Halo is no stranger to the number 7. Dare I say 7 is an iconic number when it comes
to Halo, and so the next game technically being Halo 7 is a rather exciting prospect. With Halo Infinite’s story posing far more
questions than it did answers, there’s a lot that could go on in Halo 7’s story. And so, today, in classic HiddenXperia fashion,
we’re gonna collate all the evidence we have right now about Halo 7’s story, and
try and build a picture of what it might entail. Charlie board meme So, although the story of Halo 7 is very much
up in the air, there are actually a tonne of little details that, when pieced together,
start to paint a pretty good picture of where the story’ll go, what it’ll be about,
where it’ll be set, who it should involve and so much more. Firstly, let’s set the basis for the story. At the end of Infinite, Atriox frees the Endless,
and based on what the Harbinger says it seems as though their main priority is bringing
‘the Forerunners’ lies to an end’. These lies are very likely referring to who
the true inheritors of the Mantle of Responsibility are. The Forerunners claimed that the Precursors
chose Humanity as its inheritors, but this may be the great lie the Harbinger is referring
to - one they created to rationalise their extermination of the Precursors, that they
chose to follow through with by making humans the reclaimers of all their technology once
the Halos were fired in an effort to keep the truth covered up and the lie seem legitimate. If this is the case, which personally I’m
99% sure it is, and the Precursors never intended to pass the mantle down to any of their creations,
then the Endless’ main goal will be, as the Harbinger directly stated - ascendancy
- which in Halo is another word for claiming the Mantle. Their main goal will be to seize the Mantle
for themselves - but from whom? In the wake of Cortana’s defeat, I don’t
really think any one species holds the Mantle, but for the sake of the story - and the fact
that they’re Reclaimers - I think it’s safe to assume Humanity will be the ones they
have to seize it from. I mean hell, the Harbinger tells Chief, ‘You
are not the future’ immediately after referring to him as Reclaimer, so I think that lines
up. The Reclaimers as we know them - humanity
- are false reclaimers, and are not the future - the Endless are the true Reclaimers, are
the future of the galaxy, once they’ve reclaimed the Mantle for themselves, and by extension,
the Precursors. The next question is which characters and
factions will be brought to the forefront of the universe - and the story - as a byproduct
of the Endless attempting to reclaim the Mantle? The most obvious - and most exciting to me
- is Offensive Bias. After it defeated Mendicant Bias’ Flood
fleet and the parasite was wiped out, the Grand Edict, one of the few surviving Forerunners,
deployed Offensive Bias to overwatch and guard the Endless’ burial site on Zeta Halo. Its sole purpose post-Flood war was to ensure
the Endless remained imprisoned, but now, they’ve been freed. How Atriox and the Harbinger managed to get
around the AI, I don’t know, but I see no reality in which Offensive Bias isn’t a
major, major player in Halo 7’s Endless storyline. Theoretically, it should be one of our closest
allies, which is a really exciting prospect, and one that we may in fact have already had
a glimpse into… In the Halo Encyclopaedia which launched only
a few months after Infinite, there’s this picture of Offensive Bias… with a Warthog
driving towards it. It’s common knowledge now that 2/3s of Infinite’s
story was cut. You combine that with this scene from the
2020 Campaign trailer that never made it into the game, the fact that there’s a hologram
model of Offensive Bias in the Silent Auditorium, and the legendary ending, and I think it’s
clear this was meant to be a scene in Infinite’s original Campaign, post-Endless-release where
we meet Offensive Bias. Ignore the fact that it’s at the Ark, we’ll
touch on that in a minute. The main detail I want to highlight in this
picture is the fact that there’s a Warthog driving straight towards Offensive Bias - likely
with Chief inside. I can guarantee right now, this was a concept
of our first interaction with Offensive Bias, and I can guarantee you again that we will
get a form of this scene in Halo 7. It makes perfect canonical sense for it to
be our greatest ally in combating the Endless, but Offensive may not be the only Contender
Class AI on our side… Now, theorising about Mendicant Bias returning
is a tale as old as time, but there is valid reason to believe he could play a role in
Halo 7. If the Endless are even 10% as much of a threat
as Infinite makes them out to be - and especially if they’re worse than the Flood - then we’re
gonna need all the help we can get to overcome them, which is where Mendicant Bias comes
in. Canonically, Chief read all the Halo 3 terminals,
including the final one in which Mendicant Bias says it’s seeking atonement for its
sins - siding with the Flood - and that it wants its masters - the Forerunners - to know
it has changed, and is no longer corrupted by them. What better way for it to do that than ally
with its former nemesis and help keep the Forerunner’s truth alive? For years, I’ve wanted to see a story in
the modern Halo universe where Offensive Bias and Mendicant Bias - Yin and Yang - unite,
and this could be that story. All it’d take is for Offensive Bias to mention
Mendicant, or for Chief to mention that he encountered another Contender Class AI and
surely both would have the idea to recruit him, so to speak -
even more so if we go to the Ark (again, more on this in a moment). This is a bit of a wilder prediction, but
on the topic of being all hands on deck to keep the Endless contained, I can imagine
a world in which the few living Forerunners out there return to help as well. I don’t think Bornstellar would ever return,
as much as I’d love him to, but if the Grand Edict’s still out there he and the Criterion
- be it an individual or a collective - could resurface, given that their primary directive
post-Halo firing was to contain the Endless. If they’re still alive, they’d have as
much reason as Offensive Bias to take centre stage in the story once more. The Endless pose as much of a threat to humanity
as they do the Forerunner’s legacy, and so I’d imagine those still out there would
want to help protect it, which gives us common ground to ally with them. Switching gears, of course Atriox will return
as leader of the Banished, and will not only be the Endless’ greatest ally, but likely
the ultimate antagonist of the story. The Banished’s primary reason for existing
is not being ruled by any higher power, and so the idea of humanity holding the mantle
and being the custodians of the galaxy is something they’d want to stop. They aren’t inherently anti-human like the
Covenant were, but if humans are in control of the galaxy, then by proxy, they’re enemies. The only problem I can see here is if the
Endless succeed and reclaim the Mantle, they’ll technically be ruled by them and they’re
back to square 1. Hell, maybe that’ll be the catalyst for
Atriox to strike an alliance with the UNSC, but that’ll just be a never-ending cycle
of them fighting the holders of the mantle. Either way, given that the Banished went to
Zeta Halo with the sole intention of freeing the Endless, it’s obvious they’ll be their
number 1 ally, and one of our main enemies. On the flip side, now that the Created are
done and dusted and important worlds aren’t militarily policed by Guardians, interstellar
travel is possible again, which opens up the possibility of the Arbiter and the Swords
of Sanghelios coming to our aid. The Elites are humanity’s greatest ally
- and them being both present and playable are some of Halo’s most requested features
- so I can definitely see the Swords of Sanghelios coming to back what remains of the UNSC up
on Zeta Halo, or wherever Halo 7’s set. After Outcasts, the Arbiter has unfinished
business with Atriox - the two have a bitter rivalry set up - and that rivalry needs to
be resolved in a game. So, we’ve established based on well-rounded
evidence who the major players will be: The UNSC, Offensive Bias and Atriox, with
the possibility of the Swords of Sanghelios, Mendicant Bias, and other living Forerunners
rearing their heads too. But where is Halo 7’s campaign going to
take place? Well, again, based on both canonical evidence
(and some of the loudest feedback about Infinite’s campaign), I have some predictions. The first one is obvious - Zeta Halo. Infinite didn’t even begin to scratch the
surface of Zeta Halo’s potential, and in terms of its role in the Endless story, there’s
still a lot that needs to be done with it, so I don’t think we’ll be leaving it anytime
soon. This is both a genuine prediction and a genuine
hope - I do think however that we’ll travel across the ring significantly more than in
Infinite. Hands down the biggest criticism of Infinite’s
campaign was the lack of biomes and diverse locations, and if you ask me, that’s the
#1 piece of feedback they’ll be acting on with Halo 7’s campaign. My dream is that not only do we go to snowy
tundras, dense jungles and vast deserts on the ring, but we also go to more of its derelict
underbelly. In Point of Light it was said that there are
vast portions of Zeta Halo’s underbelly that have lost power and have fallen into
disrepair… That’s the easiest layup in human history
for a Flood outbreak, just saying. But going beyond Zeta Halo, I have a strong
suspicion the Endless story will take us back to the Ark, for a multitude of reasons. Firstly, Zeta Halo is still significantly
damaged. When the Harbinger initiated the Reformation,
she did it specifically to only target the Silent Auditorium, and although Zeta Halo
technically could repair itself, I imagine it’d take significantly longer than just
teleporting it to the Ark and repairing it using its foundry world. Secondly - although the Banished may have
suffered a great defeat during Infinite, they still control the majority of Zeta Halo, and
now that Atriox has secured what he came to the ring to find, I see no reason why he wouldn’t
want to take it back to the Ark to reunite with the majority of his forces that are still
there. And thirdly - there’s a chance the Endless
may need it for something. The Ark was one of the most important locations
in the Forerunner ecumene; in Halo 3, Hunters in the Dark and Halo Wars 2 the UNSC barely
even explored 1% of its surface and what it has hidden away. This is more of a baseless prediction, but
I just get the feeling there’s going to be some deep, dark Forerunner secret hidden
away on the Ark that the Endless have to secure, which gives Atriox even more reason to take
his newly acquired Halo ring back there to reunite with the bulk of his forces. The Ark’s presence in Halo 7 would explain
why it was in the concept art of the Warthog driving towards Offensive Bias. There’s tonnes of art that suggests Infinite
was supposed to take place in more locations than just Zeta Halo - by the looks of it we
were meant to go to Reach, and of course Ark too - and so if Halo 7 is built primarily
off what was cut from Infinite like I think it will be, the chances of going to the Ark
are… decent, if you ask me. And hell, that fulfils another big wish the
community has too, for Red Team and the Spirit of Fire to make their way into the main story. You’d be killing a tonne of birds with one
stone by taking Zeta Halo there in Halo 7 and having it be one of the main locations. Now, an idea that I had that was originally
just gonna be a curveball offhand mention is Maethrillian - the ancient Forerunner capital
- but the more I thought about it, the more I started to realise Maethrillian could actually
play a role in the Endless story. Maethrillian was, like I said, the ancient
Forerunner capital - the centre of their ecumene. It was to the Forerunners as DC is to America,
or London is to the UK, but unlike many of their important locations it wasn’t destroyed. Maethrillian is still out there, somewhere,
in the galaxy. Hell, Rho ‘Barutamee, the Shipmaster of
the Long Night of Solace, spent a good portion of his naval career trying to find Maethrillian. In fact, going to Reach was just part of his
long term journey to find it, which we of course cut short. Anyhow, Maethrillian has never been found,
but it’s still out there, and most importantly, it’s still home to an entity known as Abaddon
- the only known Precursor AI in existence. The city itself was actually built around
Abaddon’s physical, Precursor component. I hope you can see where I’m going with
this. Running off the mountain of evidence that
suggests the Endless are Precursor in nature, it’d make sense for them to want to seek
out what little is left of the Precursors in the galaxy, and to do so, they’d have
to go to Maethrillian. In the wake of the Harbinger’s death, they’ll
need a new leader, and Abaddon - the entity that has witnessed the entirety of Forerunner
history - would fill that role perfectly. It’d also be a great source of intelligence
for them, given that it was the overseer of the Precursor Domain. For them to want to join forces with the only
Precursor AI in existence only makes sense to me. It would be the perfect guiding force for
a species that missed a hundred thousand years of history, and that want to fulfil their
ancestors' legacy of holding the mantle. It also kinda lines up in practical, real
world terms as well. Abaddon is an extremely obscure piece of Halo
lore - it was only ever present in one Halo story, the short story Promises To Keep in
Halo Fractures. Outside of an offhand mention in Epitaph,
it’s never been mentioned in any other story, but luckily for us, 343’s writers love resurrecting
lore on this level of obscurity. Take SPDR for example - System Peril Distributed
Reflex - an AI intrusion countermeasure that was only ever present in I Love Bees, until
343 resurrected it for Halo Infinite and made it a core part of Chief’s GEN3 Mjolnir BIOS. Or Offensive Bias - slightly less obscure,
granted, but an element of Halo’s lore that hadn’t been mentioned for 8 years prior
to Infinite’s Legendary Ending, and is now likely a key player in the story going forward. Abaddon - and by extension Maethrllian - could
just be the next obscure pieces of Halo lore to make their way into the main story. Ok, so we’ve established that Halo 7’s
primary plot will revolve around the Endless attempting to reclaim the Mantle of Responsibility. We’ve established that the UNSC, Offensive
Bias and Atriox and the Banished will be the major players in the story. And we’ve established reason enough for
the game to take place on Zeta Halo, but also at the Ark, with the more far fetched prediction
of Maethrillian playing a part too. A guy can dream. Now, I want to talk about some of the stragglers
- bits of the story that aren’t yet resolved, and that I don’t know how will play into
the story as of yet. Firstly, the Infinity. Almost 3 years and 2 whole novels later, we
still have no idea what happened to the UNSC Infinity. We know that the Banished neutralised it in
4 minutes, but beyond that we have no idea if it was destroyed, if it crashed on the
ring, if Lasky managed to just escape with it to safety - no idea. And because of that, we also have no idea
what happened to its crew: Lasky, Roland, Halsey, Palmer, Blue Team, Osiris, Alpha 9
- no idea whatsoever. Later this year the book Empty Throne releases,
which I think may give us some answers about this. It sounds kinda like it’s going to be based
on Operation: BREAKER TRIP, which is the operation Locke went on prior to Infinite’s campaign,
but who knows. If Halo 7’s story does open up a bit and
is more of a larger scale story again, unlike Infinite which was very narrow in its scope,
I expect to see some of these characters show up, but how - and in what state - God knows. I’ll probably make a video about that after
Empty Throne releases, provided it does actually give us some answers. Then, there’s the survivors from Cortana’s
attack on Earth - notably Lord Hood. I don’t expect Lord Hood to show up in Halo
7, unfortunately, given that he’s played by Ron Pearlman who I imagine is very expensive,
but last we heard he was escorted to safety in a shield world and was drinking himself
into despair. Regarding ONI, Outcasts made it sound like
after Cortana’s attack on Sydney, which is where ONI’s headquarters is located,
the Office is no more, entirely destroyed. Again, I don’t think ONI will play a direct
role in Halo 7’s story, but I figured this was worth mentioning for the sake of completion. However, this
is all assuming the next Halo is Halo 7… We’ve all been very vocal about wanting
more Halo spin offs for years, and since Infinite, it feels like the community has collectively
decided to up the ante on this, and I can guarantee you 343 are listening. Hell, Bonnie Ross even said that spin-offs
were something they planned on doing after Infinite released. Now, granted, I think it’s fair to say all
the plans 343 had prior to Infinite - especially those laid by former leadership - probably
have less value now oxygen at a Grunt’s birthday party, but with entirely new leadership
at the helm - with entirely different values - and with how much the community have been
very vocally begging for spin-offs the last few years, it wouldn’t surprise me if they
took a short break from mainline games to do one. Now, I don’t want to discuss spin-offs in
as much detail as Halo 7 because, frankly, I’ve done it a billion times before. Instead, I’m gonna list off a bunch of ideas
I know I and many others would love to see: A Flood horror game
A realism focused ODST game An ODST Flood horror game
An Arbiter Souls-Like A Contact Harvest game with Johnson as the
protagonist An action-horror shooter set during the Forerunner-Flood
War And so many more options… There’s also Halo Wars 3, but honestly,
as much as I love Halo Wars, I really hope if 343 choose to do a spin-off it’s not
Halo Wars 3. I want something completely new - a style
of Halo that no game has tried yet. On the other hand, there’s a different direction
they could go in with a spin-off that I made a video about last year - a remake. I replayed Resident Evil 4 Remake recently,
and my god, that game is a near-perfect translation
of one of the best games ever made. Resident Evil has been on the ball with remakes
as of late, the Dead Space remake was excellent, the Alone in the Dark remake I’m about halfway
through and really enjoying, the System Shock remake released to critical acclaim, the Silent
Hill 2 remake is on the horizon etc. etc. I would absolutely love Halo to throw its
hat in the remake ring, there’s so much they could do with it, but I won’t babble
on about that here - go and watch that video and let me convince you it’s a good idea
over there. And those, my friends, are my current predictions
and theories for Halo 7’s story - whatever it may end up being. I know we’re not exactly knocking on the
door of Infinite’s sequel, but I literally built my channel on speculation and theorisation,
it’s kinda my bread and butter, so regardless of how close or far away I’m always gonna
make content like this because, frankly it’s just fun.
