List of inconsistencies in the Halo series

This list is compiled to show the various discrepancies spotted in the Halo universe. It is difficult to decide which resource is "superior" to another, so usually, the inconsistency is mentioned in the articles that it involves.

If you think you can explain an inconsistency, do so here, on the article's talk page.

There are two types of Inconsistencies: Conflicts and Discrepancies. Conflicts happen when two sources say two different things about the same object. Discrepancies occur when a seemingly impossible event happens without any explanation.

Halo: The Fall of Reach

 * The London: included as a mistaken reference to the UNSC Pioneer in some early editions (FoR p.74)
 * Faster than light drive is referred to as a "Shaw-Fujikawa" engine (FoR p.141), and later as "Fujikawa-Shaw" (FoR p. 278)
 * UNSC frigate referred to as the UNSC Alliance, and then shortly thereafter as the UNSC Allegiance (FoR p.145, 154)
 * The ship UNSC Leviathan is referred to as a cruiser (FoR p.162) while it is later referred to as a carrier (FoR p.212).
 * James' left/right arm fried off by a Fuel Rod Gun (FoR p.208, 210). However, he could easily have been made a flash-cloned arm afterwards.
 * Pillar of Autumn missing its port-side emergency thrusters, and then using them twice (FoR p.271, 292, 320)
 * While riding to Reach Station Gamma, Kelly-087 tells the Chief that the Spartans are "All secure." Kelly isn't even in the Pelican at the time (says on com?) (FoR p.306)
 * In the book the date of halo's discovery is 2542 while it was actually discovered in 2552. (FoR p.335)
 * The ship the UNSC Commonwealth encounters is referred to as being a third the size of the commonwealth while it is thought to be a Covenant frigate which is actually about 1000 meters, while a UNSC frigate is only 478 meters in length. (FoR p.105)

Halo: Combat Evolved

 * Main view screen of the Pillar of Autumn labels the as-of yet unidentified ring as "Halo" (which is not officially named till the level Truth and Reconciliation).
 * Cortana says she cannot begin to calculate the pulse range of Halo just after 343 Guilty Spark finishes telling her it has a radius of 25,000 light years. This can be accounted for by Cortana's inherent distrust of Guilty Spark's motives (she had just called him a bastard), thus, she wouldn't believe anything he says at face value. Additionally, since Cortana is an AI with an insatiable urge to know everything she can, she may have tried to calculate the range herself regardless of whatever 343 Guilty Spark had simply told her.
 * Almost every Pelican dropship bears the marking E419 on its side, despite that each Pelican has a different ID number.
 * PVT Jenkins' Record View on the level 343 Guilty Spark shows the date as the 27th of May 2552 when The Maw clearly takes place on September 22. (Frankie has confirmed that the date calibration of his equipment was not performed, causing the apparent discrepancy.)
 * The pilot of the Master Chief's lifeboat is referred to as "Lieutenant" but says "Aye aye, sir" to the Master Chief even though Lieutenant is higher ranked that Master Chief. However, this could be due to the fact that nearly all UNSC personnel owe subordinate respect to the Spartans to some degree. (The Master Chief has mission command thus command of all survivors since his orders come from Fleetcom, the Lieutenant's commanders. His mission is to capture a Covenant ship, and he has tactical superiority.)
 * In The Maw, the main objective is to trigger a Wildcat destabilization of the Pillar of Autumn's fusion reactors. Later Cortana tells Foehammer that the engine sustained more damage than she thought because of the Wildcat destabilization. Note that this may be due to the fact that the engine decay rate was faster then Cortana originally expected and therefore theorized it must have taken damage on impact or she didn't want to admit that they were blowing up the ship and used it as an excuse.
 * Also in The Maw, the player has to travel over 3km to reach the Longsword, but the Pillar of Autumn is only 1.17km long.
 * In Halo: The Fall of Reach, Hikowa and Dowski are female officers of the Pillar of Autumn. However, on the level Pillar of Autumn, the bridge (HQ of a ship) has no female members.
 * Similarly, William Lovell's eyes are green, but the PoA's crew has no green-eyed members.
 * Grunt combatants can be heard saying "Bad Cyborg!" to the Master Chief. Master Chief, however, is not a cyborg. The second chapter of The Pillar of Autumn is called "AIs and Cyborgs first." Same inconsistency as above.

Halo: The Flood

 * Jackals and Special Ops Elites on board the Pillar of Autumn (HtF p.7, 36, 29). This does not occur during gameplay on any difficulty.
 * On page 38 Cortana identifies Halo but it isn't identified until the level Truth and Reconciliation.
 * On page 39 the Pelicans had to wait until they were in Halo's atmosphere. Pelicans are known to be able to operate in space although this could simply be the pilots being delayed until they were in the atmosphere.
 * During the Two Betrayals chapter, the Master Chief "went with the rifle and shotgun" (HtF p.281), and only a page later manages to come up "with his sidearm in his hand", though this could be because the book does not honor the 'two weapons maximum' of the Halo games. (HtF p.282).
 * Sergeant Parker referred to as a he (HtF p.112) and then a she (HtF p.113).
 * First Lieutenant Melissa McKay's mission clock is prefixed by an extra 1 (HtF p.127, 148) NOTE: The last time it shows her mission clock it shows D+144:38:19, while on the Master Chiefs last mission clock mention, it reads D+76:18:56. That's while he is en route to the Pillar of Autumn. It wouldn't take over 5 hours to detonate the ship, let alone 70 hours.
 * An encounter with 2 Jackals ends with one bullet ridden and the other plummeting off a cliff. However, following this a Marine steps forward and summarily shoots "each Jackal in the head" (HtF p.103).
 * Near the middle of the book Spec Ops Elite Zuka 'Zamamee lays a trap for the MC near the Silent Cartographer, coinciding with the game level of the same name. Afterwards he sends a Grunt spy to Alpha Base who reports that MC has gone there sometime before the events of the level 343 Guilty Spark. This is impossible as from the Silent Cartographer MC goes straight to the area around the control room and then straight to the swamps of 343 GS. ''However, the book does say that Foehammer picked up the Chief to bring him back to Alpha Base where he 'scarfed a quick meal and a couple hours of sleep' so possibly Yayap saw him during that time.
 * Sergeant Stacker is not mentioned in the book. He is replaced for the raid on the Truth and Reconciliation by Sergeant Parker, and for the raid on the Silent Cartographer by Gunnery Sergeant Waller. The only place where he might make in appearance is when the Chief rescued a crashed Marine squad with a Sergeant, where Stacker is normally found in the game.

Halo 2

 * In the video "A Day at the Beach" the marines fighting are ODST's. During gameplay the marines at the hotel are not ODSTs, just standard marines. Also the location for the crash of the Pelican does not match its position in game. Lastly, it shows an Elite with camo and a sword, something never observed in gameplay.

Halo: First Strike

 * Longsword landed in the Ascendant Justice is repeatedly referred to as a Pelican (FS p.75, 93, 95, etc.)
 * Isaac is referred to as Spartan-029, even though he has already been established as Spartan-039 and Joshua is Spartan-029. This is probably a typo.

Halo 3

 * Every Longsword fighter bears the marking 7-89 on its side, despite that each Longsword has a different ID number.

Manual vs Books
(These discrepancies are created when material from the game manuals is inconsistent with material from the novels.)


 * The Halo: Combat Evolved Manual states that the Harvest incident took place in 2520 (H: CE Manual p.4) while all other sources specify 2525 (FoR p.96)
 * The Manual also states that Captain Keyes has served in the UNSC since 2526 (H: CE Manual p.8) though he was fresh out of the UNSC OCS in 2517 (FoR p.19)
 * The Grunts are referred to as 5 feet tall (H: CE Manual p.10), but in The Fall of Reach they are referred to as being a meter tall (a little over 3') (FoR p.1)

Game vs Books
(These are created when the novels describe events that are not the same as what is seen in gameplay. As explained in this forum post, the games are considered by Bungie to be more canon.)


 * Primary insertion group during the Truth and Reconciliation assault is made up of ODST's (HtF p.100), while in-game there are only Marines. ODST's did appear in Halo 1 (contrary to popular belief), although they did not wear ODST body suits in Halo 1. These could have been separate insertions, but a singular attack is more likely.
 * Halo: The Flood describes only four Scorpion tanks being retrieved from the Pillar of Autumn, which does not account for the one in Assault on the Control Room. Fire Team Zulu was working out of Alpha Base so they could have been ordered to bring the tank which would account for it being near a downed dropship.
 * Cortana accesses Halo's Control Center via the Master Chief removing and placing the memory chip from his helmet in the console, while in the novel she broadcasts herself into the system using the suit's transmitter.
 * UNSC ships use rotating sections to simulate gravity (FoR p.274) yet no such mechanism is seen in-game. This could be accounted for if the rotating parts were inside the ship. The Pillar of Autumn may also have been using the reverse-engineered Covenant technology called Gravity Plating instead of rotating sections.
 * The Pillar of Autumn's MAC cannon is depolarized and cannot fire (FoR p.337), yet the gun is apparently used, and the loss of fire control still makes headlines (H: CE, opening cinematic) Note that the subspace jump takes a few days. This means that there was a time during which the MAC could have been repaired.
 * The cutscene in H1 at the end of the level "The Pillar of Autumn" clearly shows the PoA being fired upon with plasma. However in the novel, the Prophet at the ring forbids the Covenant ships to fire lest they strike the sacred relic (Htf p.6)
 * Grunts love to overcharge their plasma pistols in the books (HtF p.81), yet they never do so in the games.
 * In the game Master chief throws Pvt. Jenkins' Record View away but still has it in first strike. This could be explained by the Chief's suit automatically making a copy of Jenkins' recording as a possible means of gathering intelligence, like today’s armed forces gathering dog tags from the dead, although this is only a theory.
 * On several occasions in the books (too numerous to list), UNSC forces are mentioned as switching their MA5Bs from bursts to full auto, although in the games, they are only capable of fully automatic fire. Likewise, in First Strike, (p.137),Vinh fires two single shots at an Elite with her BR55.
 * The Halo Wars trailer ( supposedly ) depicts the Battle of Harvest between 2525 and 2531. UNSC marines and Spartans are fighting the Covenant on the ground, however during the attack on Harvest, Project Orion wasn't operational. This can be easily explained by the fact that Halo Wars may not only cover the battle of Harvest since the canon date for the game is 2531 and the official canon attack of the Covenant on Harvest was in 2525."

Books vs Books
(These happen when information from the novels are inconsistent with information from other novels.)


 * Pelican's operational maximum is listed as 12 Marines (HtF p.76), elsewhere as 3 crew, 10 seated, 5 standing (Sybex PC Guide p.66), yet elsewhere they can carry 75 children (FoR p.46), 30 Elites (HtF p.211), or 27 Spartans (FS p.27) {Note that the pelican in FS has all the unnecessary equipment removed (likely including the seats), and the spartans are more or less jam-packed into the little craft}
 * During the battle of Reach many Covenant ships are destroyed, but not before they can loose their own lethal plasma attacks (FoR). However, later plasma en route to a target merely dissipates as the originating ship and its magnetic controls are destroyed (FS p.266).
 * Halo:The Fall of Reach states that Harvest has a population of 3 million. However, in Halo:Contact Harvest, it is stated to have a little over 300,000.
 * Halo: First Strike implies, though never implicitly states, that the Ascendant Justice is the flagship of the Fleet of Particular Justice. But the Halo Graphic Novel describes the Seeker of Truth as the flagship.
 * Lieutenant Dominique is introduced as a member of the command crew of the Pillar of Autumn (FoR) then he disappears when the ship arrives at Installation 04 (HtF). It is possible that he was killed in the battle around Reach.


 * Engineers are supposedly first seen by humans at Battle Of Sigma Octanus IV in 2552, however, in Ghosts Of Onyx, when Kurt is reviewing a mission of the SPARTAN-IIIs, some years prior, he sees Engineers. However this could have been kept classified due to the secrecy of the SPARTAN III program.
 * Elites and Hunters are also seen in a mission reviewed by Kurt, though the two creatures were first seen in 2552, Kurt is reviewing the mission years prior to 2552.
 * Chronologically, the first time Brutes are encountered by the UNSC was at the Battle of Harvest in 2525, yet the Master Chief has no intel on them until the attack on the Unyielding Hierophant in 2552. This could be accounted for by the secrecy of the first encounter with the Covenant, and ONI could have tried to cover up the failure of the negotiations with the Brutes.
 * In 2525, when Harvest was glassed by the Covenant, UNSC technology took approximately two months to traverse between Harvest and Reach, but in 2552 it takes a ship only 19 days to travel between Reach and Earth, when the distances between the three planets are only between 10 and 11 light years.
 * The BR55 (Battle Bifle) is said to be a prototype weapon on the planet Harvest for Captain Ponder's militia in Halo: Contact Harvest. However, in Halo:Fall of Reach, some thirty years later, the SPARTAN IIs only just get the weapons despite being the top choice for the weapons.