of the AI-controlled characters, guns down the last Covenant troops attacking the troopers.

• Lehto: "For fans, that previous encounter right there is so fun to do with vehicle only, just plow through them. Back and forth. Plow through them, mow them down like a giant harvester."

• Scott: "I never tried it that way."

• O'Donnell: "Yes, he is the famous, irrelevant place. The thing is, Corporal Travis."

• Scott & Lehto: "Yeah."

• O'Donnell: "And we never see Corporal Travis ever again. It's really depressing to me."

{laughs}

• Scott: "I love how we brought back the tuning fork. It was always one of my favorite vehicles."

• Wilson: "Oh yeah, it's so iconic."

• Lehto: "The 'Spirit'."

• Scott: "Oh, I'm sorry. The 'Spirit'."

{laughs}

• Lehto: "I never call that though. I can't. It's really far away from a tuning fork."

• Wilson: "Oh my God. I love the sound of that grenade."

• Lehto: "Although, you know, the thing cost more than, like, half our vehicle combined."

• O'Donnell: "What? The tuning fork?"

• Lehto: "'Cause it had, like, individual seats with little handles, and cushions, and everything. There's, what, 8 seats on the sides…"

• O'Donnell: "Yeah, see? That's why we had to cut the music."

• Lehto: "No, we cut it way back. It became affordable."

• Scott: "I like the different designs of the, uh, windmills."

• Lehto: "Yeah, the big, various turbine-like kinda things. I don't know what you call those…"

• Scott: "The little circular ones?"

• O'Donnell: "Turbines?"

• Lehto: "Hmm. They're cool."

• O'Donnell":

In-game, all Covenant troops have been taken out.

• Army Trooper (in-game): "Everybody okay?"

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Check in!"

• O'Donnell: "See, there's some example of nice combat dialogue response behavior."

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Transport, LZ is clear. Move in for evac."

A Falcon, with Jun on the side seat, lands in front of the player.

• Lehto: "Falcon. Finally. You get a troop carrier in here."

• Scott: "So this part you're leaving the kiva area, the little residential, farming community. And you're-"

• Lehto: "We didn't even bother how much effort we put in to build real, human-scale environment in the kivas. I guess-"

• O'Donnell: "We should tell everybody that some of the kivas are built for pottery manufacturing, and some of them are for…"

• Scott: "Aquaculture."

• O'Donnell: "Agriculture."

• Scott: "Aquaculture is, uh, farming fish. Fishery. We thought about all that stuff, we went in to a lot of detail thinking about who are the people who lived there, what they did, how they survived in this rough, scrap of land on top of the mountain.

• Lehto: "We, uh, debated on that for about six to eight months. Drove some of the artists absolutely insane. But, uh, that came together pretty well."

• Wilson: "I seem to remember going through one of those things and, like, breaking every pot in there, and then realizing there are, like, a couple civilians standing there, actually feeling embarrassed that I just went through and break their house.

• Lehto: "They were pretty upset."

{laughs}

• Lehto: "We should have some civilians alive standing around. Complain when you broke their stuff."

• Scott: "'You're a jerk!'"

• Lehto: "Yeah."

{laughs}

• Scott: "That would have been possible."

The player, having exited the Falcon several seconds ago, engages the Jackals and Grunts outside the Visegrád Relay.

• Lehto: "Ah! The outpost! It is a great encounter!"

• O'Donnell: "The communication outpost."

• Lehto: "Niles did a great job on this."

• O'Donnell: "I would see how the music ends in this one. 'Cause, this has to expand, but still feel like an actual ending."

The screen fades from the player entering the outpost to the outpost's door closing, skipping the defending section of the level.

• O'Donnell: "Oh, they caught it, one of the places where it's gonna go long. Ah, and it fades in to one of the spooky areas."

• Wilson: "Hm. Alright."

• O'Donnell: "Now here's a question I have about this mission dialogue."

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Can't see a thing… Noble Six, turn on you night vision."

• O'Donnell: "Now, so, Carter says he can't see a thing, and he tells you to turn on your night vision. Does that help him see better?"

• Lehto: "He broadcast that to all of Noble Team."

• Wilson: "It would be a good idea to turn on your night vision."

• Lehto: "It was a helpful suggestion. Why didn't you change it?"

• O'Donnell: "I should have."

• Lehto: "Man, you're lame."

• O'Donnell: "I know."

In-game, the mid-level cutscene begins:

Six begins to search a body on the ground. Carter attends a wounded trooper leaning against the wall.

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Where's the rest of your unit?"

• Army Corporal (in-game): "We got split. I don't think they... It sounded bad on the comms."

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "All right, Corporal, stay put. We'll get you a combat surgeon."

• O'Donnell: "Think that's Ron Livingston again."

In-game, a data module falls on the ground from the corpse on the ground.

• Lehto: "Plop!"

• Wilson: "I love the way she snatches it."

In-game, Kat snatches the data module from Six's hand.

• Catherine-B320 (in-game): "I'll take that, Six. Not your domain."

• Wilson: "Gimme that."

• Jorge-052 (in-game): "I've got a live one over here! Come on, out you come."

In-game, Jorge drags out a young female civilian, but she struggles to escape, repeatedly hitting him while speaking frantic Hungarian.

• Lehto: "Oh, Marty…"

• O'Donnell: "Oh, Sára…"

• Lehto: "I hate to ask you to break that, mixed that back. I don't know how many times."

• O'Donnell: "What?"

• Lehto: "The (imitates Sára's Hungarian)."

• O'Donnell: "Come on, that's perfect!"

• Wilson: "There's some amazing motion capture animation coming up.

• Lehto: "This is…"

• Sára Sorvad (in-game): "Itt vannak."

• O'Donnell: "Itt vannak."

In-game, a Sangheili Field Marshall jumps down from an upper floor and ignites its Energy Sword. The Elite slashes at Jorge, but he dodges the strike, pulling the civilian to the ground and covering her with his body. The Marshall growls a challenge at the rest of Noble Team and charges. Two more Zealots jump down to support the Marshall.

• Lehto: "Crazy!"

• O'Donnell: "…and that means 'they are still here'. That's what she's saying."

• Wilson: "Yeah."

• Lehto: "Okay. There it is, and Marty goes off the rail with music. "

{laughs}

• Lehto: "What possessed you here?"

• O'Donnell: "It's a confusing time!"

• Lehto: "I love this!"

In-game, the two Zealots head for another door leading deeper into the facility, one holding the wounded corporal as a shield and forcing Noble Team to hold their fire.

• Wilson: "And the Elite hits its head on the door there, thump! There we go."

• O'Donnell: "This is, this actually is me playing, which is funny, because you think I wouldn't go on playing that."

• Lehto:Watch that grab on the door (struggling grunts)"

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Negative, Four, stay on the entrance! Two, handle her!"

• O'Donnell: "'Two, handler her!'"

• Carter-A259 (in-game): "Five and Six, clear the hole!"

In-game, Jorge and Six approaches the door the Zealots escaped through. Six reloads his Assault Rifle.

• O'Donnell: "I love this door."

• Wilson: "The Jorge door slam is really cool."

• O'Donnell: "Hit the strings."

In-game, Jorge closes the door.

• Wilson: "Chumm!"

• O'Donnell: "Nice… I'm digging in."

{laughs}

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I love the way the elites kind of draw you enjoy you indeed a little boom so many man's Duty kill oh this guy's scary yeah we have the option of bringing back the flashlights light yeah it's nice like Halo one yeah this is a nice play we try that first but then it was a little too retro like okay got your two D cell batteries in your helmet yeah it's the same click noise though from Halo back we decided never to change that click no matter what just a little too great doesn't mean the first Halo had a sort of battery system where you had a certain amount system failing to in Halo 3 you just turned it on and it was on all the time right and then ODST had the night vision device or most advice yeah this is x1 hi Bruce this is actually the first just legit night vision isn't that we didn't have that in Halo 3 we had visor mode no DST well similar but it yeah we so this was uh this was a moment where like George is actually taking his helmet off and showing his face to a civilian which is kind of like kind of established artists New Mexicans don't do that so he's kind of trying to establish a connection with the people of reach even your date what he is sometimes oh and we have a little tension between the meal and George yeah I like that way that turned out initially is a little over the top through too many scenes well we we actually nailed that yes yeah yeah we're happy worked on it yeah we did really art of it the whole thing with a meal is that he day he he doesn't have like the respect for service civilians so much like he's a little more sort of hot coarser like what doesn't doesn't like weakness he see I'm not for them to because I mean these Sparta threes were made to quell the rebel uprisings exactly so disconnect would be arraigned like cattle we sort of get lemon Carter's who touch Dolan Howell it is not touch any the ones at contingency yeah thank God it was oh my god the winter contingency is like a sort of a planet-wide contingency plan for basically the the the covenant discovering reach it's a call to evacuate the planet yeah destroy all the data course anything you can all tech has to be neutralized in order to prevent the Covenant from accessing it and possibly finding other human planets sword base coming for Starbase shore base far up north just about every active every camera move in this entire game is feels handheld or like in a location that's yeah I mean now that was that was the whole so the plan for the the way we shot this because like it was more or less of a human story we would see a spot in places that we wanted to justify the camera not have so much sort of flying sort of romantic camera and then we have like a lot of really nice sort of overlay work I believe he's got had a little have to do with that you know worked a little bit on those like security cameras exactly yeah yeah now one of the funny things of fun things for people to notice but they won't every time you play this cinematic the music will be slightly different I didn't know that yeah well things have been slightly different times depending on all sorts of conditions is that a bug or a feature that's a feature now no it's a feature the forklift Oh porky porky you know I gotta say I don't know why we changed it but I really love the forklift when you could actually raise and lower though we had to take that out cuz you could you could stuff it under the mule and launch the mule and outer space there's a bug against that uh there's a mutant okay but the good top because of the greater great that I'm sorry the greater leader you know what I call this thing over here thing about the pickup garage door opener target locator and you pick that up great make fun of game design go ahead and I have two will make fun of music okay I call it the oh my god are we really gonna make this thing the others hair this Chris Carney I could look at terror on your face with this time I introduced him what was this two months prior to the end of here yeah this is a kind of a later inclusion into the sandbox and the designers come to me and said hey we want a advice that that launches artillery from space and just continually pounds an area and you know you generally one explosion is pretty expensive when there's six explosions all happening within a short amount of time it can it can be really perfect so we spent a little little bit of time tuning that just to make it right but you know it's so powerful to be able to just like launch this barrage of death from the skies and ended up being a really good choice for the game see you're actually able to like a blank screen shake writing yeah a little bit that's really effective the exterior the exterior architecture of sword base Oh wasted it on that right get that little piggy and you should be hearing all the this whole base is being bombarded by the giant cap Corvette the Corvettes flying right overhead hunt and they're awesome looking guys are much harder to kill I swear something used to be oh you're just getting slower that's Joe then with a special red spot is harder to get Allen because we get a technique both of them yeah oh nice actually that's pretty good so those spikes on the back like like making them fly not knocking those up yeah it's not come on yeah what's the point you blow that off a little bit right in the worms it hurts so that play it just took out he's like crusty shell and exposed self underneath Heller always exposed new hunters gotta go commando is caramel center delicious no you guys see you guys like the new grenade effects when they land close to you and you yeah that's amazing yeah not how did you do that now we have a global digital signal processing ability so we can put a filter over at all sounds oh except music so keep music out of it put it all over everything else and then add a little looping and bring it all happens at the same time yeah I can't believe we pulled this off Steve all right that was some thick smoke battle exactly going around yeah well that's a that's a real Corvette right that's not a bet in this I have a real scale model sitting up there we had a couple of new bits of text that let us fill areas with quicker smoke than before Wow a drone from some bay rate effect I'm working on that book and I think this is beautiful [Music] remember this used to look like a turkey the Covenant ship no oh Mack went through beautifully in it four iterations of that ship before we got her I was looking in the shutters Oh George I remember we had like the attitude of the female spot in just a little bit different to that line especially as George has a big hand on her shoulder I never really just have a little attitude been all hurt ah here she comes halsy palsy so the smoke wasn't always that thick in that spot the the environment artists kept asking for thicker and thicker smoke because the area hello I was like wasn't it finished there we go and she knows George now and she's not his mom he says mom because ma'am are we gonna talk about the hate exactly well he's it at four different ways you'd say mummy and of course gen Taylor the voice of Cortana also a great place halsy because it's her brain doodads that are inside of Cortana right yes why it makes sense that she made her sound the same voice she made her in early of course she's got a little eager and I would say this was probably like a biggest technical challenge to actually get a believable face acting I mean we're looking right at her yeah her extended period of time soon and this is one of the times when we actually didn't who call face over right yeah you we did the voice first and we cut it in and then you guys shot an actress yeah we shot that lipstick basically lip-syncing to Jen's did we do George here too yeah it was me that was you that's why he five kata-kata was CJ pat did June and and another character later on so the blinking in the eyes that's all part of that face over yes yes we use different metrics for that yeah brand new system that we implemented for this game facial acting actually getting that right yeah it was Tom Isaac oh look at her just oh that was uh there was some very nice animation that we got that she just held on to it a little bit longer cuz cats cats a little sassy right there she's getting a bit cheeky with palsy I like the way she looks over at Cotter in a moment just making son 26 30 hours but what six what is the total span of time that the game takes place it's actually just few days yeah seven to two or three days a little longer than that no we in the middle of the game we take a pretty hefty break yeah how does this fit in with the cannon from the original perfectly perfectly it's like a jigsaw puzzle it's like in syncs up yeah we were really sensitive to that party yeah Lily yeah we got the dates right this is a our hats off to one of Halo one's missions yeah truth and reckoning reconciliation and here we for this particular camera motion we using a marked up 2x4 created like where he was actually literally walking live and filming likely already mocap actors he could have fallen to his death there yeah actually when he stepped over the little gap that we put out and and I I actually felt like a little queasy oh here's a little child's voicing caramels that what is that a child a little a pioneer child ghost pioneer chives that really you just singing pitched oh do you wanna you don't want to wreck it for people they ignore any idea okay it is [Laughter] but it represents the dead children of the playing there it's kind of creeps me I don't know that I thought that creepier wait so much of this much of this mission we're we're doing with June oh yes that's a knife who is played by Sunil and Hospital when I it's the craziest and talkative snipers talkative because perfect casting well with Savannah he's by himself so much of the time that he can't help it he's going to happen say exactly yeah I feel like Sunil lost himself in this garden Davis he was he had some great delight to work with he had one line that were so sad we'll talk about that later yes well we're preparing that we're preparing them in this bit yeah yes yeah you got the ingredients yes ready to make it this is also a multiplayer map oh no we know that yeah now since we're just our third assassination in a row this might be a good time to talk about the assassinations yeah and how they happened and how many hours initially it was a it was one of the animators just fooling around with this amazing idea of coming up and then in performing a fancy SS or a fancy melee I think they initially called it something like that man yeah but that that caught the imagination everyone don't get bad huh the Quetta the good work as we call it the wheel hub oh don't shoot him right away yeah I wanted to see him put ropes around by the way this is the only time yeah we hit somebody that's the plan don't remind me how many men once we put into this thing the meal was in several other measures or at least two other missions to other yeah it was a really hard character to deal with and it unfortunately it kept taking backseat to more important things of the game like finishing the game came out okay though I think it came out hard yeah one of the things we did is we made sort of the sound that the duel makes is never occluded by anything because there was a point when you draw r-right if there were too many rocks in front of them you wouldn't hear it and we all know what you say I mean it was still cool at the me yes the mule was writable at one point we could board and run up its back and stuff Agron aid into its mouth was good and didn't wasn't there a point where elites were gonna ride the mule and yes and oh man we went through so many different iterations on that thing we had the elites riding and we had grunts riding it they had they had like shoulder mounted cannons it was really goofy at one point I don't think people understand how it even painful pain development it it even vomited out like hot rocks really and never saw that one good that would kill people from it it's a bit asset at one time yes no it's a lot of ideas for that guy hello frustrating that's some rupture oh yeah I love that guy's local Seattle guy yes the magic opening thing like you know yeah they've got remotes yeah once again a little tension between the the spotters and suspected rebels and so impacted rebels yes now you know the deal is you can kill the rebels by accident or on purpose without getting penalized because they're carrying a gun they're armed yeah yeah don't try to do it in the city no the civilians is not good yeah hey there stache Chad Jay Jay Jay Jones oh no no lieutenant what it is yeah we got chase Jason Jones right here with us yes all members of Bungie yeah who came up with that no are we is every person of Bungie representatives actually know if they are you sir yes just a huge leads of Steve cotton I believe I started digit EFX hello the lighting on this whole night mission Oh another one no this was nothing major a major challenging gameplay right because like you need a TV oh you broke a snack Oh nicely done the lighting yeah it's a night mission but you need to be able to see so what would did you see the moons in the sky yeah I know everything son I know but it's it's it's very effective like how it feels like night but you know edge of a safe yeah great power very cool effects that's all chat box both who's also on your team right now oh look at that Betsy is so Jason Jones gets to be a lieutenant I want to fit on purpose Oh take out oh very nice use of the loading forklift yeah that's the forklift explode it's powered by propane absolutely oh wow that was a bummer right yeah right to the front noble sick very sure about that all right Oh ringing all right it's pretty upset Stosh this is the multiplayer locally I believe the duck car died the clouded the blank there we go hopefully it's like he's preparing ingredients for something yeah and a half looks like like hearing a great analogy for that I don't know what that'd be like what he's doing now is he's sort of boring just to say remote back yeah as a peasant army you know there's a military guy you have some sort of slang for it yeah yeah yeah preparing a souffle or preparing something yeah I'm making something yeah yes ready to go now now here's a Vista beautiful shot now this is kind of meant to be sort of reminiscent of like if you ever see those cowboy movies where they just come up on me yeah I think this is the first of your butt shots to that you have in the game you're already absolutely having this a beautiful plot of this button and should be shown as possible I like a lot of cancer romantic barbarians yes yes exactly that would be romantic I'm going to be innovated a well here we are oh yeah more vehicles than ever before this is an T duck empty dive which you came up with her name because that's the way you wanted her to come across like your auntie dot what you have yeah it was kind of like a temporary thing and then it just kind of like fit that like she's not like a mother computer or writing like that she's more of a sort of a a helpful friendly computer and here's the first of the harkening back to the original Halo music so this cinematic probably got worked on longer than any other cinematic in the game just because the sheer technical challenge here we go of having so many vehicles on screen yes it's time to see and come right there actually he should have said he's been to bake that cake cringe and we all sort of fell in love with that line of Bungie but Marcus was determined to cut it no matter what Marcus do you realize that it's still in the English subtitles I realize that's great that first person I wish we could drive like that that was gonna be scary what's this come on what's the little helmet oh oh yeah supplying levers yeah for a long time we had Dave livers screams in the head crash yeah that was good Dave Lee know the cinematics producer yes and his scream sounds are in there as a skip fraction so if we play it about doing we still here yeah he's convinced they're not no they're not there right now oh good one we just heard it wasn't there but it's a high skip fraction so everyone's allowed to hear the screaming reply leavers we didn't want to subject people to that all the time this is a really good encounter man this level really shaped up I love this opening encounter I love the way if you disable the turrets the grunts jump out and then when they're back on the grunts and jump back in you think you've taken care of it goodnight launcher brand new weapon and the whole thing we we established in like the feeling of the big push of multi vehicle is I mean we continue with like there's so much going on in the sky I'm like I mean I just saw an explosion over oh yeah big battle up there yeah hopefully they will take a little time and pan out over the horizon because definitely one of the big ideas that we wanted to sell this level is the idea of the big battle from the opening cinematic with all of those vehicles all active at once to you know dozens of individual units that you're fighting and then out on the background we want to give the sense that you're part of this large large war that they're rapping all over the planet not just your local battle right in front of you anymore throughout reach always about what you're doing so many other battles out just beyond the rhythm all those battles out in the distance you can do because of what was the name of the technique the imposter system here we got our LEDs the effigy boom look at those favorites oh that's a nice shot chatbox goes did that the ringleader now watch it gonna shoot the thing oh there goes the family longswords and watch their twirly big swirl out there yeah I made them spin around so much stuff I don't see unless now next time I play I'm gonna watch for that you will oh here we go rail rides first rail ride where sure if this is gonna work or not I enjoy this because you can play a different way every time you peed on the other side you get in this side you can shoot what you want to shoot or player co-op baddies takes a lot of design work plus you get to look out at this incredibly gigantic I love the design of the rocks we're speechless we shouldn't be posting I know years now welcome I love the skyboxes if she really you blows ability Adam yeah we've spent a lot of time on those like I want to go there and play around it's simply that whole area there should be some giant multiplayer level things like Zack freaked out when we asked him to build this area okay like what 3/4 mile of combat from there oh my gosh just huge who's crazy was the old EMP problem now this is a huge invasion map I'm about to enter here should never we just met this pilot and then okay going down and do we ever hear from him again so George says lucky around this one because we have lockable armor which which saves response but unfortunately good for hugged the pie he would have pilot George come on waking up again so just locking the armor somehow involved a gel layer yes no said does yeah of course yeah like it's unlocking it there yeah oh we've just got to know them that's kind of a reference to the halo 3 where we're Master Chief's armors is locked up and that's how he survives the fall what a circle serve to the door down because of the 200 cheddar with the jet fence I love have you ever come and dear to banshee on this level this is a lot of fun to know I haven't tried that badge and she's come down closer there on top of the rod you can jump along yeah all right must be ready to power down so the notion of the jetpack came in pretty early but I think it was like from a from an environment perspective and an event perspective it was kind of a scary mm-hmm scary thing where could you go everywhere how can you break the maps in many ways Steve when we when we talked about this the end of this mission this this was a slotted as one of the massive resource bonfires mm-hmm which I think we had what maybe two or three of them in our previous games yes how many do we have in this game uh probably about six or seven crazy one maybe actually it was probably about 15 they just kept that off but we couldn't cut him well if you had really nice team mates they would have pulled a little closer to the yeah make a jump so far now how did you guys do that Moe campus okay that was well that was some mocap but that was mostly Pat at 20 yeah hey that's a who's the voice of the pilot on this Matt Graham has been a he's the guy from lost Ethan from lost Oh William math oh man yes yeah yeah oh good friends with Peter O'Brien all right and they're not really well oh but that's so much stuff for one our house all Chad did a great job on that this size of the lung that is solid oh my god reeking crazy boom miss turned out really nice the Schendel I love how far yep the pan to save a whole thing incredible how does that ship sneak up on you like that it came out of cloak came out just above the clouds yes it's close no one can peel it so we're gonna fight scarabs at some point yeah right get rid of that we'll patch the game I think this is my favorite staying out of the game we in the audio department calls to the Scarab teased that was scarab teased one this once again a little bit of tension here George that's imminent a minute do not cool tattoo this is Joel on fire this time because you say we learn a little bit more about surviving as well that thing's crushing us and we're waiting for backup schema dynamics here going on exactly went down with the ship stick I still remember when you first described at this scene we're sitting in the apartment and a little storyboard of it mmm-hmm look in the cave behind them and all things final here cat drawing pictures and then it all came exactly together yeah yeah the picture Steve's provided earlier on never made it in the game though what exactly is she driving well that's gonna have to remain a mystery but it's the reason we're amateur game that's so so we we captured the two actors in the boob at the same time on this one right yeah Freddy and Alana in the recording booth at the same time arrived and that got some really nice chemistry together destroyed covers can see now the synchronous orbit above us Melissa Derek now you hear her drawing yeah because we didn't actually see her drawing so we had to pretend like we heard it when we cut away the very system I find out we should be able to learn yeah until it is really what she is exactly what she just drew it she throws nice day I love this thank you for sharing yeah so always cook very nice for but capable transport and the single most expensive piece of lighting Lee the lighting the facial animation the acting is all really top-notch less and it is and it's kind of a quiet scene compared to the big explosion ladies I'm addicts that we usually do but it's such a nice respite from that action and and you get to see a little bit more of the characters I think it's really successful well and I'd love to think of the spot ins actually like coming up with a plan like being smart yeah not about that one for a while did you do comparing this to Magnificent Seven or it was no samurai Seven Samurai our Band of Brothers or whatever it's or even Saving Private Ryan you you need to get more than just all those action scenes you have to have a little private moments where you get a little sense of who these characters are when they interact with each other it's important to keep that I've been seeing in there I think we missed the little transition of the the helicopter blades coming in over wow I mean we were talking about uh this little environment was built in a the cave was building a little shoebox and this environment underneath the betrayer yes there we go this was our e3 demo it's one thing I want to note about the the Falcon landing is that I was able to finally realize a long-standing dream of mine which is to have a dynamically generated jet wash or for the vehicles it's another thing that came on way late and yeah Mike Baldwin's the programmer who is working on that and and it it makes the Falcon feel so much more real but yet was beautiful with beachy counters are quiet magical about this Beach encounter yeah about this whole environment I think it's the music yeah you know when we first played this music in e3 there are several people who are like is this the way all the music's gonna sound and in leach they're a little bit terrified yeah Marnie with this music intentional that was the great was completely unintentional I know where it came from I don't know how it happened now the fun thing about this encounter 2 is it you can keep coming back out if you stay outside it's just an endless wave oh no they just keep coming in right it's a blast I'll see if you can do it yeah oh oh you know in a while it's going down lighting around that one yeah look a little dirty to me yeah romantic big reveal that's a cool hollow girl yeah like that who built that no raid built some of it can build summers we had a whole scene in here with reported all the actors talking and cat talking and also cut all for the better you often absolutely I love how the lights come on revealing the favor watch the kick kick oh yeah we salutes ya get back out of there space combat I love these transition this is actually really happening from planet surface to space utilizing all the really cool things we can do with our atmospheric systems this was old CJ it was beautiful like the the sequence of the you came up with her [Music] now you'll hear I love the crackle of the crackling oh yeah that's looking for that it's actually in Space Shuttle so mark Goldsworthy magic out here on this guy it took I don't know how many months and that about how much artwork with the sky matches we go through at least five different skybox transitions the 3d guys hated us for all these shots getting so close to home I thought yeah but like what a job idea I love that there's a camera attached to this CJ showed me the space shuttle launch that actually does have some camera heads to the Africa hearts very reach I'm pretty speed up yeah space dust beautiful he's just a seamless transition from from ground to space yeah antastic Ferengi gameplay no loading my mom the feeling of the Sabres the Seraph is crazy - that's that's a vehicle that was one of the very first first vehicles ever made for Halo back in 98 that's right it lived all the way through originally a tank I built it it was a tank and it was based off a horseshoe crab yeah and it sat there was one in the inhaler two at the salmon hangar yes jump on yeah with the heretic yeah elite would you find a [Music] space wafer so at this point from campus sudo built this thing it is insanely detailed for how huge at this point the space level is sort of become I wouldn't say passe but like part of part of the reach experience but in terms of what it represents in terms of effort and there's a departure from what we've done before it's pretty pretty extraordinary to have that experience in there yeah it is crazy we put so much time into making this a reality for this kind of novel gameplay moment we planned those early on we had them up on the board in the in our little war room when you ever first build in the campaign fly to space that was one of the big things we just slot about to do oh there's George I think he becomes a pixel and say hey does waiting across right there in a little fold with the but how small he was in this I never saw what you guys had to play my boy you're an old man I just thought we were looking at the planet there he comes these guys are good at just a minute ourselves in space they just like kick off in a hole just for brick now CJ was like eh I did watch the kind of giddy schoolgirl when he came up with that Jacques it's such a beautiful I love it when he can say in the future of subtle to have mover with the video images on the screen we had one too many characters of this game unless we wanted it to feel like like like somebody's reporting from the field and on the news you just have the photo up yeah yeah you don't need a animations like they're marketing back to some of the space musical a very open it we have this little target confirmed and then this this we had to put that same filt a different filter but a global filter everything so all the song Chuck out that sounds different load gravity low ground how you get that with enemy you slow it down uppercut I took us a while to come up with that name operation uppercut see it's all digression because it's like low grant know where apparently just well a little bit oh look at him down low but but not much not much cuz it we have to activate the ship systems in order to uh get gravity back online [Music] and like those bronze cups each other these factors I believe that was a rien 3-pack he's got on his back yeah you see that for gameplay no get back to filming see when you go to outer space you automatically put the reentry pakka actually after it attaches to you and say yes sir see he's got a reenter attack yeah it's amazing what nobody has won it Spartans have Pacific the re-entry pack actually like hooks on machine hooks onto your back when you get in the seat of the side right if you're there - yeah but the rest of the soldiers we don't they're expendable I don't have the ran there's always - gonna fly out yeah what was the plan again the plan was always to get out of there on the on the Pelican that they came in on but the one thing with pelicans is usually a one trip deal and we're probably more like a half a trip bill Oh erosion explosion booooo-whoo Savannah hello pelicans Wow hmm no that was oh so sad or that really well whenever it's sad you hear the monks come in all those poor innocent souls how many monks to be you service Marty Marty it's not exactly true I did have some monks in the study it's like the bridge this one here is just me many times as many singers Cat Stevens cat I like that's what over him I get all the troops around the planet always that what we're looking for the [ __ ] replacements Oh tell me again Oh one-hit-kill hello we went in camel takes good yeah I guess and up in the sky there why wouldn't they see it but really good lung nya saw us getting closer oh we're on approach for on a refueling yet I have to say this is one of the more complex missions we've ever done with the wafer it used to be more complex probably would have been another 40 minutes we can play no at least the elites are amazingly difficult we spent so much effort getting the AI for the elite to be amazing I looked at halo 1 2 as a good example of how we did it right simplicity of the design now you guys probably know this but if if you don't go right back to the the loading dock or whatever can you stay here after we stop talking you can just talk the Marines forever so the grains will stay with you and you can just keep talking about so you'll hear all the fun kind of that with all the Marines so you can sort of build up a real sort of connection and rapport is so that when they don't make it with you all of those bolts so it's Greek detail oh man yeah look at that such a good character well I'll go good news and bad news and there's some bad spurted some fire and I thrusting English toast which means the only way off this slag heap is gravity that sounds like bad news this is not gonna talk about good well that was the good news yeah gets worse oh I tell you when you take off your helmet that means some sort of bad news is times fried I'm gonna have to fire it manually no no what wait Fred will make you see you later what are you going six the first partner who sacrificed himself is Georgeson reach duty so love and then he just picks them up and he must shoot him in the right direction just by throwing them so he lands in the right spot I reach total random location yeah goodbye engage that entry back at some point slipspace there it goes look at the size of that carrier yeah because subspace ruptured block didn't beautiful and he did a really good thing with timing the with debris now technically you mission look everything where did George go he was just you know what I don't think George is necessarily dead we might be in the same place master cheats in Qatar because those random - oh yeah he's waiting for them on that mysterious planet hangout sipping tea so I wonder how many people when seeing this cinematic at home cut to the signal loss screen and thought that they actually had a problem with their table my TV doke yeah George sad let's have a moment of silence here Oh waking Rob easing shot that's pretty cool the only thing he has is a little like a limp and a and a hurt arm mm-hmm now the respec he just says a side off that's all these guys he's on his arm for on her right so is the reentry pack like doesn't have Jets annette does it handle it go parish has jets has a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and some kool-aid I think that was when powdered you have to find the one yes yes [Music] gosh where we seen this seen before [Music] this is a test isn't it isn't a test see how dedicated you are [Music] now here's a shot of the camera to love okay I'm walking up the hill big reveal of I'm gonna crown another patented butt shot and Alexandria see that's why I think it's more fun to play as the female mmm good point no closer please yes the Dodge City is amazing we're actually looking out over the entirety of their level there Wow no it was funny how many times I played this level and there were no civilians wounded around and then they got in this is crazy huge this is a player yeah Pete stackers do and burn kill the birds Oh but feeding them teddy bear oh we had this massive list I didn't know no the contract items to build being gym bag more than we could ever stuff into the game and we broke out in hysterical laughter one day when we found the teddy bear backpack oh here we are look at all these civilians one of those women civilians had the funniest hair I've ever seen remember the hair that looked like an animal that was alive it was a bug they got big stick pins that can I had a mind of its own dude yes I like the civilian that looks like bone oh yeah thanks is there a bone oh oh yeah fly glasses whatever you do don't shoot the civilians that's bad news it's pretty much you shoot us a villain in the game is over just BAM this is a great feat and you have to start over this is tough too because you can accidentally kill a civilian because you can't see what you're sure to see Druz ooh sometimes I'll shoot it when it's over look at that guy but this is just a fantastic scene that captures the fact that covenant or everywhere yeah they're attacking the humans and everywhere you go the Brutes there's only so much you can do about it another one of the big long rail rides that that was a production nightmare for the environment guys yeah originally this was not supposed to be a playable zone let's say we pulled it off wow it was hard to script all this to a awful lot of scripting so that's that's Coby Belle right now yeah Coby was in what's his plaintiff families with well I I had remembered him from the fire medical hi Third Watch yeah he was a lot of fun to work with two billion ship oh no wakeful and astute observers will notice that the ship explodes two frames before the impact of the actual shot from indicated it yeah there's a targeting laser that's at the funeral something something gel layer gel layer yeah should have looked around [Music] the ball so this is a fire fight space as well coming up yes again I had a lotta love flying nothing in the space racing around in the hog so why that whole sequence with the the transport exploding it was something that you had in mind for for a long time and were wanting to use it can you talk a little bit about like what your goal was with that and it was a perfect opportunity for us to just showcase the tragedy of human life being being lost on the planet what better way to do that than one of these big ships going down a couple of different moments throughout the game or what we wanted to do that this this turned out to be the perfect location for it though yeah member early I'm talking about wanting to have some civilian someplace and making it feel like you you have some mission to rescue civilians that evacuate them and just see how many what I like about that particular sequence is that a lot of the emotion a lot of the story happens almost like a radio play that you listen to it yeah we're coming up on it this is another one of those areas where you could do it you can finish this off in so many different ways of the blast sandbox really comes through notice the green grunts are not speaking English Marcus finally thank you so much 30 know what a language are speaking their thinking no come on what is it no I know they liebe did some a lot of research they've leaver single-handedly made the alien language work he had an entire program after he figured out how to make it work that you just typed in English and it came out thank Ali so basically you press the button no no he he actually programmed himself to do this like cool that you know yeah yeah he was the only one who know how to pronounce the syllables so he had a like help us with every actor we had it's built in job security right there yeah good this is this is a moment where cat learns a Georgia start there's another little music transition that'll happen different long if any play this guy should notice this they have to play it again I always play with the sound way down transport is away [Music] there's a little piece of music that's just that was originally thus for the teaser trailer back to mama just the horns and the sepals the dead uh-huh it's an own life oh look at that same food greats that is huge now this is it like a cinematic that week sort of kept really simple like there's no dialogue and like totally relying on Marty to carry it with the music then there are a few moments like that amazing I could have really worked I walked into Marty's office a few times like that and I said hey Marty no pressure but higher cinematic rest on your shoulder you're they're gonna make a break it yeah I'm always excited to get those sort of assignments this mission is another one of those novel gameplay moments akin to space we've never done this kind of thing where we flew from rooftop to rooftop in a vehicle it took an immense amount of effort to pull this thing off now here I know where this is from this is from our halo to announce trailer it looks very much like a shot from yeah wasn't that the announced trailer what was that the reverse shot yeah yeah [Music] you know reading I appreciate about this to Lee is that I know that there were probably found some people were saying this cinematic is dead and takes too long and and you kept saying no no musical music will help the timing on this yeah absolutely there's a nice delivery thing Freddie as I was like really subdued he's not supposed to act like yeah business is usual with George having just died yeah I love the people who like there's a lot of fun comment that like for them to guess on your affairs and one of the missions nathan fillion the yeah his character romanian has his cameo appearances on this level that is pretty cool there's several little secret things in this connection I don't know if we're gonna see it dan Miller the designer on this level and he is human to stick the stuff in there he's got more Easter eggs on this little I think that the entire game he has in total it's funny too because I was like a little bot how we probably one of the saddest pieces look out of your eyes for music for all the things that happen we have summer summer love things like this good oh here we go I mean we should probably rotate our music we should probably really credit Red Bull for some of the Dan Miller's ideas probably so we had a lot of comedy relief in this in this level well that was anything yeah wait to get to the nightclub the lighting in this level and the architecture some of the best we've ever done out and this is a harken back to a good old ivory tower good multiplayer map and if I destroy she means push the button but yes automatic destroys things yeah I love that you know why first why make it more complex no bipod like if the spot and you used your iPhone hip flexor right exactly I know why the Covenant would put a big glowy red button on the front of their very important military asset that blows it up but we all said you did forget it's bill elevator music no matter what and what's funny is you can go in and out of the elevator and it changes from creepy scary music - elevator music back and forth it was the one place to like show off our music engine at the end of this whole halo saga break the fourth wall here just a little bit like you're proud of it I am trying I would love to break that fool called on well just so you know all that elevator didn't promise from old commercials that I did and that's sort of my purging of all my over oh my god is there a Flintstones one No shut up though last one out turn out the lights know that refer to flying the Falcon business if you figure out how to turn the nightclub on you will have such a treat Marty you've already said too much did I yeah but this is for legendary by this by the time people see this I wouldn't already be done for anything I'll go the bar to get into that thing it's all right all right when I want anymore remember don't look at that you can land on any one of these rooftops I know it's amazing if you fly too low too close to the deck look at all the battle going on beneath you there's all kinds of bad stuff happening down on the ground level yeah it's not safe to go down there I haven't played this co-op yet but apparently it's amazing with all the air battles you can be having can you have four Falcons on this or is it just two for Falcon but co-op guys can man the guns that is correct yeah in music stops right there right on that line of dialogue well it stops so now you still could fly around for a while but hopefully you're going to land some here this is the scene where like cats attitude towards the player changes a little bit yeah yes yes the church scene it's what we affectionately call him yes yeah you're just stunned - she's getting - no cat here a little more because at first she bristles a little bit because you're the replacement for the previous right noble six and she's not quite ready softened so yeah humanity Wow a meal he's cold Emile masks his emotions with humor inside I've never known anyone to do that those are senior-level communicate point is why put Spartans on defensive deployment see that link - SATCOM cat chasing it dispenses got more shrapnel in it then that line was one of the audition lines here on the trail keepers we heard so many different tricky women do that line she had a lot of like really sort of original way she said stuff like especially like : Oh Colin Mulholland yeah 40 we didn't need that Duke the Colonel Hall and then trace it to us it's an old jingle singer Frank and I'm from Chicago oh really yeah where do you say oh geez funding go hundred beer commercials he's one of those breathing oh dude this kind of guy he was a great singer we really had a lot of fun with him he's a good musician too good guns a lot of reasons we at some point will release the outtakes when she goes with guns for the first time Oh nice quick run now cat was momentary blind momentarily blinded that because she was the only one little light oh so she missed the hazard or seller's button thanks could you say that more buzz there's the nice which is why they want a spork torch and burn off keep dr. Halsey excavation data from all excavation wait maybe but according to Holland the government are still hunting for something what does he get off calling a demolition of priority 100 so he's not shooting at the vehicle up there he's shooting at her someone had a beach zealot up the is Ella zealot commander see here's these after something that they know there's that little theme that had on Sara I got a dog catch up feat saddest moment the game this awesome cat and we were just getting to know her says tissues right over here no need plenty of black mm-hmm now this shot reminds me of some of the concept art for marathon way back in the day to sort of those big destroyed vistas and incredible uplighting and I'm so glad you guys put cat in his arms is amazing this is actually from a concept shop that originally there was gonna be a whole issue that came after that filled in this area wow that's right driving the Scarab around the destroyed glass city I got cut I was a little crazy it was crazy you were gonna be able to drive the Skip drive the Scarab through a glass that we had it working in prototype initially harp and then we we came to our senses here we are look at all the ash Eric you guys now stood up in order to do this though you turned on rain without rain right isn't that how it works this is actually one of the weather systems it already got has kind of realized after cars we kept coming out of this level Sounders are all I mean you came in one day and it looked like this if we heard right no that was an exhibition oh something happening I saw surprise shot there Li si Kara's delivery was very down there he's pretty upset he's an upset about catch he was cute we know there was some relationship between fire you got at some point watch out for the dead bodies in the water rushing against your legs as you go through are there yes all right looking at you with blank eyes I haven't looked for him I never seen them all right there's Ron Livingston again wait let him get on the oh you're not taking them with you so it's not a Halo game without one section where you just get in a scorpion and blow the [ __ ] out of everything else has to be and if you don't like the way the tank drives it's only the section so somebody did that change get improve dramatically initially now initially we had like Toa different tank controls it was pretty hard whoever fixed in there they'd get wood during the beta it was really hard to drive now you can you can destroy all these a a guy so about ever getting out of the time you can blast them with the tank from afar so he could do it the old-fashioned way they do say work say I've always used up old micro nights by that time if you go in there and chew on it you should be able to walk in and have your shields think about if you didn't hey little one remember that one but where do you say huh just walk into it I think that was been mostly because we ran out of ideas on how to destroy that thing we're affiliate big review here we go coming up soon tram ride I love this shot great lighting another good character acting moment looks like they got themselves corner or more committed to the position [Music] I'm going with corner there's nothing here Jamie actor sir was supposed to blow this place I love this line coming up Don take your vector from Jamie yes and junus look at what it's coordinates our eyes see you're looking well it's pointing also click and a half east here comes housing feet underground right I didn't request shovel quick he doesn't know he's being funny awesome fantastic reactions all insulated yeah a secret door door with mist coming out of my lovely there we go [Music] actually actually that's another section or the musical change every time just subtly change though yeah nice soli why is our animation like so much improved on a technical side over past Halo games basically the use of mocap using using actors and ourselves like walking around in the suits and Katrin over and I've been able to do all the layout like fully with with the mocap information and then cleaning up at movie I friend tell you anything else done that what apologies for the unusual security measures commander of the stakes demanded doctor all so how many embarrassing photos do we have those people wearing the mocap suit I guess most of you mister spandex yes yeah I mean I fit perfectly into Spanish I look looks good clattering those packs around the response ways girl you are here to ensure the delivery of this vital treatment there's more geometry in this shuttle to in all of Kayla water but no John kidding we've been saying the direct command just so we could actually physically drive through this thing a couple miles of tunnel oh my goodness and I think we nailed this shot from the original concept yeah what the heck is that it's been buried here for how many years encrypt hundred-thousand years you hundred-thousand years because things are falling a date already ma'am we're coming to you the decrypting process is still underway I don't think you understand we're out of time if it isn't portable when we reach you and she still all we know is an AI of unknown origin we don't know what a I was talking about yet really - the guy don't know the conical bullet finally holes he says please please yeah yes have a lot of decibels commander I'm seeing this cave is not a natural formations very nice that's a big title of course that's a reference to halo 1 that is correct had one of them stupidest mission dialogue lands ever but this cave is not a natural formation well originally was designed to be and natural-looking formation but Cortana can tell that it wasn't magical and then you made it into a giant metal thing Marcus we need to get that level button quick yes some things never change whoa I love the way these elites charge when they have the sword that they are so intimidating [Music] this is a great firefight space this is officially a piece that's in 11:8 just in case you were interested oh I love any time look at that it's an engineering six five and six good where you get paid the big bucks yes so you can do eleven eight times eleven eight it's my fusion stuff coming in where are they going and deep into the heart into the heart of the anisa all I'm gonna say is there is a vault down here you've said enough okay we can cut that quiet look at this remember when Jamie did that line and he was in the studio and he put his hands up and you get into everything he did everything if he was carrying a gun he was he picked up a pen yeah he always had something to say and here notice you are to take her to the UNSC recognize that don't you here you'll find a fuzzy on two last crews are waiting to get her off planet is the rescue Cortana - shiny visor and I've matched when reach Falls our annihilation is all but certain actually the truth is CJ came to Vanitas we even do that rescue Cortana music here again I'm like yeah can't an act question this is the no we didn't have Cortana and ODST so this is the fourth representation of your time so now she's in that she's in that little package the real package was heavy too yeah I think you know some high-tech she's gonna give it to Carter wait not Carter she has made her choice six I think you see the jealousy in car space yes just a helmet movements now this line comes from when you hand someone a very inexpensive lens there's only one other person dollar blends it is a nurse I haven't anything expensive it's driven if it's heavy good luck you know a sequel the story of June and Halsey is the seat Numair offspring yeah because June doesn't pop amplifier versus Halsey and we don't know exactly what that very smart snipers there's another but now come on - how could we not oh this this cinematic is chock-full of buds now look how cool my own ears he just backed on yeah and he super glued his ass right to the seat he better adjust myself slightly he says he didn't feel totally secure okay watch what's a little rascals cake watch [Music] before door FX in there the geometry looked ridiculous so see Paul sound designed that thing and we got to the end of the final mix and there was so much low base in it but it it actually kicked in the Xbox compressors been made everything go away and killed it all yeah and so I was like wow if we had planned on that I would've been happy with it but because it was an accident we had to fix it there is like destroyed the Xbox Carter guts all over the inside look at any blood coming ladies its ear oh we well I would say that for one of our camera rules coming up why oh really this look is what it's coming up it's when we justify the camera and like feel that it's shot by a camera man see what happens when they jump out of the bag well that's because it's a helmet cam oh this one oh that's hanging off the back of the car okay we were gonna go the camp man's filming them yeah okay I'm watching you go I'm gonna go check this is a game about the anchor fight and I yeah I believe in the credits of the older camera man remembered remember the camera man know one thing that that you guys tried to sell when we were filming the cinematics is actually make the Spartans behave in the cinematics the way they wouldn't game so when the Spartans fall out and they impact on the ground you actually should see their shields take damage whole what we just see there we saw the pillar of autumn oh yeah I'm gonna do this yeah what's the achievement if you run and jump and assassinate right there let's go good there's a goodie download this is a really nice environment well great cave you can't say it out here's another now we're gonna fight this scarab now right we get to get in this go find it my library I'm lucky chair yeah go Carter what I love the way it looks like an animal some very nice animation all of our scrambles our eyes to stay on the rock face goodbye car you know what that was let's go down little two of them is that line he's so upset oh my god this is the biggest environment we've ever built for any single encounter it's a lot different in the beta as well it's a multiplayer very area for invasion boneyard and this is another one of those areas where you can play you can avoid this entire thing if you feel like it you can't like you be hard for us to get through it with a stay encountering someone there's more AI in this area than we've ever packed it a game get it off a lot three I wish the right back up at least at some point I wish those Forks still worked there were so much fun to lift things up oh yeah nice recovery she spent at hey actually this makes me think why didn't we do like a halo 1 style trench run at the end of this voice is who that's exactly vibe who's the voice of Chuck oh yeah yeah he's one of the brains we have lots of fun memories oh here we are Wow right at the end the platform filler big is that pillar of autumn really and in our game there is that like I mean it's the scale probably but it is scale it's 1100 feet long he's Manning the big gun this is when the meal shines oh man just come right up to these guys pretty brave way to play this level originally brutes weren't gonna be in anything other than one mission oh really yeah the Brutes on this mission are amazing we brought them back only because we wanted a different flavor for some encounters but ended up liking what we how we reach the the brute kind of revision I'd them as the subservient race I can tell that like that were in Halo 2 you know these guys not playing on heroic cuz these routes he would have shot he would have died that so easily and this is the original keys as well like the same voice oh yeah captain keys good to see you spire is Pete stacker place two parts and every game not just we did a better job animating them than we did in Halo one kind of had a versus uh where's his little little crazy with that even the hood Lord bridge yes together we had had battle jack all right this is your chance to escape noble six let's go get on the pillar about get on again Pelican Pelican versus another pelican crash I was uh I was a little sad when I worked on this scene because I knew it would be my last Pelican crash Oh Neil oh but still he's able to turn around and think it's night that's it the choice I have good luck sir now we look to use but yes we talk a lot about how do you give the player the sense of making a choice don't really give the player that choice feels I think it feels great to say yeah I'm gonna stay behind and take that gun feels very much true to what a Spartan would do Oh gun is pretty fast covenant cruisers approaching no how come we haven't had this gun like all the way through you know the for Halo games bad cuz what finally just one shot cuz there's only one I'm in existence they got blowed up on a research all animation I just like that thing spinning around path what is that big door I will finish them on the red spot there we go affects Bonanza Steve look at that the gantry section that pulls back is amazing now you realize it's a place where you can go to the show I gotta be quiet I'm gonna ruin it for everyone uh it's legendary look at the tugs whose idea that we want to put tugs on the bottom of the POA just to get it up yeah yeah struggling and then there's aa big chunk of metal the main engines fire because you guys actually worked out the physics on that know exactly how much propellant that would need to lift that thing up and yeah sure we thought that I think romic please actually did do that and there it goes look at that skybox Marcus come on that skybox is amazing did this have anything to do with the volcano in Iceland I challenge anyone to say that named volcano yeah yeah but jet blast but no it's not allowed not the last one so here's the very opening scene from halo 1 and the opening last minute addition to the game and we we had to go looking for the original recording cos of captain Keyes and Cortana and I dug up all the assets you know we did that's the actual healing one recording both of those things which was great to get in here look at that thing though looks so cool the original we're back in to reach music so cool on the outer rim of the galaxy and threshold giant moon and that's the original ring from halo 1 the main menu it was the one that way you actually flew around I did not know that untouched unscathed yeah the same one play forged film we'll see you star side oh now we need to talk about each person on the team quick alright I'll take the top there you go we loved all these people like there were our children I like we put them over everybody in alphabetical order yeah Wow a lot of people yeah look at that this is a long set of credits though it is what was the total over this number of people that were working on beach on Artie within budget I think we had 135 140 somewhere around there you mean and then that includes like all the outside help and no boy no okay so now that's just internal and some of our contractors we had on site I have no idea how many people there so if you include all of the external you need tests test all our partners animation partners and 30 actors 60 80 musicians and singers outside engineers it's a lot of people it's a huge effort yeah and all those individual monks got a separate track yeah every I think it's every 13 weeks ago [Music] yeah like Salvatori Stan Lepard thank you guys I wonder why they had the credit for the Natarajan Nile Rodgers so sort of club music wonder what that would have been hmm again you've said too much credit the crediting they're doing that and he's spoiled with it for everyone I thr bungees a real place look up real departments for the winter studio what's the rest of my girl oh my aunt no kidding those are guys who were working on something else we're not a grush shop anymore Steve [Music] I'm a little okay was that you maybe I was really creepy I will never ever listen to this the same way well no nightmares about that crap it's really freaky to think there's also as you're doing it falsetto no no actually it's as a whole just just pitched up it's more than pitched up but I'll show it to you sometime eyebrows this what did you do there's a there's a little device that's called throat and you can actually change the size of your throat I don't want to hear any sound like a little boy but I also had a soprano sing along with it so she's looking in the reverb far away so Marcy no no it wasn't Marcy actually but she was she was there that day [Music] it's a lot of testers testing is unbelievably important to our process way the whole mezzanine packed full of testers just for localization who are there for at least six months yeah what was it I think it's a nine it's at nine nine language yeah Portuguese got added on right if there's our actors nice job beep-bop yes great Greg Grunberg yes Gavin Patrick Gallagher is was in he's the coach and you Bob O'Donnell Bob O'Donnell voice of the terminals wait terminals with triangles we never saw the analyses no criminal I guess we'll have to go back and play again dig a little deeper Bungie auxilary players that includes Steve Scott as Falcon pilot number two yeah this fall Steve Scott is talking pilot number two and were these people some of our friends at ms o friends of course what are you talking about yes that's why I had this big music for them yeah Joe waters graphics engineer and sweet haircut oh yeah change color every week Joe did the loading screen uh-huh yep auntie does a lot of work it really is because it has to use no data at all in order to work super quick load yeah [Music] localization [Music] contract test nobody count Wow so I always write one really big giant long piece that doesn't necessarily get used in the game because I know I'm going to need something for the end credits because their credits are so long seven minutes what do we the clock in around there yeah longest credits I've ever seen now some of these music pieces of it's not kids a couple of ambitious but never the full piece so did you was this anywhere else in the game because parts of it not not not this full piece and not the ending of it this is the only time you'll hear this ending and this is a harkening back here goes see they'll hit the duh yep didn't [Music] oh nice the ending still be working we saw a little we saw a little seven in there without you guys that was amazing we're not done little treat for people who actually sat through the whole credit exactly right it's not over god bless them for one more buckshot kinda not really I like the camera jiggle yeah now how did this this whole end sequence idea come about and we kick that around 20 different ways at least there was this uh we spent I don't know how many weeks hashing out this idea that what if you came back into the game and actually played the last living moments of your character's life yeah survive super controversial like half the studio loved it half of it totally hated it the idea that you could you would actually die because we've never ever died in a Halo game for real well this is what this is what I think is gonna be interesting because you play the game and how many times do you die but UNIX respawn but now look at the crash there's a crack in your helmet and we die just find this the only time you actually really died and we know we die in this location because of that probably the most insane mocap effort ever some guys going up to room or listen yeah there's a lot of end tweaking to this at smaller and absolutely in a muffled all the sound like the the helmet is no longer able to record sound very well so it gets more and more muffled I didn't want to make it here low sort of heavy at work and only breed I'm not dead yet though probably now he is sad helmet goodbye noble six just need a little more time here Thank You Lee and here we come back yes happy helmet we didn't take that 50 years in the future 50 years later as ruthless efficient there's that moment did we ever get the Eagle that was gonna come down and land on the helmet I was only on legendary what was gonna happen on that sort of slugs wait you're actually gonna have a bird land on the helmet so this is actually 50 years later is this is the furthest forward in time any halo ever goes yeah because we wrapped up the entire yeah see we're saying that we won we won and even a glass planet like reach can come back to life that's right which is cool yeah to us the ship touching down colony ship bringing life back and then one of the very few major triads that I use because I tend to have open fifths and minors and stuff you are it comes dear me well it's great way to happy so guys this is totally bittersweet now ten years doing this together yeah yeah this is the best one who we've done yet as well and I'm glad this is the the final send-off to her fans and you're right it's really been an honor to work on this project for the loving 12 years we've had it I mean who would have ever thought we could keep going this long and the talent we've had in the studio this whole time is just gotten better and better it's a great thing to do if mathy didn't have a stinking code right now it suggests a group hug hug yeah but now forget about it okay all right let's go thanks for watching alright thanks for watching whoever stayed with us no Creek Creek follow us into the bathroom