Master Chief: A Visual History of Halo's Hero

The mysterious, armor-clad hero of the human race is not quite human himself: As part of the Spartan program, Halo's Master Chief, aka John-117, was genetically engineered and reared by the military to become the xenocidal savior of everything. Master Chief is a hulking pile of future man, with a penchant for one-liners and a steady hand; he could probably blow up the Death Star by driving a Warthog up to the exhaust port and tossing a plasma grenade into it, no "Force" required. We're not aiming for a comprehensive history of Halo in these pages. Instead, we are here to salute the green and gold guru of the Halo universe in his many costumes, cameos and codpieces. This one's for the Chief.

Halo (Unreleased, Mac / PC)

In 1999, Steve Jobs announced Halo at Macworld as the successor to Bungie's Myth games. Although we can't confirm that the soldier shown in the scant images of this unreleased game is indeed John-117, we can confirm that they show a guy in a green suit with a gold visor and a huge gun, and that's good enough for us.

Halo: Combat Evolved (2001, Xbox)

Master Chief officially debuted in Halo: Combat Evolved. In this game he remains entirely in his iconic Mjolnir armor from the moment he steps out of his man-refrigerator in the opening scene until the very end, where he removes his helmet ... and his face is obscured from view. Some argue that this gives Master Chief an "everyman" quality that allows players to connect with him, which is awesome -- unless said player is a girl.

Halo 2 (2004, Xbox)

In Halo 2, the changes to Master Chief's trademark green getup weren't purely cosmetic. The pummeling Chief takes in Halo: Combat Evolved proved too much for Chief's Mjolnir Mark V armor, and the upgraded Mark VI armor he receives at the beginning of Halo 2 is the same outfit he wears for all of Halo 2 and Halo 3. Whatever happens in Halo 4, you probably won't want to be in the room when he finally takes the armor off.