Did Halo take a few pages from Starcraft?

[keen320]

Ok, I just thought the other day that Halo and Starcraft have a lot of similarities, particularly in that they both contain three factions with parallels to each other.


Okay, nothing surprising about this, since just about every game ever made has a human faction. But both human factions focus almost exclusively on conventional weapons and armor.


Much more here. Both Protoss and covenant are older races (although covenent are actually a bunch of races- it's not a perfect comparison) with much better tech than humans. Both equip soldiers with personal energy shields, and both issue cool energy blades. They both worship the artifacts of a long extinct precursor race. They both make use of numerous powerful energy weapons, and have cloaking abilities. Their legs even look similar.


Both the Zerg and the Flood like infesting people and making them look big and scary and ugly. Both also churn out bloated green things. Both were not properly exterminated by previously mentioned dead precursors. And both become the greatest threat to the galaxy and necessitate a human-alien team-up.


I'm wondering if anyone else is seeing this? Did Halo take some stuff from Starcraft, or did they make it up on their own? And did either of these take similar amounts of stuff from previous media?

And of course, the obligatory question of which of these parallel races is tougher than the other? I figure Terrans vs UNSC is pretty much in Terrans' favor, but the others I'm not so sure of. Also the question of which has the best heroes.

[Srelex]

Meh, Starcraft itself lifted a bit from 40k, and both were heavily influenced by Aliens--they just use ideas fairly common to scifi tbh, although I wouldn't be surprised if either influenced the other subconsciously at least.

[Stark]

Are you serious? Citing Starcraft as a 'source' for power armour is ludicrous in the extreme.

Starcraft certainly popularised the three way 'machineguns, space elves and space monsters' setup, though.

[Zor]

In regards to the Humans and the Flood/Zerg, both of these trace their memetic origins back to Starship Troopers (which WH40k and Aliens drew from).

In regards to the Covenant and the Protoss, i am going say that their is a bit more diference between the two. Aliens having better tech than humans goes back to war of the worlds. The Covenant's war with humanity is active hatred, protoss/human conflict comes more from callousness on part of the Protoss powers that be. The Protoss also have an ancient astronaut thing going on with them as well as psionics. Also, Digitgrade feet is very minor point.

Not that this means that both of them are not using longstanding bits of established sci-fi tropes to make their races.

Zor

[jollyreaper]

Meh, Starcraft itself lifted a bit from 40k, and both were heavily influenced by Aliens--they just use ideas fairly common to scifi tbh, although I wouldn't be surprised if either influenced the other subconsciously at least.

You could even make an argument that 40k kinda formalized the three-way fight between swarming bug aliens, advanced solitary super-warrior alien badass and generic human marines, aliens vs predator vs colonials. But in general, Starcraft did have a very strong 40k with the serial numbers filed off feel. The Protoss weren't quite exactly space elves but the zerg are completely tyranids, no doubt about it.

But in the more general sense, all of those settings are trying to draw on and refine existing ideas rather than break new ground. It's just like when someone says "I wanna do a classic fantasy story so of course it needs to have castles and knights and wizards" and the idea is to use all of your favorite tropes but improve on the shortcomings as you perceive them in previous examples of the genre.

[Stark]

I thought the idea was to tell an interesting story with engaging themes?

[keen320]

Also, Digitgrade feet is very minor point.

I was thinking more about knees. I just though about it while looking at the pictures.

Ok, obviously I should have mentioned a few of the inspirations I had previously noticed, like Zerg drawing from aliens, and precursor race trope, but Power armor I sort of took for granted as having been taken from previous sources. Didn't think of the Bug influence though, or the advanced alien tech over human tech trope.

[Imperial528]

If you look at the early Marine models (See one here: http://images.wikia.com/starcraft/image ... 1_Art2.jpg), they actually don't look very similar to Spartan armor, and appear much more like pressure suits. I wouldn't be surprised if the SCII-era Marine models were influenced by Spartan armor or Space Marine design.

Anyway, something interesting I stumbled upon is that StarCraft also drew inspiration from Star Trek. For example, the Terran Battlecruiser. Iconic to it are its two wings, but I noticed that they are extremely similar to warp nacelles. I mean, they even follow the three nacelle-related design rules that Roddenberry made. (Must come in pairs, at least 50% of the nacelles must be visible from either one, and they need to be fully visible from the front.)

Slight nerd nit-pick: Keen, the Protoss do not worship ancient Xel'Naga artifacts. They have a religion based on their species' psionic connection.

[spaceviking]

If I remember correctly Halo was first envisioned as an mac RTS. I am unsure if at that time if the game was based around a three way fight between human, covenant, and flood paralleling the star craft factions. If it was I would say the idea that Halo lifted significantly from star-craft is apt.

[Srelex]

If I remember correctly Halo was first envisioned as an mac RTS. I am unsure if at that time if the game was based around a three way fight between human, covenant, and flood paralleling the star craft factions. If it was I would say the idea that Halo lifted significantly from star-craft is apt.

I've never heard that anywhere else. As Halo was an evolution of Bungie's Marathon, I doubt it.

[Manus Celer Dei]

If I remember correctly Halo was first envisioned as an mac RTS. I am unsure if at that time if the game was based around a three way fight between human, covenant, and flood paralleling the star craft factions. If it was I would say the idea that Halo lifted significantly from star-craft is apt.

I've never heard that anywhere else. As Halo was an evolution of Bungie's Marathon, I doubt it.

The setting and story were built on what they did earlier with Marathon, but Halo did start life as an RTS, though the RTS iteration of Halo was a very early one. It didn't last long before being scrapped in favour of a third-person action shooter, which (IIRC) was what got Microsoft's attention and ended up becoming the FPS.

As far as I'm aware they were all in more or less the same setting, though obviously a lot of the finer details weren't worked out then. A lot of the early publicity stuff they sent out to Marathon fanpages seem to imply they planned for Halo to have a much stronger link to the Marathon setting compared to the minor nods and references that they ended up sneaking in.

[Kingmaker]

Halo and Starcraft both draw from the same source material (the archetypal space opera).

I would point out that the covenant have little in common with the protoss aside from dogmatism and a superiority complex. The protoss display little imperial or crusading ambition. Furthermore, covenant technology is based off what they looted from the forerunners, while the protoss developed most of their own stuff.

But in general, Starcraft did have a very strong 40k with the serial numbers filed off feel. The Protoss weren't quite exactly space elves but the zerg are completely tyranids, no doubt about it.

Probably because they're both drawing from the same cliches. Space locusts predates the zerg or tyranids, space elves predates protoss or eldar, and space humans... you get it. While Blizzard almost certainly stole borrowed elements of GW's art design, SC and WH40k are thematically very different and feel very different. For example, there is far less of an "everything is fucked" air to SC.

[Shroom Man 777]

More like fringe world yokels who dunno where their loyalties lie.

I was thinking about this too. But not about the obvious similarities that everyone knows. In Star Craft 2, I noticed something else. In some of the Terran missions where Raynor is doing his ragtag plucky rebel hero leader warrior without a cause shtick, you can hear the soundtrack segue into guitary-violiny bits that is eerily similar to Firefly's soundtrack.

Like in this SC2 cinematic, starting at 3:10

While Star Craft already did have a Western in space vibe back in '98, with Raynor being a Marshall, with the Confederates, and all sorts of inbred space hicks, it's cool to see that SC2 also drew from another awesome Space Western fiction.

[adam_grif]

The aesthetic triangle of Human-Elite-Flood and Human-Protoss-Zerg arguably goes back to Starship Troopers, although the Skinnies are admittedly a weak fit on some categories other than being lanky space aliens. It's not really shocking that a three-faction game would use those sorts of designs, since they're trying to make the factions distinct and they contrast each other pretty nicely.

[Todeswind]

Science fiction and fantasy ends up being self-referential, if only because it's such a relatively new genera when compared to something like romance or high-fantasy. Every speculative fiction author since Jules Verne has taken elements or entire concepts from other authors and expanded upon them. The first starcraft game and warcraft games borrowed heavily from the warhammer universes (which themselves borrowed from others) but have in the years following evolved into their own disparate genre of speculative fiction which, in its own ways, has influenced the warhammer worlds.

Sure, one power armored "space marine" ends up seeming similar to another on an esthetic level but the stories of the respective fandoms are substantially different and the thematic concerns are equally separate.

They're both fun, stop sweating over it.

[DesertFly]

The Alien vs. Predator franchise has the same race triangle, with the plucky, close to our technology colonial marines, the enigmatic and dangerous (if not outright hostile) advanced-tech Predators, and the animalistic, slimy, infesting-human aliens.

[adam_grif]

Dunno if you should really count AvP since it was two separate franchises that were later joined at the hip.

[Shroom Man 777]

One thing though, StarCraft's space locust arachnoid insectoid monster menaces look way cooler than 40k's. The Zerg are more imaginative in their alienoid scariness than the Tyrannids, which seem to have just one kind of color motif and design aesthetic - those hormogaunts and termagaunts and ghostgaunts and fastgaunts and stronggaunts all look the same. While the Zerg look far more freaky deaky.

[DesertFly]

Dunno if you should really count AvP since it was two separate franchises that were later joined at the hip.

It wasn't designed that way, yes, but it is interesting that it fell out that way.

[Sarevok]

One thing though, StarCraft's space locust arachnoid insectoid monster menaces look way cooler than 40k's. The Zerg are more imaginative in their alienoid scariness than the Tyrannids, which seem to have just one kind of color motif and design aesthetic - those hormogaunts and termagaunts and ghostgaunts and fastgaunts and stronggaunts all look the same. While the Zerg look far more freaky deaky.

Starcraft overall is better looking than 40K and it's medieval age in spaaace ! themes. Just take a look at the poster child of 40K- the spacemarines. The space marines are not really Space Marines, they are just gothic knights with lame looking swords and armor that often looks like it was made for a Dungeons and Dragon like fantasy setting not a space age setting. Their ships look like cathedrals and their tanks are dumb looking wagons that made WW 1 tanks seem advanced. Their average soldier the Imperial Guard seem almost clone copy of WW 1 trench warfare era armies. Yeah imagine using khaki clad British riflemen to fight in space.

Starcraft on other hand seem like future America but in spaaace ! The marines talk and act like real marines (as seen in hollywood action movies) not medieval knights in space. The spaceships and vehicles are a milwankner I mean hardware lovers dream. They got a tacticool feeling everywhere from gauss rifles to battlestar inspired WarShip designs. Its the kind of setting real American neocons would build if they had anti gravity, fusion power and FTL available.

Future America in spaaace ! is way cooler than Holy Roman Empire in spaaaace !

[Elheru Aran]

One thing though, StarCraft's space locust arachnoid insectoid monster menaces look way cooler than 40k's. The Zerg are more imaginative in their alienoid scariness than the Tyrannids, which seem to have just one kind of color motif and design aesthetic - those hormogaunts and termagaunts and ghostgaunts and fastgaunts and stronggaunts all look the same. While the Zerg look far more freaky deaky.

I have to take some exception to this. Tyranids, canonically, can come in pretty much any colour, for one thing. And while, yes, they do have a lot of different units that use the same basic gaunt biotype, they've got as much variety in their units as the Zerg-- Lictors, Raveners, Carnifexes... Ultimately this is basically an subjective argument, "these guys look cooler than this guy" and you can't really make an objective point of this.

Also, I still maintain that the Zerg are totally derivative of the Nids...

[jollyreaper]

Yeah, some of the 40k designs are pretty naff. I figure the space marines are as blocky as they are to make the models easier to cast. No real excuse for space cathedral ships or the godzilla-sized mecha to have castles on their heads or the tanks to look like rolling pipe organs.

[Black Admiral]

The space marines are not really Space Marines, they are just gothic knights with lame looking swords and armor that often looks like it was made for a Dungeons and Dragon like fantasy setting not a space age setting.

Congratulations, you've just figured out something that's never been a secret. The Astartes are thematically based on the old knightly orders - hell, as if it wasn't obvious enough already, the Black Templars in Helsreach explicitly refer to themselves as knights.

You want my opinion, both aesthetically and thematically the Astartes are a damn sight more interesting than the SC Terrans (oh, and if we're talking lousy vehicle designs, the bloody transforming siege tank is right at the top of the list - at least all the Guard's vehicles know what they're supposed to be).

[Srelex]

In terms of character, the southern redneck cowboy Terran Marines are a bit more attractive than the screaming wanked-out Astartes, IMO.

When it comes to the Zerg and Nids, both are a bit of a mixed back when it comes to aesthetics, but at least Blizzard doesn't wank out the Zerg to such absurd lengths as GW does with the Nids.

[Black Admiral]

In terms of character, the southern redneck cowboy Terran Marines are a bit more attractive than the screaming wanked-out Astartes, IMO.

That applies only if you think that the only possible characterisation for an Astartes is a screaming fanatic, which is most emphatically not the case; they've as broad a range of characterisations as could be expected (even accounting of individual Chapters tending to the emphasis of certain personality traits - for example, the Raven Guard's emphasis of isolation and self-mastery; even their celebrations are extremely low-key and private).