Who remembers the blue spaceship thing in front of the half spaceship (that the Master Chief's in) at the end of the trailer? Well I have a theory that it was some sort of Forerunner cruiser and that some of the Forerunners are still alive! Anyone agree, or disagree?

I half agree with you. My own examination of the bonus clip at the end of the halo 3 credits and this trailer do conclude the forerunners are infact, back.

Firstly, upon viewing the bonus clip (at the end of halo 3 credits upon legendary completion) I noticed the lights were brightest in certain pattern on the planet. A second look confirmed that the lights form the symbol RECLAMATION and is the standard construction pattern you will see of forerunner megacities. This concludes that this is either a forerunner planet inhabited by another race, or the forerunners themselves.

Secondly, the large weapon seen in the halo 4 trailer is standard forerunner beam design, futher confirming the forerunner theory. But unlike your suggestion, the weapon seems to be embedded onto the planet itself. If this is true, (as it appears) then there is a large chance of this planet being a forerunner SHIELD world. (A hollowed out planet, or entirely synthetic like a halo ring, but a full sphere, similar to a Dyson sphere, of which the forerunners had many) Even if I am simply mistaking the positioning of the weapon, it is unlikely to be a forerunner ship as it bears no similarities and forerunner ships operate in tactical groups. The only other option is a large sentry drone, as seen in halo 2 in the library. Although every one of these scenarios indicate the forerunners.

That is all you can glean directly from the evidence, and now for some of my own thoughts and theories.

The Forerunner portal that bridged slipspace from Earth to the Ark is similar to human and covenant slipspace technology, although far more advanced... allowing for extremely short journey times across the galaxy, millions of times faster than any other race as of known. The way these ''wormholes'' work is they open a rift in the space-time plane, opening a passage into slipspace, a very unstable and physics-dashing dimension between real space. The portal must be supported at either end (in the case of a stable wormhole such as the Forerunner portal) but human and covenant technology have to ''calculate'' what distance travelling inside slipspace will equate to in the real universe and rhen ''collapse'' the passage when they wish to exit slipspace.

In the case of the Earth-Ark portal, the Ark end failed to support the open wormhole and collapsed. Although the full ship had made it through, inside slipspace, the collapsing end caught up to half of the ship, tearing half of the ship out of the slipstream and dropping it into real space, somewhere between earth and the Ark. The other half barely m,anaged to make it through the Earth-end before it collapsed. The Ark being 2 x 10^36 lightyears from the galactic centre was in very deep space, between galaxies (in order to be out of the Array's firing range) Seeing as the outer edge of the galaxy would be about halfway between the Ark and the galactic centre, The chief is likely to have been dropped either towards the outer edge or in outer-galactic space. (If this is the case then the planet is almost certainly a shield world, as the outer edge of the galaxy is not habitable in the case of normal planetary affairs)

*Unless Earth is on the FAR side of the galaxy in comparison to the Ark, in which case he could have dropped at any point in a horizontal line across teh galaxy between the Ark and Earth.

Also, if he was dropped in the outer galactic range, it would make sense for the Forerunners to have a shield world there as it would be far enough from the Array as to be survivable and the flood would be unlikely to find a lone planet in deep space. Perfect for the surviving refugees of the Forerunners to stay out of sight and prevent a dying out. This also makes sense in a logical case, as any surviving Forerunners would have been evacuated to a hidden and distant position (They would have not been evacuated to the Ark as this would pose a flood infestation risk, which is why the Ark is nearly entirely automated with centries, similarly to the Rings, as they would only be recearch stations. The ark is reserved for the securing of all races and species for indexing)

Finally, the forerunner part of the story is the most obvious course of continuity for the Halo series. The human-covenant war is over and has been done with.

I expect Halo 4 to be about the Forerunner-flood side of things, such as finding the origins of the flood and such matters.

I dont believe the forerunners will be hostile to the Chief... but the automated defence systems would initially be, as indicated in the trailer.

Note: I came to the conclusion that the next game would be focusing on the Forerunners long before halo 4 was announced.

To futher hilight the Forerunner surface of the planet, see http://www.halopedian.com/Legendary_Planet

You can clearly see the 7th coloumn, the reclaimer symbol, the overarching Forerunner symbol and the Marathon symbol.

Futhermore on closer inspection... the large bright ''beam weapon'' looking thing isn't a weapon at all. It is distinctly an opening on the planet's surface.

Proof that this is a forerunner planet

Proof that (if not the forerunners) the planet is clearly occupied

Proof that the planet is a Shield world.

i agree with you

Forerunner planet... i agree... Occupied... Agreed... By Forerunner?.. disagree... The point of firing the Halo rings was that all living things in the universe were to be destroyed including the Forerunners themselves... They had DNA clones of all living species and put them back on there original planets... apart from their own kind... all that they left was their machinery and stunning buildings... :)

may be forerunners want revenege

Forerunner planet... i agree... Occupied... Agreed... By Forerunner?.. disagree... The point of firing the Halo rings was that all living things in the universe were to be destroyed including the Forerunners themselves... They had DNA clones of all living species and put them back on there original planets... apart from their own kind... all that they left was their machinery and stunning buildings... :)

--- perfection 

you're forgetting that the forerunner shield worlds protect inhabitants from the Array. The forerunners had at least a handful of these and it is fact that at least SOME forerunners had sheltered in at least one shield world prior to the firing.