Sometimes while playing a game I'm particularily excited about, I like to visualize how I would like to see it. In my mind I like to make it more cinematic, usually going far beyond what the current technology would allow. I will share with you what was going through my mind right after I watched the Halo 3 announcement trailer during the Microsoft conference. What Cortana said was "I have defied gods, and demons. I am your shield, I am your sword. I know you, your past, your future. This is the way the world ends." I imagine it is the Gravemind of the Flood using Cortana to communicate with the Master Chief in the only way that he can. The scene shown at E3, in my personal opinion, was a possibility. The Gravemind was showing the Master Chief a possible future. If that object in the center of the crater fires, life as we know it will end. "This is the way the world ends." The way the actual event plays out (in my mind.) Starting the Fight After viewing the event shown to him by the Gravemind, the Master Chief arrives on the Halo construction planet long abandoned by the Forerunners. Worn and exhausted after single-handedly (naturally) fighting off hundreds of enemies a Spartan arrives at the crater seen in the Master Chief's influenced dreams. The camera shows you a slightly different scene. THOUSANDS of Grunts, Jackals, Brutes and other followers of the mistaken Prophets cover the basin. They wait on vehicles and huge animals. They are holding a defense while the Prophets prepare to activate the device. You get a sense of urgency in the way the Spartan jumps off the cliff and runs head on towards the massive army. The scene cuts to the view from a sniper scope trailing the Spartans slippery descent down the edge of the steep cliff. Dust trails him all the way down. Reaching the bottom and regaining his composure, the Spartan starts running and duel wielding right at the sniper scope. The scope zooms in and hits the Spartan right in the neck dropping him like a heavy rock face first into the dirt for a gruesome neck-cracking, grinding stop. The scene is now the Spartan's view. His viewscreen intermittent static. Fading and black. The Spartan is dead. The camera is panning clockwise around the Spartan's dead body and the impressively heavy streak he left in the dirt. In the background of the same scene you can see the Jackal that killed him move from his position and turn his back to the Spartan, job complete. As the camera continues to rotate with the dead Spartan still in view the angle moves so you can see up the cliff. It begins to rise leaving the body of the Spartan behind. On the camera's climb pebbles fall down past the screen as you continue to rise towards the blinding light of the sun. When you reach the edge of the precipice you see what caused those rocks to fall. The foot of another Spartan. The Master Chief. He is kneeling at the edge of the cliff and after checking out the scene with his sniper rifle he quickly picks off three other Jackals in quick succession. He rises to his feet and the camera stays below looking up at him with the sun right behind him. The camera slowly rises as he lowers his rifle and raises his left arm as if to signal something. His hand up in the air he quickly points it forward. Back at the Covenant camp you see them panicking. The shaky camera seems to be following the group. Everyone is running away. There is dust, chaos and betrayal as every one of the grunts and other Covenant fight for the vehicles and weapons needed to survive. The camera still running is pushed off a ghost by a Brute. Apparently dismayed by this turn of events the camera quickly pans back the to cliff to the origin of fear. Amidst a cloud of smoke comes an army of newly trained Spartans numbering in the hundreds. Warthogs and all in a full Blitz attack right through the middle of the Covenant defense. Slow motion as first contact is made. Brutes shot from afar. Grunts blown up into the sky by huge explosions. Bloodshed like that of Normandy. A new enemy, large and fast moving runs through the crowd of shooters and slices through a Spartan with a variation of the energy sword. More metallic, seemingly more solid. You see visible damage as the Spartan says "Damn" in a female voice and grabs at chestplate now leaking blood and sparks. She drops to her knees as the camera focuses on her. The background blurs and seems to gain distance. Time seems to slow down again as we see this Covenant assasin taking down Spartans in the background. While this is happening the Spartan removes her helmet and her long hair drops giving it more significance as a human loss. The camera follows her head horizontally as it slams into the ground. Top of the cliff. A dropship blasts over the cliff towards a barrage of shots and missiles. The Master Chief jumps out just in time as the ship is hit by two missiles simultaneously and a third as its exploding. He assumes his typical skydiving pose as the camera remains below him all the way down right into the heat of the battle. He crashes hard into a Wraith demolishing it. After a few seconds, scratched and bleeding, he climbs out. A scarab rises behind him. The Master Chief's flaming dropship slams right onto the scarab in a fantastically blinding explosion profiling the Master Chief in a blanket of fire. He reloads. "Let's go." -=====================================- So what do you guys think?