For my contexual studies I shall...

I shall be looking into how approaching Transmedia from both an artistic standpoint and a financial one can alter it, as history has shown me from my personal experience that looking at something purely financially can destroy what made it great in the first place, but then again creating content with financial aid can destroy it before it's even begun.

For the study I have chosen to look at two game franchise whose game sales and stories are both held in high regards to their fans, but each have diffrent results concerning their transmedia.

These two game franchises are Halo and Mass Effect.

Halo:- The Six Billion Dollar Doughnut.

Halo is a Sci-fi First person shooting game made by Bungie and Published by Microsoft for the release of Autumn 2001 with Halo: Combat Evolved. The game had gone through many changes over it's design period, originally starting off as an Real time Strategy game for Mac, but was later released on the original Xbox console as an FPS to show case the Xbox's graphical and processing power.

The game released in later 2001 and was praised by both critic and gamers alike, making it the number one reason to buy and Xbox at the time.

"A third of the world's 15 million Xbox owners have a copy of Halo, an extraordinarily high penetration for a shooting game among a library of more than 400 titles."  Xbox wears a Halo of Success by Jason Hill. Nov. 4 2004

Due to it's popularity in not just gameplay, but also story Halo birthed a multitude of Transmedia including, books, comics, spin-off Games. Alternative Reality Games and live action shorts.

Books:-

Halo has been adapted into many different forms of transmedia, the most commonly talked about our it's novels, most of which are written by Eric Nylund. Who also wrote the first Halo book Halo:The Fall of Reach a prequel to the first game which would also later be adapted into it's own game.

The Fall of Reach claimed a positive response from readers, mostly on how much depth it added in to the Halo universe, at first the book hardly sold any copies, but by December of 2009 the book had sold over a million copies.

The next book was written by the 'infamous' William C.Dietz and unlike the previous book which added content to the world, Dietz was apparently only asked to novelize the game. Either way the book received mixed feelings from readers, some not liking the portrayal of the characters, finding it very confusing after just reading Nylund's take on him.

Bungie and Microsoft went back to having Nylund writing the next book, making Halo:The Flood the only book that Dietz wrote for the game.

Unlike the previous novel Nylund wrote Halo First strike sold very well during it's launch, so much that it made the New york time's best sellers list along with his next book Ghost of Onyx that wrapped up many plot ties with in the series. The following book was again written by a new Author a Joseph Staten who wrote Halo: Contact Harvest, which unlike the last time the book switched authors actually received a positive reception making the New York best seller.

So far it seems Halo has a really good relationship when creating literary media. Bungie intended to please fans by sticking with a writer who got the best results and seemed to understand the universe they creating. Instead of just hiring out a new author every time. Bungie have stated that they considered each novel Canon to their universe, so everything that happens in the books happens in the games universe and they do not stand on their own legs.

But it seems, that the next three Halo books will NOT be written by either Nyuland or Staten, instead it will be written by Greg Bear.  It seems to be divided among Hardcore Halo fans and casual readers. A review by a Dr.Nigel Seel who claims the book is "Tired, Unoriginal and Boring."While the Portlandbookreview gave positive feedback to the book, claiming that it was a good addition to the series and fans would love it.

But the book is still fairly new and only time will tell how the rest of the Halo fan base react to it, but it is interesting to note that Bungie have 'not' stated as to why they did not get Nyuland or Staten to write this series, perhaps it is due to the games change of hands, with 343 Studios taking over the reigns of Halo.

Comics:-

With Video games being a visual medium, it is not uncommon to see the Halo franchise move towards comics books or as the first would like to be called Graphic novels, The Halo: Graphic novel was a collection of four short stories. Like it's purely written counterparts, The graphic novel was praised for fleshing out the Halo Universe and war praised for the quality of the artwork and how they worked with the stories, it is rumored to have 100,000 copies printed. The Book itself was published by none other than Marvel comics, which is curious as most properties outside of super hero comics for around this time are usually self published OR published by Dark Horse comics.

That said Marvel was in development for a graphic novel mini series that tied the second and third game together. While the miniseries was a commercial success, outselling on it's launch and the hardcover edition was the best selling Graphic novel of the week.

Sadly the mini series hit mixed reviews from readers, while it did still have a great story, action and plot. They felt that it just couldn't recreate some of the games grander moments and that the lack of Master chief, the game's protagonist seemed a bit off considering that this was meant to tie his games together. But it is still worth noting that these were minor hiccups in a overall well written book.

By the looks it seems that Marvel comics were tasked with doing all the Halo comics as they announced in 2009 that they'd two more comics as five part series written, one written by Peter David and the other written by Fred Van Lente. The first to be released was Halo: Hell Jumper by Peter David, while Fred Van Lente released Halo:Blood Line in December 2009. Both stories received high praise with very little to no displeasure about the story, most reviews by consumers praise the two comics for their additions and insight into the world.

A comic book adaptation was made of Eric Nylund's Fall of reach, like his novel the comic book received a lot of praise, but did not reach the same commercial success.


Film:-

A film adaptation as been in works since 2005 and has yet to see the light of many big name studios and directs have said to be working on the project, but no official trailer or production shots have been seen to this very day.

But Halo has known for doing live action trailers for their came as well as a live action mini series for their recent game, Halo 4. The mini series has been shown on the youtube channel Machnima and is called Forward onto Dawn.


Anime:-

In Feb 2010 343 studios financed and released Halo Legends a collection of short Anime themed stories, the dvd was felt with mixed feelings, more which gravitated towards the look and feel of the series rather their over all worth, some feeling that the anime style didn't suit a series like Halo, while others feeling that it was refreshing and seeing these interpretations was interesting.

Spin Offs:-

• Halo Wars :-

Halo Wars was a Real Time Strategy Game made by Ensemble Studios for the Xbox 360, there objective was to make a simple easy to play RTS for a console and make a Halo RTS, like Bungie had originally intended. While the game gathered many postie reviews, the reviews themselves leaned more towards how the RTS controls handled in the game rather than the games contribution to Halo universe over all. In my own opinion of the game, it serves it's place as a good story, but doesn't change anything radically to the universe only adds history.

• Halo 3:ODST

Halo 3: ODST was released by Bungie studies sometime after the release of Halo 3. The game follows a group of Orbital Shock Drop Troopers, rather than Spartans like previous installments of the game. As such they made tweaks to game to make the play style feel very different to what the players were use to, such as making the shields weaker and adding a health container. Jump distance had also been reduced and players are not longer able to duel wield all weapons.

The general reception of the game was positive feeling that the changes made the game feel alot more fresh and challenging, making players think and reconsider the player style they were using despite having similar controls.

• Halo Reach

Halo Reach was the last game to be released by Bungie, it is clear from playing the game that Bungie took ques from what worked from ODST and made it better in Reach. Story wise Reach is based off the first best selling novel in Halo franchise, as such takes place before the first Halo game, making this the first prequel to the Halo franchise.

Like ODST, you play a down graded to what the player is normally use to, in this game you play as a Spartan III and while you are still much better compared to that of a normal human, you are still no up there like Master Chief from the main franchise.

The game receive critical acclaim,  Edge, GamePro and many others consider this to be the best Halo game title to date. (to date of the review). Sadly again there is no real insight as to what it adds to the game, beside adding extra history.