character. He's a man of few words. If he speaks too much, it goes against his innate persona. And yet if we don't have him speak at all, there's no way to really understand his mind and you can't chart his growth as a characterhe becomes dull and one-dimensional. In the video games, the Master Chief is rarely seen without his armor. To aid players in identifying with the character, cutscenes tease the character's face, but never fully reveal it. At the end of Halo: Combat Evolved, the Chief removes his helmet, but camera movement hides his head, while at the end of Halo 4, Master Chief's eyes are briefly shown if the game is played on the highest difficulty. O'Connor said in an interview that revealing the face of the Chief is not as important as revealing the events going on around the character. In Halo: The Flood, the Chief is described as tall with short brown hair, serious eyes, and strong features. His skin is unnaturally pale as a consequence of spending most of his time in his armor. The Master Chief stands about 7feet (2.13m) tall and weighs 1,000 pounds (450kg) in armor; without it, he stands 6feet, 10inches (2.08m) tall and weighs 287pounds (130kg). Appearances Video games The Master Chief's backstory is revealed in the 2001 novel The Fall of Reach. Born in 2511 on the human colony world of Eridanus II, John and other selected children are covertly taken from their homes and conscripted by the United Nations Space Command (UNSC) into the SPARTAN-II Project. The military and the SPARTAN-II Project's lead, Doctor Catherine Halsey, believe humanity will fall into interstellar civil war without the creation of supersoldiers (the Spartans). John proves a natural leader and leads his fellow trainees over eight years of grueling training and dangerous physical augmentation. A new threat emerges: the Covenant, a collective of alien races determined to exterminate humanity. Though the Spartans prove effective against the Covenant, they are too few to turn the tide in the UNSC's favor. Master Chief first appears in the games with Halo: Combat Evolved. Master Chief and the crew of the UNSC ship Pillar of Autumn discover the alien ringworld Halo. Master Chief is entrusted with safeguarding Cortana, the ship's artificial intelligence, from capture. While fighting the Covenant, Master Chief and Cortana learn that an ancient race known as the Forerunners created Halo