Interview: Master Chief's voice on a more personal story

After three games of stoic silence, Master Chief is finally getting ready to speak. Halo 4 has been pitched as a more personal story for the...

12

After three games of stoic silence, Master Chief is finally getting ready to speak. Halo 4 has been pitched as a more personal story for the character; while he'll still be "a man of few words," the voice actor behind the iconic Microsoft mascot is excited to dive into a meatier role.

"This is where I always hoped we would go with Halo," actor Steve Downes told Shacknews. "So when they said that the idea on Halo 4 was in many ways Master Chief's story, and his relationship with Cortana, and with the other people he comes in contact with, I was real excited that we were going to go a little deeper in that regard. We did a lot more in the studio this time than I've ever done before with him."

More studio time meant a few changes for Downes. While his performances in prior games took place over a few days in a Chicago studio, where he works as a radio DJ, this one took him to Los Angeles. "We did several sessions; we did a couple of sessions in Los Angeles, in addition to here in Chicago," he said. "So it was by a factor of ten, more studio time to get this right."

But the more striking change may have been working directly with voice actor Jen Taylor, who plays Cortana. In all of the prior games the two characters recorded their parts separately. "In fact, we had never met until about a year ago in Seattle for HaloFest. This year as we were working together, for me it made John so much more real and the relationship with Cortana was so much more real."

To Downes, that relationship is central to the character. He says he's played the role as if emotion is confusing for him. Cortana has been his confidant, and this game sees her facing an existential crisis from data corruption. In a way, Master Chief will be facing the possibility of his friend's death. "All along, he's been trying to sort out what his relationship is with this AI," Downes says. "He doesn't really know where to put these feelings that he has for her, so there's a lot of that in this game."

Meanwhile, Master Chief might eventually face a similar crisis of his own. While Halo 4 is the beginning of the Reclaimer Trilogy, ensuring another three games at least, sometimes franchises fade away. Asked how he would end the story if he had complete creative control, Downes suggested that it should come with finality. "That would be the end for him, rather than riding off into the sunset," he said. "If that was it, then that should be it. He should die a hero's death. If it were up to me, that's the way I would finish it."

Of course, it's really not up to Downes at all. He joked that future plot developments are "on a need to know basis, and I don't need to know." Even getting an advanced copy of the script for Halo 4 wasn't the norm for his work on prior games. "It's not really unusual, especially for gaming voiceover, to not see the script until you just get into the studio," he said. "So this time I really wanted to live with it for a while, and they accommodated me on that. So it was great to internalize it days or weeks before going in to do it."

Halo 4 is due on November 6, when we'll see just how personal this story is.

Editor-In-Chief
From The Chatty
  • reply
    August 13, 2012 8:00 AM

    Steve Watts posted a new article, Interview: Master Chief's voice on a more personal story.

    After three games of stoic silence, Master Chief is finally getting ready to speak. Halo 4 has been pitched as a more personal story for the...

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 8:06 AM

      THE BABY

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 8:17 AM

      Can anyone confirm if Halo 4 well max out at 30 FPS again? Loved Halo 3 man but the low frame rate did a number on my eyes after an hour of playing.

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 8:37 AM

      Have the Most Interesting Man in the World do his voice, and every time he closes a conversation have him say 'Stay thirsty, my friends'.

      I thought Master Chief spoke on Halo 3?

      • reply
        August 13, 2012 8:58 AM

        He spoke as early as Halo 1, but he's always been a bit of a "strong silent type." From Downes comments, it seems like Halo 4 will have a good bit more dialogue for the character.

        • reply
          August 13, 2012 9:08 AM

          Yeah I remember him talking in Halo 1 and 2, he just doesn't say much. Not sure what the headline means about him being ready to speak.

          • reply
            August 13, 2012 9:17 AM

            Let's put it this way: Do ya like Jane Austen novels? Let the emoting begin!

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 9:03 AM

      Is he going to sound like a 9 year old, swearing constantly? That's all I can imagine him sounding like anyway from online play.

      • reply
        August 13, 2012 9:12 AM

        No, they're going Duke Nuk'em. Comments on pretty much everything, in the manner a 9 year old would say them, with the voice of God on horse steroids and cheap liquor.

      • reply
        August 13, 2012 10:07 AM

        They are going to use the new Aussie Tribes: Ascend voice.

        • reply
          August 13, 2012 12:15 PM

          Hahahaha, that voice is such a troll voice. It's great. I had leftover gold from the beta pre-order so I bought that voice just to annoy people. The VGO (Oops) one is the best.

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 9:13 AM

      [deleted]

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 9:16 AM

      I like the Master Chief because he was the strong silent type. The less a character reveals, the more you can project yourself onto him. It's why I love Gordon Freeman. You can imagine him as a quietly brave, studious action hero, a snarky wiseass with a crack for everything, or a giggling psychopath. He's a freaking cypher and even the way NPC's treat him in the later games is open to interpretation

      Here's hoping Master Chief doesn't turn into a Kevin Smith character.

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 9:19 AM

      master chief has spoken in every game he's appeared in ?

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 9:19 AM

      Are these ever going to come to the PC? :(

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 9:24 AM

      I'm posting way too much on this one, mostly because the idea of Master Chief suddenly talking about his feelings just makes me laugh, but the idea of Master Chief dying a "heroes death" is about as uncreative as it gets. Jesus. Everyone dies now, to the strains of an unaccompanied female/child's voice singing a wordless high pitched tune, as the first emotion of pain/fear blossoms on the hero's face, and just a slight intrusion into the melody is made as you hear an explosion/bullets/people yelling before returning to the strangely personal silence of the death blow, perhaps a grunt of surprise coming from the hero, as he looks at a the blood/a picture of his family/the children he just saved as they board the ship, and falls over in slow motion. Cut to voiceover as the best friend starts talking about how he'll never be forgotten, there's the memorial for the hero, his name on a plaque.

      How about this: He wins. He totally wins, and then retires to the suburbs to raise a family, where he occasionally terrorizes high school kids as they come to pick his daughter up for dates. He sits in a recliner outside and watches the sun set and has a nice life because you don't have to die nobly every damn time in slo-mo to have an emotional impact. Sometimes it can be an awesome impact. How about him zooming out from telling this story as he hands his car keys to the valet on his way to his son's wedding reception, or as part of his job interview for a gig at a military defense contractor?

      • reply
        August 13, 2012 9:25 AM

        if noble death is a cliche then the hero willing triumphantly has to be even more tired.

        • reply
          August 13, 2012 9:30 AM

          I'd settle for just living. Jesus. It's binary. He either lives or dies. They're both cliches. Those are the only damn options, other than "and then he joined the Flood, because he just realized how stupid The Jersey Shore is, and would not suffer humans to live."

          Let him live. My favorite ending of all time is probably the Bioshock ending where the reward was saving the little girls and watching them grow up to be successful happy women, as they return to his bedside in his last hours and thank him one more time for saving them all He didn't win the castle. He didn't get the girl. He had a real-life effect in that he stopped the badguy from getting out into the world, AND he raised some kids to be happy adults. One bad outcome prevented, a small positive outcome created. Terrific ending. ]o

    • reply
      August 13, 2012 10:01 AM

      But he talks all the time... he's not Gordon Freeman over here

Hello, Meet Lola