How long have you been a Halo fan, and what memories do you have of it?

[ArBiTeR1400]

I'll give a rundown of my personal history with Halo.

Way back in 2002 when I was 7, I first playing Halo: Combat Evolved on my uncle's original Xbox for the first time. Only played the first two levels; The Pillar Of Autumn & Halo, I awed seeing ring overarching up in the sky when I landed. The aesthetics, the mystery & soundtrack, I was lost myself on the second level wondering around, that time I didn't know how to play properly but man those memories burned right into my head.

Many months later, Halo 2 came out & I was god-smacked even more, two levels at that stuck out for me was Metropolis & Delta Halo. Had the same awe.

It was 2008 when I got my first original Xbox from my local pawn shop along with Halo: Combat Evolved & Halo 2 at 13. This was around the time Halo 3 came out with Xbox 360 then a year later in 2009 my mother brought me that Xbox 360 with Halo 3 on her tax-return, few months later again Halo Wars out & I got it out of my own pocket money I saved, 100AUD in coins.

Over time I've been collecting all the games from launch date along with every other Halo source material such as the books. I lock myself in my room for weeks & get extremely nerdy to myself putting every Halo material all in chronological order by writing down everything in notes to the point I skipped doing homework & major projects from school to outright skipping school days, it got to the point my family was worried about my well-being . I'd break down everything in recorded lore & even put down educated quests for material with no recorded lore dates, I even argued on the old 343i forum when I was living at my grandparent's house for a bit on a particular episode in Halo Legends: Prototype that had to take place in 2548 to 2552 (I believe in the latter of mid-late 2548) due to the BR55HB (Halo 3 Battle Rifle) manufactured for the first time, that's how heated, detailed & nerdy the debates got, most old threads are deleted now but ya can thank me for having that one input that is now in Halopedia.

Anyway I play, read & watch everything in a marathon run that last roughly a month non-stop. When a new material such as a game, book or series came out, I slot em in order & do a marathon re-run again with the added material. It got to a point that all the recorded Halo material that was released, it took me 3 months to do everything in marathon re-runs that my eyes got sore from sunlight & twitches. I had to stop because I was growing up & had to take on more life responsibilities & the mental well-being not that I didnt want to. Last one I did was after the release of Halo 4 back in 2012, from their I never done one since.

Now with Halo: Infinite coming out & some chunks of Halo books I missed (currently about to start Halo Wars 2: Awaking The Nightmare DLC), I will be diving back in to do a marathon re-run for the first time in years starting around next year hopefully, but will be going at it a little slower due to life responsibilities.

Today, I own all the games to date in their limited edition forms & just about 80ish% of the material such as the comics, books & mini-series still, not planning to give it up & tracking down any some stuff I miss from the pass few years. I'm not what you call a normal or hardcore, but an outright geek-fanatic that hides in his room & not a shame say it anymore. I don't like to boast & tell much about it, just Halo has been a big part of my life as much as same example of Star Wars in 1977 or 40K in 1987 fanatics when their IPs started.

 

[FalseShepherd]

I mostly remember getting stuck on CE backtracking through the flood trying to overload all the reactors or whatever it is... I would always get lost.

 

[ZiggyGrimm]

November 10, 2001, I remember it like it was yesterday. My karate instructor worked his 9-5 as a Microsoft sales rep in Canada, he was charged with bringing the X-Box to market in Southern Ontario Canada. He was shipped the system as well as all of Microsoft's initial games to use as a demo in the weeks leading up to launch to give demos to any smaller stores that were hesitant to stock the X-Box.

As we all know the X-Box wasn't exactly a hard sell, so about a week before launch he was all done with it. He played some of the games but wasn't much of a video game player. At the time I was madly in love with the N64. He gave my family the demo system as well as all of the games he had to demo (there was about 10). The first game I tried when I got it home was the basketball game that launched... it was fun, the second day I popped in Halo. Well, I went to school the day after and told all of my friends about it. They laughed at me, the system wasn't out yet, there wasn't hype as much in the media hype in the media as we have now for new game systems (or maybe there was and we were too young to be paying attention), they hadn't heard about Halo or much about the X-Box except rumblings that it was a thing. None of them believed I had one, never mind was testing this amazing game that "Made James Bond seem boring". (I also tried Mechassault and Bloodwake)

I had one friend over that night to play it, we tried the split-screen multiplayer. He backed me up the following day. The other kids were curious but thought we were pranking them still. Eventually, it launched... and you know the rest.

My love for Halo has never faltered, like many of you I had group hangouts, LAN parties, and even a birthday party all surrounding Halo. It is honestly some of my fondest childhood memories.

 

[TrUeKiLa]

I've been an avid Halo fanatic since Halo CE. One of my all time Memories is just about any Multiplayer game on Halo 3. Matches such as Bullrun, or Ice Cream man, or Sky Castle. When you are the last man desperately running for your life as 13 infected Spartans are chasing you just to die because you got stuck in the slightest are some of the best memories I've had. My hope is that Infinite will bring that back and we will see Halo come back on top of the Games industry like it's supposed to be.

 

[plasmarain21]

Probably since around 2008 or 2009. At the time I was 12 / 13. I was into science-fiction for a long time, especially into Star Wars so I was looking for movies and video games similar to it. My favorite sub-genre of sci-fi was of course space opera and Halo was a fine example of that. The very first Halo game I played was Halo CE on PC because I never owned an Xbox. My parents couldn't afford one and by the way - Halo was never popular in my country. Kids in Eastern Europe were into PC titles Counter-Strike 1.6 or Runescape and very rarely would hear someone mentioning Halo.

As for me, I always loved the atmosphere of these games, especially Halo CE. The soundtrack, the level design, fact that you can use vehicles, beautiful environments to explore, and god-tier soundtrack. It was a true sci-fi adventure for me with all the traditional sci-fi tropes - aliens, spaceships, AI, cool futuristic armor and weapon designs. Even though I couldn't play other Halo games for a long time I got familiar with the lore through Halo: Legends anime and simply reading about the games online.

Damn... the more I write about this the more I understand how much there is to tell. For example, Halo: Reach has a very huge personal meaning to me because I always saw its story as a metaphor for a situation that occurred in my personal life back in 2010. I always drew inspiration from the Noble team and their desperate fight against the Covenant invasion because it mirrored my own personal struggles.

 

[Omega Weapon 7]

I loved stacking TVs together for some good Halo 1 sessions with 3+ consoles in the same room. I'd never heard of Myth or Marathon before, but I'd come to find out about them after discovering Halo 1 when me and my brother got it for Christmas one year in a electronics Boutique bundle pack. Such good times.

 

[Spiderboy196]

I been a fan since 2001 and love the games the most then lore of the halo universe

 

[Dreamster]

I started 2008 with my brother, brother was a fan since launch, sadly we couldn't afford two people for Xbox live so I piggybacked off his account for a while till we could.

 

[Hein B287]

First time i got into contact with halo was when i was gaming with a friend from school. Played through the whole thing together, switching when one of us died. I remember that the first level where you meet the flood was the most scary. That was on the xbox original.

after that i jumped straight into halo 3 a few years later when i bought in a bundle with the xbox 360. that got me hooked on the game itself and the world. started reading up about it. even made the first small steps towards prop collection.

throughout the years a lot of stuff pertaining halo has been accumulating. novels, informational books, tabletop stuff and collectors editions. i'm also a big fan of the Warhammer 40k universe but halo has and always be my first love for a scifi universe.

 

[Sierra Charlie]

I started playing Halo on the PC when it first came out on the PC. Combat Evolve, my brother bought it, but I played it the most, mostly on multiplayer, but being so young and not grabbing the concept of it, I was not good, haha. Then I kept with it, by reading the books, and playing with the action figures (I was really young lol like 8 or 9). I've always kept an eye on the halo series and read a lot of the books. I was always loving the back story in the books. In 2019 I literally hopped around my town's gamestops to collect a Xbox one, the MCC, Reach, ODST, etc and play them all. I will say ODST really was a good game, but Reach was and still is my favorite.

 

[Deborah Avery]

When Halo 3 came out, I think ALL friends of mine were playing it. I was eleven on that time and I didn't have xbox. But often came to my friend and we played together. We had so many epic wins and losses and this was probably the first game that left so many vivid memories.

 

[Hydra]

Fell in love with Halo CE in 2001, read the novelization (Fall of Reach) that same year. Highschool memories were hooking up our boxes to play CE via LAN and then eventually we played 2 online together. My husband proposed to me with a custom designed ring inspired by a Halo ring in the early 2010s. Since then, been inspired by the live action commercials: ODST, Reach, etc.

 

[TheDarkSpartan]

For me, it goes back down to when me and my brother used to play the crap out of Halo: CE and Halo 2 on the original Xbox. We had these controllers where one had fans built into it that dried your sweaty hands, and another was a Mad Catz "Little Brother" controller. My brother would force me to use the little bro controller on the floor, while he sat in the luxury massage chair with the hand-cooling controller.

I started out playing Halo 2 with buddies. They were helping me get over a bad break up. After playing the campaign, I jumped back and played Halo CE and then Halo 3. I discovered the books and started my collection. Halo really helped me get out of a dark place in my life. My wife and both of sons love my Halo hobby as they call it and love to see the Halo fandom things.
Halo for life

 

[Arne]

Oh boy. Halo. Well like some of the older players on here I started with Halo: CE. I was at my cousins' cousin's house (not related to him) and he didn't like me since I was an annoying kid (2003 I was 8) and he was playing Fable and got annoyed with my questions about the game and put in Halo. He invited me to play thinking I would shut up and no it was the opposite. I was hooked. Playing Halo: CE on the classic Xbox with the Duke controllers, man how time passes. Any way we left and anytime we would go over I would ask to play, he would let me, I think he liked how into the game I got. Fastforward to the 2004, my mom buys me the Xbox and asks me what games I want. without hesitation, Driv3r, Halo, and Fable. I ended up with Driv3r, Halo and Halo 2 since it released shortly after I got my Xbox. I got my whole family hooked on Halo. We would play slayer and used it to settle disputes in the house. Halo 2 blew me away. Being able to duel wield weapons blew my mind and I had a blast running duel wield magnums. I would kill my brother in multiplayer just to take his magnum. Where I lived at the time, the GameStop didn't have a ton of Xbox games coming in that I was into so I gradually moved away from the Xbox, then my Xbox stopped working and Halo was shelved while I played on the PlayStation 2. Lots of good memories there but that for another time. Fast forward to high school I had stopped console gaming for PC gaming since I started to enjoy MMOs opposed to single players, shooters, and so on. Then it happened. Halo Reach released. I bought a second-hand Xbox 360 and went and bought Halo-Halo Reach. I played them one after the other and had a blast with my buddies. To this day I can't play Halo competitively, but I enjoy co-op on it more than anything since that was my very first interaction with the game and it is the series that my little brother and I bonded over when we finally got our first Xbox. I never kept up with the lore, and am lost as **** half the time, but I truly enjoy the series for all the fun my household had with it growing up.

 

[Kahn 319]

I've been a halo fan since I played halo 2 at my friends house when I was like 9 or so, Halo Reach was a big reason why I ended up joining the military, not to play spartan but to fulfil a need to experience something new and meaningful, not saying my whole time in the army was meaningful but i came out more experienced and ready to deal with life's problems.

 

[DystopianDeer]

My brother is 7 years older than me but he still liked to include me when he played games. Halo: CE was the first time I actually got to play a game with him that wasn't a fighting game. He bought it on launch day and we took over the living room tv to play. It's still one of the coolest things that he'd let his 11-year-old sister play Halo with him. The games are still deeply ingrained in our relationship 20 years later. ODST was the first game I didn't get to play on launch day with him because I was in another state when it launched. I played it with a friend that was in love with the series as I was. But I still see it as my brother and I's thing.

 

[WhiskeyHammer]

Oh boy, I guess this post is for me because I am a Day One Halo fan. From the very beginning. Halo has been on my top 10 lists for 20 years. I've made life long friends from multiplayer, as well as lost many during LAN parties (not sorry for those).

All of my memories include playing early fan made custom games of Zombies/Infection and SWAT, to getting out of the map and looking for secrets.

And something no one does anymore, but I remember the midnight release for Halo 3: ODST, where I sat at a GameStop and won an ODST standing cardboard ad in a trivia contest.

Halo has been one of the most influential parts of my life and I love it in all parts.....well.....maybe not in a couple places

 

[Jaysee1983]

My little brother and cousin played it all the time in the early 2000's. Occasionally I would play with them and drive the Warthog around and act silly. They were a good bit younger than me so they really enjoyed that. That's my first memory of Halo. Fast forward several years and Xbox added the Maser Chief collection to Gamepass and announced the series which got me into playing the games. So far I've played my way up to Halo 4 and I love it. The music. The weapons. The story. Its all well done. I love the drop scene in Halo 3 ODST when the Hell Jumpers are going down in pods to the city. I'm late to the party but I'm enjoying the content so far!

 

[WZProps]

My dad introduce me to Halo 2 when I was 10. Since then, Halo's been a very important part of my life. I basically grew up with the franchise and it especially had a lot of impact during my teenage years. I'd spend countless hours just gaming with people on Xbox Live on Halo 2. I met one of my best friends that way.
We'd do all sort of things at the time, from just trying out super jumps some random person told us about (since the internet wasn't what it is today, you mostly had to rely on the legends passed down orally from gamer to gamer) and walking around out of the maps, exploring what we were not supposed to see, like explorers discovering some uncharted territory. We'd play our fair share of good old fashion zombie where you had to manually switch teams and rely on sportsmanship from your fellow players.

I then discovered Halo books were a thing and managed to get my hands on them. At school I'd read the first 3 novels so much the covers and parts of the books were falling apart. I'd even do presentations on these damn books when we had to pick some book to present to the class.
It's about this time I was able to get my hands on Halo:CE and played that for the first time. I remember it being a bit underwhelming compared to the 2nd one, which I've had played and insane amount up until that point. But, it was fun nonetheless.
Then came Halo 3. That's probably the Halo game I played the most. Just the addition of the forge mode allowed for infinite replay value as long as you or some random person thought of something new to do. Possibilities were endless. Playing "I am Legend" is one that comes to mind.
I'd also meet my 2nd best friend playing Halo 3, being in clans and stuff. Here again, countless hours spent on this game.
Halo Wars then came along. Having played my fair share of Starcraft when I was younger, I really enjoyed having a similar game, but with my favorite franchise. Controlling tiny Spartans was quite fun. I also remember being mind blown by the quality of the cinematics made by Blur (They still hold up pretty well to this day IMO)
I loved Halo3: ODST. The different tone and approach they took for this game made it very enjoyable, especially with friends. Just walking around in the city at night listening to some mellow tunes was quite a soothing experience. Plus having it a bit more focused on the characters and the team made it much more easy to be invested in them.
It also brought Firefight, what would become one of my favorite gametype. I wasn't a big PVP guy (still not a fan), so having this PVE mode added to the mix really increased the value for me.
Halo Reach for me was peek Halo. The story, multiplayer, game modes and gameplay, customization & aesthetics. Just overall goodness. Not much more to say really.
Halo 4 and 5 didn't quite hit home with me as much as the others did. I wasn't too much of a fan of the aesthetics and design choices. I was happy they introduced some new characters and brought back older ones, but it still felt like something was a bit off. I missed fighting the floods. Prometheans were okay, but that's about it really. I still played my fair share of them, 5 more than 4 though.

Not long after H5 came out, I decided to get my first tattoo and went all in by getting the Spartan markings all over my back, upper arms and inner forearms, in one long exhausting session. Was fun...
And in 2018-2019, I thought it was a good time to finally combine 2 things I love, making costumes/props and my favorite franchise. That's how I ended up building my ODST Buck costume.

But yeah, all that to say that Halo's been one of the most influential constant in my life over the years and still is to this day.
And I wouldn't have it any other way.

 

[Aikon]

I started playing Halo a little after Halo 3 came out so I haven't played as long as a lot of people here But Halo 3 was/is one of my favorite games to date and I played it MANY MANY times after I got it.

Fast forward to Sophomore year of college and I meet a guy and he was really into Halo too (He's an active Southern Regiment member, who actually introduced me to the forums) So to try to impress him I got the Master Chief Collection and for a couple of weeks we played through every campaign, plus Halo 5. Those memories we made are some of the happiest moments of my life, now he's my bf of 2 years and I'm progressing on building my first armor project, a Halo 3 Marine Medic. We both love nerding out to Halo together so I can say that Halo has changed my life for the best <3