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The act of "ceasing fire" or "standing down" was introduced in the first Halo game. This allowed gamers who were involved in making movies or Machinima able to act as if they were in a holstering position rather than a combat-ready mode.

Halo: Combat Evolved
Firstly introduced in the game, the concept of ceasing fire was not taken as it were of no use. When Red vs Blue series came online in the Internet, it was widely accepted for gamers who started making videos. Within the game, this can be done by moving the viewpoint downwards. Although the user is facing to the ground, other players will see the user in a normal position.

In Halo: Combat Evolved, using a M6D Pistol or a Plasma Pistol would make a nicer appearance. Using a Needler sometimes bends the left arm inwards along with the MA5B.

Halo 2
Seeing that Red vs Blue helped in the Halo franchise, Bungie added a neat feature where the player could simply cease fire or lower their weapon by just holding down on the D-Pad. It will not be shown on the player’s screen but will be seen by others. Shooting, throwing grenades, meleeing, reloading, entering vehicles, dying, or just pressing “down” again will cause the weapon to pop back up. On Xbox Live, the trick can also be performed by exhausting all grenades and holding L once.

In Halo 2, not all weapons can be put into ready position such as dual-wield weapons, Rockets and Energy Swords. The trick will not only work on two-handed rifle type weapons, as when the Brute Shot is lowered, it seems no different. On closer inspection, however, the player's arm is bent slightly and the Brute Shot itself is slightly tilted.

Halo 3
In Halo 3, the feature is still within the game but rather in a button combination. The player can cease fire by pressing and holding the following in order:


 * 1) LB (Left Bumper)
 * 2) RB (Right Bumper)
 * A
 * 1) Left Thumbstick (Crouch)
 * 2) D-pad "down"

Holding the combination together for three seconds and the weapon on your HUD will disappear. Most weapons will go down into the cease fire position, but some will have little or no change, like the Energy Sword, Gravity hammer, Brute Shot, Sentinel Beam, Plasma Cannon, Machine gun turret, and Flamethrower. It will work on the Rocket Launcher, Fuel Rod Gun, Spartan Laser, and duel-wielded weapons, but the player will hold them in an unnatural way.The animation of the rocket launcher,fuel rod,and the spartan will look similar to the animation of the player holding the pistol in Halo:Combat Evolved. If you are dual-weilding, looking up and down will make your hand go in that direction and together or apart respectively and looking left or right will make the near arm go down and the far arm go up. This time, shooting, throwing grenades, meleeing, reloading, picking up support weapons, going into edit-mode on Forge, entering vehicles, or dying will cause the weapon to pop back up. The player would not be able to see his/her weapon but other players would. Also if you cease-fire in Forge upon returning to player mode your weapon will be off your HUD, but you can throw grenades without your weapon coming up onto your screen (your gun disappears. It is a bit like Blind on Halo 2 when you see the shots.) If you were to get in a Mongoose while thats happened and while holding an Assault Rifle and jump back off, the Assault Rifle will not move if you shoot or melee but will do those things.

The Cease Fire position in Halo 3 was first performed in public by Red vs Blue members.

Using the Cease Fire position on any weapon that it works on, then switching to the Energy Sword, will cause the user to see the sword as having a shimmery transparent aura, however other players would see it appear as normal (see Silhouette Sword).

If the player lowers their weapon and then enters a vehicle, when they get out, although the weapon is raised in the player's view, to other players it will still be lowered.

In Halo 3 local Split-Screen, this trick may be a possible method to combat Screen Watching.

Note: This does not work on Xbox Live due to the possibility of exploits, according to Bungie.

There is a group of Halo 3 players who are annoyed that weapon lowering does not work on Xbox Live for Machinima purposes. And as such, created a group called Lower the guns. Stating that many great Machinima groups died after this feature was taken away. This group has done well over the past year since its creation, getting several Machinma groups onboard with the idea of getting weapon lowering possible over Live, as well as over 4000 players contributing to the group. They state that Bungie CAN actually affect the process of online play by getting weapon lowering possible over Xbox Live, via an update.