Halo 3 co-op is offline, for now

"We're not dumb. We know that people want it," Bungie's Frank O'Conner tells EGM. But according to CVG, leaked info from an upcoming EGM article suggests that what we want ain't what we'll get. The development team is still struggling to bring Halo co-op onto Xbox Live. "I think the biggest problem for us for online co-op is that we have a situation where you can be in a Warthog with five troops, almost a mile away from the other player. That's a significant challenge," says Frankie.

Currently, it appears that Halo 3 will ship without online co-op, but supposedly Bungie hasn't ruled out bringing the feature to players through a future update (remember when folks wished for the same for Halo 2?). This doesn't mean that 4-player co-op is any less likely; but, if it does exist, you'll be forced to suffer through it using antiquated split-screen methods (unless you've got a LAN setup). Disappointed? We are; many of us naively accepted Gears' online co-op as surrogate confirmation that Halo's campaign would finally become an Xbox Live experience.

We'll leave you with a few hopeful words from Frankie: "If we can make it happen in a way that works well, we will."

Update: 1UP editor Jeremy Parish weighs in on the controversy; Update 2: Bungie's Frankie says, "like other elements of Halo 3, online co-op is a feature we're wrestling with ... as we approach the tail end of development, we will have a clearer picture of whether or not that online feature will be included."