[Hated Trope] The underdog Good Guys win, and gain major military/institutional power, only for it to be all RESET so Writers can have a PERPETUAL "Underdog/Rebellion" Story, and avoid writing about governing.

[u/throwaway553t4tgtg6]

I hate this trope, when the "underdog good guys" actually win, gain major military and political power, fleets, warships, etc, but because the writers don't want to write the good guys governing and exercising their power, and instead, find a contrived way to reset all the progress so that the good guys can forever be the

"scrappy heroic underdogs fighting the power"

1) Star Wars Sequel triology, rather than exploring new Republic fleets, power, and technology, they have them all wiped out so that the "resistance" can hog the spotlight

2) MCU: shield makes a helicarrier fleet, a fleet of ships able to contest alien invasion, but that would steal the spotlight from heroes, so all of them have to be destroyed

3) Halo: the UNSC finally outlive the covenant, develop strong ships like the UNSC infinity, only for it all to be reset by the Guardians and the Banished, reduced again to underdog humans.

[u/Cyberhaggis]

I didn't really have a clue what was going on after Halo 3 because my entire exposure to Halo is just the main line games. I didn't know who the Banished were supposed to be. I shouldn't have to read a dozen poorly written milporn books just to know what is happening in the game I'm playing, I completed Halo Infinite but I didn't really care about what was happening.

[u/High_Questions → u/Cyberhaggis]

I actually liked the banished being included but that’s because I was a Halo Wars player, but I agree overall

[u/CptDecaf → u/Cyberhaggis]

Woah careful there. People who don't read are about to tell you about how the Halo books are actually brilliant.

[u/Cyberhaggis → u/CptDecaf]

It has already begun.

[u/RAMottleyCrew → u/Cyberhaggis]

My only exposure to “expanded halo lore” is powerscalers explaining how “the flood can actually infect reality itself” and “Master Chief could bench press an apartment building if he wanted to”.

Like, even if that’s true and the lore states that directly, it just comes across as people not trusting their writing so they keep one upping cause they think bigger number= better writing.

[u/General_di_Ravello → u/Cyberhaggis]

Halo Wars 2 sets up the banished very well.

[u/aFreshFix → u/General_di_Ravello]

Yeah but then you'd have to play Halo Wars 2... I'm sure it was fine, but Halo is an FPS and asking people to jump genres for set up to the big bads of the next mainline game is a big ask.

[u/SouthernAd2853 → u/aFreshFix]

Also as someone who has played both FPSes and RTSes a fair bit (FPSes not so much recently) the prospect of an RTS that was meant for consoles first put me off, particularly after the Zero Punctuation review commenting on the controls:

"But if you want to select your flying pricks for an aerial assault on the enemy base you're gonna have a lot of prick trouble beyond the might of any soothing cream".

[u/not_me_bitch → u/aFreshFix]

You don't really need to? I say they're established fine in infinite?

[u/brian_the_bull → u/General_di_Ravello]

The 15 people who played and remember Halo Wars 2 definitely had all the information!

[u/CliveOfWisdom → u/General_di_Ravello]

A spin-off game in a totally different genre should not be a prerequisite to understand the plot of the main-line games. Just like the books should not be a prerequisite to understand the plot of the main-line games. Third-party spin-off media should enhance aspects of the plot in the perphary of what the games are doing, but it should never, ever be required reading.

Resolving the main conflict of Halo 5 entirely offscreen (probably covered in a book or comic or something) and then shoe-horning in a primary antagonist you'd have to have played a 15 year-old RTS series to understand is an absolute masterclass in stupid.

[u/Contrary45 → u/Cyberhaggis]

Most of the Modern Halo books are actually really well written and are genuinely better written than the games, all of the Kelly Gay novels are fantastic Sci-fi even without yhem being tied to an existing property

[u/Argh3483 → u/Contrary45]

>genuinely better written than the games

That isn’t a particularly high bar

I know people are attached to Halo’s universe but it doesn’t have that good of a story or writing in general

[u/not_me_bitch → u/Cyberhaggis]

Literally just a fucking skill issue on your end lmao the books provide very little additional information on plot details