Remington 870 still in production in the 2500's is the most realistic part of this

There’s an implication here that 530 years into our future, Ian will still be making videos.

Ian: Reviews fictional shotgun from a video game series Also Ian: Plays it serious as a funeral and reviews the gun using lore from the series Absolute lad.

So awesome to learn the history! - We tried asking chief - he knew nothing....just tried taking it from us.

I absolutely not only appreciate Ian's dedication to staying in character, but some of the deep cuts of Halo universe lore he was dropping.

600 years later and Ian still hasn't changed a bit. He truly is immortal

The idea of Ian McCollum, a famous firearm historian, with no ties to video games whatsoever, taking the time to cover, from tip to butt (I hope Garand Thumb gets involved in this as well), a shotgun designed around its fictional counterpart, not only in character, but also to the point of crediting its actual creator as the canonical designer of said fictional counterpart, is special in a way I can't express with words.

"A flood light, or, rather... A light for seeing the Flood with" Not bursting a blood vessel trying not to laugh from that was Ians greatest challenge

The M90 saved my life. I was stationed on Reach, and what was left of my platoon were some of the lucky ones who got evacced. We had a couple guys with M90s who held the chokepoints leading up to the evac bird. Turned anything that came down those tunnels into chum. Neither man made it out. Corporal Karl Josef and Staff Sergeant Sancho Kaggwa. Rest in peace, brothers. Not gone, just redeployed to heaven.

My dad was deployed to several theaters in the war, including Reach. He would say that the shotgun would turn a split chin into an open chin real quick. Never talked much about the war, but every once in a while he would suddenly share some crazy shit.

As a Halo lore fanboy it's absolutely impressive that Ian delivers these lines with his usual professional attitude, made me smirk the entire way through

Wow. He pulls it off with a straight face and in character. Could have been an April fool's joke, but no, he goes with it. Awesome.

Halo and a forgotten weapons crossover? A christmas miracle

Between this and the Fallout 3 AK/Chinese Assault Rifle, we need more crazy yet talented gunsmiths to make fictional firearms into reality if only so that Ian can nerd out on them alongside us and recontextualizing reality into fiction and vice versa

Ah the memories this brings back. I was just out of bootcamp and stationed in east africa during mid 2552 when the Covenant hit. We had to scramble to evac the wounded from the outpost after rigging the facility to blow and I was pulling security with this bad boy. Right before I embarked on the outbound pelican I remember the Chief tapping my shoulder and without saying a word he handed me an MA5C before taking my shotgun. I was sorta relieved because I was way more qualified on that weapon over the shotgun, little did I know the mag was almost empty and I got my ass chewed by PLTSG for losing the weapon I was issued. Good times

It's comforting to know that even 500+ years from now Ian will still be making videos. He can never die because his work is never done.

One of the things we really appreciated about these was the giant iron sights. The helmet link displays weren’t adequately hardened during my first deployments and sometimes the Covenant plasma weapons would resonate on a frequency that would break the connection. Those irons saved my life during my unit’s Irandi IV drop. Feet first, brothers. You know the music.

I love the way Ian makes a video about a fan-made, sci-fi shotgun as serious as his regular videos. He even includes stuff from the lore. I have serious respect for this man.

Ditching the tried and true M90 system for the god-awful Bulldog was one of the worst armament decisions the UNSC has ever made. There was no need to fix what wasn't broke. ... Joking aside, this video is absolutely hilarious and I'm so glad you made it. I would very much love to see more tongue-in-cheek breakdowns of replicated fictional weapons if you can get your hands on them.

Definitely a workhorse weapon. Reminds me of a platoon sergeant I had once. After every confirmed kill he'd growl "You just got Sarged".

I was pointman in my ODST platoon, so I was the designated Shotgun guy. Carried a BR55 SOCOM as my primary and would switch to this gun’s cousin, the M45 for close encounters. That gun saved my life on more than one occasion in New Mombasa.

It is so wild to see where the M90 comes from. Its wild to think that something so old is still in service today in the UNSC.

absolutely love the lore covering why the receiver says Remington 870 😆

Not sure if command would approve of me watching old-school screen media on patrol, but learning about how our service weapons came to fruition is fascinating. It’s almost like I’m looking back in time at some Forgotten Weapons

ForgottenWeapons crossing into video-game universes is like a guilty pleasure. What a great Christmas present. Thank you Ian!

Next thing we know, Ian will be wearing the red cloak, mechadendrites and servoarms of a Tech Priest for a 40k gag. And analyzing a Brazilian homemade gun as an “Ork Shoota “.

I love how Ian stays in character and makes the Halo lore so convincing. Great video Ian!

This is freaking amazing. How he keeps a straight face is beyond me. We're not worthy.

REMEMBER REACH Thanks for covering the weapons that won us the war: it's awe-inspiring to see the tools used by heroes like the Chief up close.

Now I understand why I've seen so many modern weapons that I wouldn't consider forgotten on this show. This is a show from the future.

My brother and I served in the ODSTs during the glassing of Skopje in '47. We were the last of our squad after a botched landing and it was a grueling few days just trying to stay alive. Two things kept us alive; the M45 and the M12 Warthog. I have a few of these I purchased from a surplus sale a while back.

Oh wow…how you wove the actual gunsmith’s life and the creation of this weapon into the narrative lore of Halo was just masterful. This is such a lovely video

My uncle served on UNSC Perugia. He talks about the shotguns often, apparently they were able to tear down an elite's shield in one or two hits, allowing the rifles to effectively dispatch them. Boarding parties loved them to bits.

I inherited my father's M45D Shotgun that he was issued as an ODST during his deployment on Reach. He absolutely loved it and never traded it for anything else. A beautiful weapon, and very fun to fire at the range. Shooting it for the first time is scary at first, but you get used to its insane recoil. Rest in Peace Dad, thank you for being an amazing father, and for your honorable service in the UNSC.

I'd love it if there's any "surviving" examples of the BR-55 prototype (XBR-55) because I think an explanation of the pros and cons of its 9.5x40mm cartridge would be neat to hear Ian comment on. Or just talk about the Battle Rifle itself since it's such an iconic design with an interesting caliber choice. Love the in-universe framing device here and definitely was a fun one to watch!

Good to know that Ian the 6th is still honoring his ancestor by uploading videos

My Grandpa told me how he was there in that final battle. His squad had nearly all been killed. His commanding officer was firing a machine gun from an overturned warthog and he was defending their flank with his shotgun. He always said that the only reason he was able to keep fighting was because The Chief was still in the fight. He kept calling out, "Can you still see him!?" Every "yes" gave him the strength to keep fighting.

Watching Ian struggle to remember the lore fluff for the script but still able to effortlessly recall real weapon details and history is heartwarming. Merry Christmas! :)

Hey Ian! I actually work in the Archive for the Colorado School of Trades, and your video prompted me to go look if our former student left any of his notes behind! Lo and behold, one of his original concept drawings for what I assume eventually became the M90A. The original noted purpose for the placement of the magazine tube was in fact, to allow guys to reload the weapon more reliably in zero G environments, specifically for situations where the ship being guarded loses power.

My grandpa was stationed on reach when the covenant first arrived, he and his platoon retreated to an office of naval intelligence base and held off wave after wave for hours straight with nothing but the M90, covenant never got close. really a game changing weapon. Some gray spartan took it though and traded him an empty plasma pistol. He died 3 minutes later, RIP grandpa.

Ian, you legend. You never broke character right to the end. This absolutely sounds and feels like one of your regular videos.

So I actually watched the development of this gun over the course of a year on a gunsmithing group on FB. Nathan did some incredibly cool work here. Ending up on Forgotten weapons has to be every gunsmith nerd's wet dream

My favorite fun fact about the sight systems on these military long guns is that often the "lit" sights you see in media - wether it be from recruiting drives or just typical footage from the fronts - are actually almost all completely black or un-lit white to the naked eye. It depends on the particular weapon and even individual variants (especially swapped customized by the user), but generally those points don't appear reflective at all in the normal visual spectrum. Rather, integrated HUD systems can track them using their sensors and essentially overlay the colour on them. On some weapons, they are also used like landmarks to help integrated HUD systems that have zoom and aim reticle auto-overlay. Naturally, many civilian versions just have regular lit or reflective coloured sights. If you are ever looking at combat footage and you see one of these guns seemingly with super bright lights but notice the area around the light on the gun isn't reflecting any - that's why. It isn't *actually* a bright light there. It doesn't help that media tends to add in the lights in post when they have footage where it isn't picked up by the recording cameras, to make it look "right" rather than keep it real.

Imagine showing this to your 2007 self

I have never been given such a Christmas gift and likely never will again. The accuracy to the lore and story I got to be added to is something I will carry with me for the rest of my life. While my time at Misriah was short I still hoped the efforts made might do some good. I got called back to jumping feet first into hell, I guess it was where I belonged. I’ve thought about that prototype a lot since then. It was juvenile glee to begin, total obsession to finish, and agonizing revisions to the end. The CAWS program became a bigger foe than the covenant. Swimming in the deep end with stimmed engineers and bumping shoulders with efficiency AI… jumpin’s a lot easier… you wouldn’t see me smile till they fielded the production M90.

The commitment and lore is fantastic

The fact that he is literally treating it as he would any other non-fiction gun is what makes me love these videos

The idea of the Remington 870 still being in production half a millennia in the future is hilarious.

That flood light to see the flood line was simply brilliant.

I carried an M90 when I was stationed in the crows nest during the battle of earth. Came in handy once the covenant assaulted the base, especially because of the tight corridors and closed in spaces of that old bunker complex. Unfortunately for me, I had to hand it over to the Arbiter in exchange for an M6. I wasn’t happy about it, especially considering what his kind had done to us for the past however many years… But I didn’t really have a choice. Desperate times and all that. But since the entire arms room and base were blown up afterwards, I was never issued a statement of charges by my armorer. I guess I lucked out.

“Chief why are you watching Forgotten Weapons” “Learning tactical history sir”

I remember when the Covenant first came to Harvest. I was part of the 446th ODST and we were deployed in a nearby system putting down an insurrectionist rebellion. Some of the first on the scene our shotguns were indispensable when we were just learning how to fight the new enemy. Ill never forgive the Sangheli for those horrible days. Thanks Ian this sent me right back to dropping from low orbit.

No way this is the best Christmas present ever, truly iconic

What ONI doesn't allow Ian to say is that it also is in service due to its ability to rapidly and viscerally destroy the chest cavity and central nervous system of enemies after shields have been depleted. This is especially useful in outbreak areas which is why HAZMAT cores or S4 divisions on Forerunner installations are regularly given weapons such as these.

I got very confused at first when Ian sad: "500 years ago back on WWII" I was like: "Tf is he smoking? What you mean 500 years ago?" But then I got it, absolute Legend, thank you very much for this video!

I remember my classmate making this particular shotgun at school. Never expected a forgotten weapons video to be done in character with it a year later.

I have always been fond of these, but you have to be careful to check the bore before you take one out on patrol. I've come across many examples where the choke was so worn that the shot spread was more than I'd thought could be physically possible. I seen this primarily on old early and pre-war examples that were being stockpiled on many worlds (including Earth and Reach) for refurbishment but got mixed up in the main supply chain in the chaos that prevailed just before (and certainly after) the Fall of Reach. I suspect worn out barrels also made it into the parts supply around this time as well since I've seen guns that looked to be in great shape externally shoot pellets in patterns that were barely useful outside bad breath distances. Sometimes I wonder if this wasn't an accident at all, but yet another attempt by ONI at psychological conditioning, specifically to encourage troops to close distance with the enemy and [MESSAGE QUARENTINED BY ORDER OF THE OFFICE OF NAVAL INTELLIGENCE UNDER UEG CODE 5-138311.132]

He looks so young at age 570!

As a survivor of the Harvest campaign (you will forever be remembered, may your legacy live on!), this weapon saved my bacon several times... and made mincemeat of one of those Split-lipped bastards, point blank to the face. Still a beautiful beast, one of my buddies gave me his, and we were some of the few surviving battalions of the once beautiful planet Harvest.

I’ve wondered why the spread was different between the M90 shotguns on the Pillar of Autumn and the ones on Cairo Station, and the adjustable choke clarified it.

Don’t forget , Standard manual of arms for this weapon when used in combat suggested one shot to the chest followed immediately by a solid smack with the butt stock

Gun Jesus reviewing one of the most iconic shotguns in gaming history? Very nice Christmas present!

love that you're finally embracing game guns instead of being annoyed about the enthusiasm FPS games bring towards them.

I remember when Forgotten Weapons used to make videos of weapons that existed in the past. Today we have a forgotten weapon that hasn't been made yet. I hope someday we will have extra-physics explanations like how the Needler works and how a cloud of smart-Gas can seek a target.

My uncle enlisted near the end of the war, so he got to use the M90 for a bit in theater. Once the UNSC switched to the M45D, he said it was a massive downgrade and almost every Marine hated it. The older veterans especially.

If any game devs read the comments here: a collab video like this where you get characters to talk about the history and implementation of the weapons in your lore/world would be way too hype. This was delightful

I watched this right after waking up from a short nap, and I can't describe you how it unsettled my mind for a while..

I've been watching FW and playing Halo for over a decade. To see two of my favourite things combined is making my inner child jump for joy.

My grandfather served with this weapon during the Harvest campaign. When I was a kid, the last thing I heard about him was he had been redeployed to Arcadia where he saw some action, only for the ship he was serving on to disappear with all hands after the battle concluded. Rest In Peace gramps.

600 years later and Ian still has the classic pesky mic and flat black table. Absolute class.

Ian may be the first human to figure out how the Needler works if this keeps up

The fact that Ian said the Remington 870 was still being built in 2500 makes me laugh so hard

This is amazing im in a machinist group on facebook and the dude who built this often posted updates. I never would have expected it to make it to this channel that has to be some kind of life goal. Wish i remembered the guys name id go back and congratulate him.

My older brother, a Staff Sgt. in the 105th Shock Troops Division, was deployed as an ODST during the Battle of New Mombasa. He had a fondness for the M90, often joking that all it took was a pump or firing a shell into the air to send the Covenant running. He was brave, with a spirit that could light up any room. Sadly, he never returned home after the glassing. Every day, I miss his laughter, his courage, and his unwavering dedication. Feet first into hell, big bro. Salute o7

Excellent and funny merge of real-world info and in-game lore. As a gun nerd and a halo nerd this video had me smiling throughout.

Honestly I feel like the loading at the top is really appealing for a shot gun- I’d buy one

This and the Fallout 3 assault rifle video shows that Ian can do a better job explaining the in-universe logic and reasoning behind weapon designs than the game devs.

Love how he is talking factually. This ticked me and I found it interesting

The fact that you’re going into halo lore in this video in the style of your normal videos is a real treat for halo fans 👍🏻

“We’ve got a floodlight here… a light to see The Flood”. I’ve never died a little and been elated at the same time before

530 years & Ian doesn't look a day older. That man must have good genes...or he's immortal.

Granddad always told me stories about turning splitjaws into ground beef with his M90 back on Reach. Crazy how such an ancient design still holds its own today.

When I was in New Alexandria as an army trooper, a spartan lieutenant took my shotgun and he(or maybe she, couldn't recognize)... the spartan looked very busy. I hope he survived after the war.

Really appreciate all the attention to detail! Very fun to watch

Ergonomically, top loading worked out a lot better in full kit imo. In prone, on the run, in the hog (yes you'd think people would use the rifle in that case but I've seen it!) Also note that a lot of these ergonomic choices revolved around compatibility with more furnished armor systems like for ODST and Spartans. Hence, trigger guard, pump, and controls might seem needlessly enlarged, but it comes in handy for winter gear, power armor, and also if you're a 7ft tall science project. I didn't really mind, but some of our shorter guys straight up looked like children holding these haha.

Only a matter of time before we see an episode on the BFG-9000.

I absolutely love these videos you do! The UNSC shotguns are all a huge favorite of mine in video gaming gun design. Excellent video as always and Merry Christmas to you!

Just so you guys are aware, 343 Industries have Ian a shoutout in their latest Canon Fodder article. Well done, Ian!

Back in ‘48, the local meridian colonial reserve unit and my army company raided a police departments armoury for weapons. We were near a coastal town named brume-sur-Mer, and at the time our supply line was effectively destroyed. Best we could get was MREs and water, maybe some ammo, like a box or two of 7.62. Very dire situation. Anyway, we found within the armoury some M7s, a couple M392s, 3 MA5Cs (we were issued MA37s, so at best we gained more mags and ammo but the barrels weren’t interchangeable on the account of the 5c having a thicker and heavier barrel.) and like 10 M90s. These we LE variants so they were 12gauge. Now, if we were hunting deer, I’d have been a happy man, but deer don’t have 4 chins and energy shielding. Normally with an 8 gauge, it’d take like 2-3 shells to down a hinge head. 1st shell to burst the shielding, second and/or third to put the sorry bastard down. But with the 12g, it took at least an extra shell, and as we quickly found out, that additional second to rack that extra shell was normally when the sangheili got its bearing back and returned fire. Now don’t get me wrong, anything that wasn’t a brute or split lip, 12g did just fine. But just fine doesn’t cut it when the entity in-which you’re engaging is 8ft tall and very angry that you just shot him. The 8g did wonders for us 2 years later though. When the covvies came back my unit was tasked at one point to clear out a sewer system in one of the major cities. The M90 was wonderful in that operation. 8g alongside a flamethrower and an autorifleman was beautiful to watch in action. We’d find a nesting area and burn it down whilst plugging any ingress and egress points for buggers to swarm us. Didn’t do too bad topside either in the alleyways and crosswalks. With short sight lines and shorter engagement distances, the ability to put up a wall of hot tungsten pellets was unmatched.

Ian, I gotta give you missive props for not only playing up the bit, but being committed to it to not drop the facade and go "*sigh* this is stupid pretending a video game is real, even for entertainment" even gaming youtubers can't muster that a chunk of the time, so kudo's to you for playing your part like a champ :3

This world is awesomely, and wholesomely whimsical sometimes.

The fact that Ian can talk about the future, present, and past so firmly only indicates he can time travel and has fought The Covenant

The guy who made this works at a gun shop around me. Really great guy and very talented. From my understanding, the "blueprints" for this started on an MRE napkin during basic training.

Ian always delivers for Christmas, and this year is no exception. Merry Christmas Ian! What a unique weapon to have on the channel.

This video implies that Remington 870 will stick around for another 500 years. HELL YEAH

The M90 was my best friend back in '52, I'd still take her over anything newer any day too.

I remember during the battle of New Mombasa, due to the close fighting of Urban setting, our battle rifles were fairly usseles... Many brothers were picked up by invisible elites... Thankfully we found a New Mombasa PD weapons depo, and by that point until our evecuation pretty much every squad in the company was half shotguns, half other weapons, very much to the convenant's displeasure

I remember using one of these in the invasion of new Mombasa. I found it on a dead marine and killed my first brute with it. Thanks to the m90 I survived with my family

Floodlight joke was great lol. Merry Christmas and happy new year, this video is amazing and a gift i didn't know i needed

I used one of these beauties back in '47, when I was just a guy pulling security onboard a cargo freighter. Course we never saw combat until the covvies made it to earth, our ship took a bad hit to the left engine so we had to land in Panama to get repairs. Glad to see many others share an appreciation for this firearm. I wish I could've taken mine home.