WTF Bungie?

Halo fans lined up Monday night as Bungie released the third installment of the exciting shooter series. Already, many are keeping late nights and skipping morning classes while they beat the campaign, play with all the new features and, most importantly, kick their friends asses and try to build up their rank online. But in the midst of this fever of special features and 16 player free for alls, two lone soldiers have stumbled upon something that others may have missed.

It was late yesterday night when my roomie and I completed the Legendary Co-op Campaign. Basking in the glorious feeling of having finished the fight, we began watching the film of the final level. While playing with the free-roaming camera, we came across something that threw us for a loop.

The level begins with a walk along a snowy ledge and turns right into a cave. Now alot of players have probably found the first part of this already, but I’ll explain how to get there for anyone who hasn’t. (If you already know what I’m talking about skip to the picture of the yellow terminal and read on from there.) Walk through the cave until you come to point shown here.

Now you’re going to want to break off of the path here and head uphill to your right. You’ll see a small tunnel in the wall. Go through there. If Cortana asks you where you’re going you know you’re in the right place.

This will lead you to a hallway that leads both left and right. To the right, there’s nothing but a drop off. To the left, you’ll come across a terminal that resembles a glowing yellow eye. RB will let you read a sort of cryptic journal entry there. Our best guess so far is that it was written by an older monitor to some other reclaimer. Post other theories if you’ve got ‘em. Keep going to the left, and you’ll find a room that ought to trigger some nostalgia.

Now remember I said that to the right there was nothing but a drop off? Well that’s where things get interesting. While watching the replay we stopped for a moment here and looked around with the free-roaming camera to see if there were any other interesting secrets. We went ahead and scanned through the area to right, the drop off. There was a small alcove on the left and when we looked through there we were surprised to see what looked like the silhouette of a woman in a skirt standing in the far corner.

Upon hitting play again on the replay, we continued to watch the image and saw that it moved up and down constantly as the footage played. We decided this definitely merited further investigation, and immediately replayed the level in an attempt to reach the alcove.

There were alot of failed grenade jumps and crouch jumps before we finally found a way of getting over there. In the middle of the drop off room, there is a small cross piece that you can stand on. It was way to far away to jump, even propelled by a grenade blast. So my roommate stood on my head and I jumped off the ledge. He then jumped off of my head, and was able to land on the cross piece. I re-spawned there with him. From there, if we moved as far to our right (facing the alcove) and as close to the alcove as possible without falling (one foot will be hanging over the edge), we were able to make the jump into the alcove.

We walked into the far corner, and there she was. Only upon firing at the silhouette, we found it wasn’t a girl at all. Or a silhouette for that matter.

Here’s a shot of the object illuminated by the muzzle flare from an SMG.

Why in the world are we seeing what looks like a cardboard cutout of a mostly naked young boy hidden in an almost inaccessible alcove in the final level of Halo 3? And why does he pop up and down as if he’s jumping? You’re guess is as good as mine, but here it is for your befuddlement.

All I have left to say is: Bungie… wtf?