[News] Master Chief Design Took Nine Tries To Get Right: "It Took Forever," Creator Says

Master Chief Design Took Nine Tries To Get Right: "It Took Forever," Creator Says
By Eddie Makuch

Master Chief creator Marcus Lehto has recalled his initial design process for the now-iconic character, saying he and the team at Bungie "tried a lot of things" before settling on the look everyone now knows.

"The creation of the Master Chief is something that I went through so many ringers to try to find the right look, the right feel, the right stature for such a character," Lehto said in an interview with Kent State Magazine. Lehto attended Kent State.

The report said some of the early designs for Master Chief were "too slender, too stylized." To come up with the final design, Lehto said he look at a variety of things for inspiration, including an M1 Abrams tank, the line of an Apache helicopter, and a BMX helmet.

"And then from a visual design standpoint, I really did focus on some of the things I learned here at Kent State to break it down into the most basic visual elements," he said. "It's such a key thing to get right in order to not overly complicate a design."

The original Master Chief design.
Lehto said he went through nine different versions of Master Chief before settling on the one everyone knows today. "It took forever, but I wasn't going to stop because I had learned through the program here that you don't stop when you're just on your first iteration," he said.

Lehto is talking about the original Master Chief design as seen in the first Halo game in 2001. The character's look has undergone some changes in the 20+ years since, but the general look has stayed mostly the same.

Also in the interview, Lehto discussed how Bungie came to be owned by Microsoft, and not Apple. Some may recall that the original Halo was revealed at the Macworld 1999 event, with Steve Jobs personally announcing the game for Mac and hyping it up. After this, Lehto said Microsoft came calling and said to the team at Bungie, "Steve Jobs can't have that," referring to Halo.

Microsoft then offered to buy Bungie, move the team from Chicago to Washington, and make Halo for Xbox. The game turned out to be a huge hit for Microsoft, and it spawned numerous sequels.

2026 marks the 25th anniversary of the Halo series, and Microsoft is marking the occasion with the release of Halo: Campaign Evolved, a new remaster of the original game. In addition to Xbox and PC, the game is releasing on PS5, which marks the franchise's debut on Sony's platform. Microsoft has multiple new Halo projects in the works, and another title is said to be a "Fortnite-like" live-service game.

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