Prophets of Continuity

Continuity is a fantastic thing.

Defined as ‘the unbroken and consistent existence or operation of something over a period of time’, in fiction this relates to events that have already happened in a story arc being remembered and playing their part in the current tale.  Some series do fine without bothering with it: the Final Fantasy games always contain different stories set in vastly disparate worlds and Glee contains a whole host of continuity problems and errors (or so I’ve read from its Wiki, anyway – I personally avoid the programme like the plague).

For the most part, missing continuity doesn’t really matter, but for me, it’s what makes a good story a great one. It shows that the story’s creators have an obvious love for what they’re writing and a passion for what they’re doing. It’s why I love Star Trek with its different incarnations all overlapping with one another and why I adore Doctor Who, its reference to episodes that have been produced over its fifty year history being a delight to look out for. It always makes me smile when I catch a reference to something that has gone before.

One of the finest examples I’ve seen in recent years, however,  left me feeling more melancholy than merry.

Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary has just been released and is, as you probably already know, a lovingly recreated remake of the very first Halo title. It’s a good title to revisit for its tenth birthday and to remember the now uber-franchise’s humble beginnings as the original Xbox’s flagship title.

However, I was stunned into reverent silence even before I’d laid my hands on the controller.

Following on from the events of Halo: Reach, the opening sequence sees the Pillar of Autumn complete its warp jump to a random location in an attempt to evade and elude the hostile Covenant threat.  During this sequence, you hear two people conversing: Captain Keyes and Cortana. What follows is this exchange:

Keyes: “Cortana, all I need to know is did we lose them?”

Cortana: “I think we both know the answer to that.”

Just like that, in those two sentences, before we’ve even been introduced to the main characters of the game, shivers went down my spine. A decade ago, we had no idea what they were talking about, but only recently have we known that they’re referring to the doomed Spartans that covered the Autumn’s escape from Reach. For years, this cryptic line puzzled fans, but now, for just over a year, the riddle has been solved.

The fact that these lines are included in Combat Evolved, especially as the first lines ever uttered in the entire Halo franchise, makes evident the skill of the former incarnation of Bungie: they’d been planning Reach for years, imbuing the backstory with detail since before the first game was even released.

As a result, these short lines made me reflect on the fates of the Spartans left behind on Reach and realising just how immersively cohesive the Halo universe truly is. Sure, other series make references to past titles – just ask Marcus Fenix about General Raam – but few do so skilfully, subtly and thus affectingly as Bungie did with Halo: Combat Evolved.

Here’s hoping the continuation of Master Chief’s story in Halo 4 be just as captivating as his current legacy.