Posted at oxm.co.uk on April 30, 2012 by Edwin Evans-Thirwell:
Halo 4 web film “Forward Unto Dawn” introduces new UNSC character
Five-part series will “make Halo accessible”
Microsoft will launch a new Halo web film series “Forward Unto Dawn” in the run-up to Halo 4’s November launch. The aim: to expand Halo’s audience by teaching those who haven’t played the games about the universe behind them.
Forward Unto Dawn is the name of the UNSC ship Master Chief and Cortana were stranded on at the end of Halo 3. The web series, however, will explore the fate of the UNSC Infinity, a hyper-advanced prototype warship which serves as the setting for Halo 4’s competitive multiplayer. It’ll feature a new UNSC character, whose story will simultaneously flashback to the beginning of the human-Covenant war, while setting the scene for the new game.
Constituting five episodes, each 15 minutes in length, the series represents Microsoft’s “largest investment” in live action promotion to date. The director and cast have yet to be revealed.
Forward Unto Dawn will “make Halo accessible for people who haven’t played the games,” Matt McCloskey, director of franchise business management at 343 Industries, told Variety.
“We wanted to do something unique from a narrative standpoint that’s big in scale,” he went on. The new series is “not just a marketing piece”, McCloskey insisted. “We wanted to go way beyond that and transform this live-action exploration from advertising into a full standalone product that people will enjoy.”
According to 343 founder Frank O’Connor, Halo fans are bang up for this kind of promotion. “Every time we do a live-action commercial the audience says, ‘We want to see more so that we can explore the ‘Halo’ universe a little bit more. Demand grew more and more out of the two little vignettes we’d previously produced.”
Will Forward Unto Dawn project breathe fresh life into the idea of a Halo blockbuster film, comparable to the Peter Jackson flick Universal canned in 2005? “I don’t think anybody needs any reminding of [the potential],” McCloskey said. “Everyone keeps reminding us of that.”
Forward Unto Dawn will be exclusive to Halo Waypoint and Machanima.com initially, but will later move to other platforms. An Xbox Live release hardly seems unlikely.