New Call of Duty leak says a Halo crossover was headed to CoD: MW3, but never saw the light of day. Could it come to Black Ops 6?

New Call of Duty leak says a Halo crossover was headed to CoD: MW3, but never saw the light of day. Could it come to Black Ops 6?

What you need to know

  • Call of Duty leaker TheGhostOfHope has posted on social media that a Halo crossover for 2023’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was cancelled “for completely unknown reasons.”
  • The report was corroborated by the Call of Duty news site CharlieIntel in another post, in which it revealed it heard the collaboration was planned to come out in 2024 before it was scrapped.
  • Allegedly, the collab would have been an Operator skin of Master Chief — Halo’s main protagonist — similar to the skins of the Spartan that are available in games like Fortnite and Rainbow Six Siege.
  • It’s unclear why the crossover was cancelled, though a plausible theory is that Microsoft chose to save it for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 instead. It’s slated to release later this month on October 25, 2024.
  • Notably, Microsoft now owns both Halo and Call of Duty following the completion of its $69 billion Activision Blizzard acquisition last year.

As a long-time fan of both Call of Duty and Halo, I can’t help but feel a tinge of disappointment hearing about the scrapped collaboration between these two iconic franchises. Back in the day, the rivalry between Master Chief and Soap was the stuff of legends!


Back in the day, Call of Duty and Halo were considered heavyweights in the first-person shooter (FPS) gaming world, going head-to-head like titans. Fast forward to today, and both these giants have found a common home under Microsoft’s Xbox Game Studios roof, thanks to Microsoft’s whopping $69 billion purchase of Activision Blizzard. And here’s something intriguing – according to a recent leak, there was a secret collaboration between these two iconic franchises scheduled for this year that unfortunately never materialized.

This week, a post from Call of Duty leaker TheGhostOfHope on Twitter revealed some surprising news about a collaboration between Call of Duty and Halo that was initially planned for 2023’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 but ultimately got cancelled without any clear explanation. They expressed their amazement by saying, “It’s hard to believe that the Halo x COD Master Chief collab ended up being dropped for MWIII for reasons unknown.” The leaker even shared an artificial intelligence-created mockup of a Master Chief cosmetic on Call of Duty’s in-game store, suggesting that the Halo protagonist would have been featured as an Operator skin within the shooter game.

According to CharlieIntel, which supports TheGhostOfHope’s claim, the collaboration was initially planned to launch in 2024, but for some unspecified reason, it was eventually scrapped. They mentioned this in a recent post.

The two parties involved didn’t provide any reasons for the collaboration being cancelled. They mentioned that they were unaware of the reasoning behind this decision. Some speculate that Microsoft might have postponed it for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, due to its upcoming release on October 25 (available through Xbox Game Pass Ultimate), and as a sequel to 2020’s Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War.

Considering that Black Ops 6 is poised to be one of the biggest games of 2024 and has the potential to be one of its best Xbox games and best PC games, I’d say this theory is pretty plausible. However, it’s also entirely possible that the crossover was shelved for a completely different reason. At the end of the day, we’ll never know for sure why the project was discarded, if it’s still coming, or if it was ever even real at all unless Microsoft or Call of Duty’s developers come forward with statements or an announcement.

11 Halo crossovers have taken place in various games since the launch of the sci-fi FPS series in 2001, with recent appearances of Master Chief in Fortnite and Rainbow Six Siege being notable examples. Given this trend, it’s logical to assume that Microsoft might capitalize on this opportunity by offering Master Chief as a cosmetic microtransaction in the newly acquired, high-earning Call of Duty games.

New Call of Duty leak says a Halo crossover was headed to CoD: MW3, but never saw the light of day. Could it come to Black Ops 6?

Significantly, the leak about Black Ops 6 occurred concurrently with Microsoft’s announcement that it would debut on Xbox Cloud Gaming at launch. Earlier today, they also unveiled new controller designs and console wraps for the Xbox Series X. The controllers are now available in Xbox Design Lab, while the console skins can be pre-ordered for $55 from the Microsoft Store, with shipping scheduled for October 23 – just two days before the game’s release date.

343 Industries, the team behind the popular Halo series, recently made headlines. Not too long ago, they changed their name to Halo Studios and announced that future Halo games will be developed using Unreal Engine 5. This move provides a glimpse into what the iconic franchise could potentially achieve with Epic Games’ technological infrastructure, as demonstrated by the “Project Foundry” tech demo. Simultaneously, Halo Studios unveiled that several new Halo projects are underway, but they declined to provide any additional information about these endeavors.

I can’t wait for the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 on October 25, 2024! It’s going to be available across various platforms like Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Windows PC, PlayStation 5, and PlayStation 4. This time around, it will be a special treat for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers as the game will be accessible on these services from day one! Plus, you’ll also be able to play it through Xbox Cloud Gaming.

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2024-10-16 21:39