The Halo series may be getting back to its ARG antics in the leadup to Halo Infinite, or at the very least it may have a new piece of Cortana to share with you. A keen-eyed fan watching the game's E3 2019 trailer noticed some of the digital noise that appears when Master Chief's systems come online actually included pieces of a QR code. Once put together, that code led to the URL for a sound clip that seems to end with a line from someone who sounds a whole lot like Cortana (the Halo character, not the digital assistant).
This is how I got it, took multiple screenshots of the red bars and put them all together, then I had to make the QR code pic.twitter.com/Rjitz6W2SwJuly 29, 2019
After about 20 to 30 seconds of creepy sci-fi ambience and heavy footsteps, the voice speaks: "This… this is part of me. I don't know why, I don't know how, but it is me." Given how literally scatterbrained Cortana has been since the end of Halo 4, that sounds pretty consistent with her character. Spoiler warnings for Halo 5: Guardians, but Cortana isn't on our side any more as she's taken control of Forerunner forces to impose her notion of a utopian future on the universe.
This sound clip could tease her finding something of herself in the Forerunner's massive archives - perhaps showing that she has an unknown place in Halo's eons-spanning history. Or maybe it's another Cortana-model AI finding one of the fragments the other Cortana left behind, which… probably wouldn't be good?
This could just be the start of a series of teasers in the leadup to Halo Infinite, which is scheduled to arrive along with Xbox Project Scarlett in 2020. Is the world ready for another "I Love Bees"? I can only hope we'll soon find out.
Find more games to play in the meantime with our list of the best Xbox One exclusives.
