It Took 9 Redesigns to Perfect This Iconic Gaming Character

Halo: Combat Evolved was the killer app for the initial Xbox, serving as the most enticing launch title for the console as it brought Microsoft into the console wars. Quickly defining itself as the premier series for Bungie and the Xbox line of consoles, Halo quickly expanded from the adventures of Master Chief to an entire universe, where titles like Halo: Reach and Halo Wars could emphasize the different visual elements of the creative team and how they stand out from the central character.

All of it ultimately descends directly from Master Chief as a character, with the look of the character serving as something of a bedrock for the rest of the franchise to be built upon. That’s what makes the revelation that Master Chief went through multiple redesigns all the more interesting, as it suggests there might have been different paths during development of what the game’s final look and tone might have been like. Here’s what Halo‘s co-creator had to say about the design process behind Master Chief and why it’s so important to the overall eventual direction of the series.

Master Chief Had Several Potential Designs

Halo co-creator Marcus Lehto was speaking with the Kent State Magazine about the creative process that went into the first game in the series when he revealed that Master Chief’s iconic Spartan armor took multiple attempts to finalize. Lehto explained that “The creation of the Master Chief is something that I went through so many wringers to try to find the right look, the right feel, the right stature for such a character.” Some of these designs have been made public in the past, such as Shi Kai Wang’s early concept for the character that featured a sleeker design, a bandolier of grenades, and a slimmer Chief.

However, those looks were determined to be too stylized in their design, instead of being reflective of the blunt military effectiveness of Master Chief’s eventual design. As the design process went on, Lehto turned to real-life military vehicles such as the M1 Abrams tank and the Apache helicopter for design aesthetics. This likely contributed heavily to the idea that Master Chief looks like a walking tank, which adds an understated visual layer to his status as an unstoppable killing machine.

Ultimately, it took Lehto and the team at Bungie nine attempts to finally cement the look for the character. Since then, Master Chief has become one of the more recognizable characters of the modern era of gaming, with his bulky but practical armor serving as a clear visual indicator of the tone of the space military-heavy action shooter. “It took forever, but I wasn’t going to stop because I had learned through the program [at Kent State] that you don’t stop when you’re just on your first iteration.”

Design Helps Define Function

Especially with characters like Master Chief, it can be easy to underestimate just how long the creative process can take. There’s a certain straightforwardness to the character’s finalized look that seems to fit naturally into the world around him. However, it’s easy to imagine how a different look for Master Chief may have bled into the greater aesthetic of the Halo series. A more stylized approach to the character might have led to a more stylish and refined look for the opposing armies. Instead, the UNSC and the Covenant both benefit from being directly complemented and contrasted by the Chief, respectively.

Master Chief feels like a piece of military hardware in his blunt design, befitting a character who comes to represent the military effort to fight back against the Covenant. Conversely, the Covenant’s bright colors and various physical features (whether that be the exposed limbs of the Grunts, the clear manidbles of the Elites, or the ape-like Brutes) inherently contrast against the largely unseen Master Chief and his completely covered body. Entertainment, especially in the realm of video games, tends to be descended design-wise from the main character downwards.

The design of the Master Chief was key to the overall eventual look of the Halo franchise, which in turn left room open for experimentation in other Spartan armors and in underscoring the inhuman natural elements of alien lifeforms like the Flood. All of that was dependent on being able to complement or contrast against the design of Master Chief, so it makes sense that the team at Bungie took their time to make sure they got the character just right.

You Just Have To Get It Right Once

Master Chief’s design, requiring nine attempts to get right, invites plenty of speculation over how the character and the larger series may have evolved if a different approach had been chosen for the character. It’s possible that the overall tone of the series might have been very different if the game had gone in a more stylized or cartoonish direction. This speaks to the importance of design aesthetic when defining the tenor of a game. Halo‘s world fits Master Chief, not the other way around.

As the series progressed, the Master Chief’s Spartan Armor got its own lore, including a history that introduced moral complexity into the universe by exposing the experiments that the UNSC went through to perfect the armor. Similar to other characters from across gaming who went through a series of redesigns before they were perfected, Master Chief’s final design ended up being the correct choice for the game developers.

Any artistic medium is going to require that push and pull during development. While it’s interesting to ponder what Halo might have been with a different-looking Master Chief, it all underscores just how effective the character’s design ended up being and how perfecting it established the core identity of what would become one of the defining gaming franchises of the 21st century.