Halo - Hail to the Chief!

When you find yourself in a universe (or franchise) that's constantly expanding, filled with horrifying zombie aliens, a religious war, and ancient alien technology (and even more ancient-er aliens)... it's time to sit back, read a million books, and learn about the lore, universe, and fandom of Halo! ...And we couldn't be in better hands as Krysta of [Halo: Podcast Evolved](https://www.halopodcastevolved.com/) guides us through the vast lore that is in store! ## Episode Outline ### Fandom Facts **History and Origins:** > Halo is a military science fiction first-person shooter video game franchise created by Bungie and now managed and developed by 343 Industries, a subsidiary of Microsoft Studios. The series centers on an interstellar war between humanity and an alliance of aliens known as the Covenant. The Covenant, led by their religious leaders called the Prophets, worship an ancient civilization known as the Forerunners, who perished in combat with the parasitic Flood. The central focus of the franchise builds off the experiences of Master Chief John-117, one of a group of supersoldiers codenamed Spartans, and his artificial intelligence (AI) companion, Cortana. Other characters, such as Noble Six from Halo: Reach, are also introduced in the series. The term "Halo" refers to the Halo Array: a group of immense, habitable, ring-shaped superweapons that were created by the Forerunners to destroy the Flood. They are similar to the Orbitals in Iain M. Banks' Culture novels, and to a lesser degree to author Larry Niven's Ringworld concept. > > — [Wikipedia - Halo (franchise)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_(franchise)) The game franchise has been running since 2001, and in that time over 65 million copies of the 13 games have been sold, grossing almost $3.4 billion (not counting the books, comics, live action films and miniseries, and anime). **Search Data:** By search data, [interest in the Halo franchise has been on a slow decline](https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=%2Fm%2F04h6hv,%2Fm%2F0128442n,%2Fm%2F026wy8d). Comparing to other first-person shooters, it's possible that this is in part due to more competition. Interest in the game mostly spikes around the release of new games. The top countries for Halo, by search volume, are as follows: Mexico, Columbia, United States, Australia, Canada, Guatemala, New Zealand, Panama, Puerto Rico, United Kingdom. **Fan Demographics:** This week, we have an assortment of data from different sources. The most comprehensive we found was this survey from [r/halo](https://www.reddit.com/r/halo/comments/1wwgas/halo_a_demographic_survey/) with over 1300 results: - _Gender_: Mostly male (96.2%; female 3.8%) - _Age_: Mostly 18-24 (61.8%); 15-17 (22%); 25-34 (14%) - _Employment_: Mostly students (51%); Employed full-time (22.1%); Employed part-time (13.7%) - _Ethnicity_: Mostly white / caucasian (79%); Spanish / Hispanic / Latino (6.7%); Asian (4.6%) - _Marital Status_: Mostly single, never married (86.7%); Living with partner (6.2%); Married (5.2%) Regarding age data, there is this thread from the [Halo Waypoint forums](https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/forums/90a6869bcf944c54a17102ac9e31da1a/topics/average-age-of-halo-players/395d83dd-0491-4ea4-867c-ae4966e637d0/posts) (number of participants is not stated): - 1% - Child (5-8) - 3% - Young Teen (9-13) - 41% - Teenager (14-19) - 41% - Young Adult (20-29) - 13% - Adult (30-64) - 1% - Senior (65+) And a different source, [T3CHNOCIDE's Demographic Survey Results](http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:T3CHNOCIDE/Demographic_Survey_Results) (over 250 respondents), which seems to corroborate age and gender data: - _Age_: Mostly 14-17 (50%); 18-21 (25%); 22-30 (12.5%) - _Gender_: Mostly male (90%); other / no answer (7.5%); female (2.5%) **Fanac Fast Facts:** - Archive Of Our Own has [over 600 works related to Halo](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Halo%20(Video%20Games)%20*a*%20Related%20Fandoms/works): - Top 3 Categories: Gen (46.6%), F/M (35.3%), M/M (10.1%) - Top 3 Fandoms (non-Halo): Red vs. Blue (6.2%), Mass Effect Trilogy (4.4%), Star Wars (2.1%) - Top 3 Characters: John-117 (40.6%), Cortana (23.5%), Kelly-087 (11.5%) - Top 3 Relationships: Cortana / John-117 (10.3%), OC / OC (2.4%), Thomas Lasky / Sarah Palmer (2.4%) ### [Last Episode's](https://fanthropological.com/team-ico) Famous Last Words **T:** How much of the fandom is non-competitive or curative? [// Hard to say; Halo competitive subreddit has 6.2k subs, halo has 192k subs, halostory has 15.1k subs. Looks like a lot of curative]: # [// Admitedly, dumb question: That's most fandom]: # **G:** Did the Halo series draw any inspiration from Starship Troopers? **Z:** Is the Halo franchise set up to keep going even though there are no new games on the horizon? Do fans move on after a certain age? **Nick:** What's up with that talking plant? ### Main Discussion **Topics covered in this episode:** TBD ### Spotlight: [Installation 01](https://installation01.org/) > Installation 01 is a fan-made Halo game being made by Halo lovers working from around the world. We aim to build an artistic tribute to Halo that recreates the multiplayer experience of the Bungie-era games. The game will be free to play on all PC platforms, including: Windows, macOS, and Linux. > > We operate very carefully under Microsoft's Game Content Usage Rules. All of Installation 01's assets are either created from scratch or obtained through the Unity Asset Store. We currently maintain a level of contact with Microsoft Studios and 343 Industries, which you can read about here. > > — [Installation01 - About Us](https://installation01.org/about) ### Spotlight: [Queens of Gaming](https://www.queensofgaming.com/) > Queens of Gaming is an all female casual gaming clan founded by xD Fantasy in 2010. The clan started off as a Halo based competitive team for Halo 3. We soon changed to a more casual group and expanded to Call of Duty for Modern Warfare 2 and the next installment for Halo, Reach. Throughout the years we have expanded to variety of games such as Destiny, Overwatch, Rainbow Six and more to come and now expanding to PC. With just over 90+ members we continue to expand to more games that everyone enjoys to play and make any necessary changes needed. This clan is not just run by one leader, it is run by everyone, meaning that everyone's opinions are heard and get a chance to let their ideas come into play. Our goal is to create a fun gaming environment for all female gamers no matter if you enjoy going straight into multiplayer, working as a team towards a common goal, or if you need help leveling up or obtaining achievements. We allow all female gamers to join regardless of skill or age. If you are looking for a clan that does not care whether we win or lose but prioritizes having fun, then join us! > > — [Queens of Gaming - About Us](https://www.queensofgaming.com/) ### Spotlight: [After Hours Gaming League](https://www.afterhoursgaming.tv/) > The After Hours Gaming League is a modern twist on traditional corporate sports leagues like softball and basketball. We encourage fun, teamwork, and friendly competition on the battlefields of top esports titles. In Spring 2018 we donated $21,550 to charity on behalf of the winning teams and had over 1700 players. All skill levels are welcome and we do our best to keep matches evenly paired. Matches happen every Saturday and the first 5-9 weeks are non-elimination matches. > > — [After Hours Gaming League](https://www.afterhoursgaming.tv/about) The league was started by popular gamer and professional StarCraft player Day[9], and has different esports games every season. Doesn't include Halo this season, but a cool semi-related cause! ### Famous Last Words Our chance (and yours, if you're watching on [twitch.tv/thenickscast](https://twitch.tv/thenickscast)) to have some (in)famous last words about next week's topic before we've done any prep work! Next week, we'll be talking about the fans and fandom of Anne Rice's _Vampire Chronicles_! **T:** How much is Vampire Chronicles responsible for the vampire trend in movies, tv, etc.? **G:** How much actual history is threaded through the Vampire Chronicles? **Z:** The fandom seems fairly curative... is there any fanfic? Is fanfic forbidden? What is the attitude? **Krysta:** How did the interview go? ## Where can you find us? Pretty much everything we do is `something/thenickscast`, but in specific... - If you're looking for this podcast (Fanthropological), you can find it at [Fanthropological.com](https://fanthropological.com) or on different podcatchers including [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/show/2IVp8MBIUyCqlKyZn79iHn), [Apple Podcasts](https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/fanthropological/id1163621210?mt=2), [Google Podcasts](https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cDovL2ZlZWRzLnBvZGlhbnQuY28vZmFudGhyb3BvbG9naWNhbC9yc3MueG1s) and many others! - You can join us for the live recording of the podcasts and participate (or catch us when we're playing some games) at [twitch.tv/thenickscast](https://twitch.tv/thenickscast) - Keep up-to-date with our latest goings-on on [Facebook](https://facebook.com/thenickscast), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/thenickscast), or [Instagram](https://instagram.com/thenickscast), all `@thenickscast` - We also occasionally create extra content about fandom including convention coverage and interviews on [YouTube.com/thenickscast](https://youtube.com/thenickscast) - We have some fine merchandise available at [shop.thenickscast.com](https://shop.thenickscast.com) (and we'd love your support!) - If all else fails, you can email us: [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]) ## What is "Fanthropological"? Every week, Fanthropological delivers over an hour of fandom-related "fanalysis" covering a different fandom every week and giving you hard data, history, special guests, and, of course, speculation! We cover topics spanning the gamut of anime, manga, comics, video games, comics, movies, books, television, and, in general, geek culture. ## Credits - _Ending_: [ReMix: Halo: Combat Evolved "Mahabharath Highlands"](https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01182) by [Freemind](https://ocremix.org/artist/4562/freemind), [GrayLightning](https://ocremix.org/artist/4516/graylightning) from [http://ocremix.org](http://ocremix.org/) used under [ocremix.org content policy](http://ocremix.org/info/Content_Policy#If_you.27re_using_our_content_elsewhere_.28.22Terms_of_Use.22.29...) - All other music and sound for this week's episode were provided by Nick Green!