Everyone knows Halo 3 is "the game", the game that the hype machine has latched onto and the game that fans want to be perfect in every way. Being huge Halo fanboys we too want the third in the trilogy to live up to every promise, include every feature, and be the best game that it can be. So, when we hear that not only the rumored four player co-op more than likely won't make it into the game, but any online co-op for the matter we obviously get a little heated and want answers.
You can guarantee that the guys over at Bungie aren't clueless to what the Halo community wants and know that online campaign co-op was expected in Halo 3 and is a feature that fans have begged for since Halo 2's release. So, we just don't see why such a feature wasn't a high priority and can't be implemented even if it isn't a perfect solution. It sounds like Bungie's reason for not including online co-op is because of technical issues due to the possibility that the distance between players in-game can get too great. We have a simple answer for that; do what you did in Halo 2 and "teleport" the player who's lagging behind to the lead player's position. Yeah, it isn't a perfect solution or very "next-gen", but if that's what must be done to give us online co-op then we'll take it. Heck, when playing co-op players are usually fighting side by side anyway, so such teleporting would be minimal. We just want Bungie to know that we'll accept the old-school teleport system if it means we get online campaign co-op.
Will the lack of online co-op ruin Halo 3 and make us boycott the game? Not the slightest chance. But it's one of those things that we all expected and figured would have been important to Bungie. This feature is important to the fans and most of us would be willing to accept the "teleporting" solution if need be as Halo 3 could only benefit from such a feature. We're only hard on you Bungie, because we care and want Halo 3 to be the best. But know we want our Halo 3 online co-op.
We also want to mention that the EGM article that broke this "no Halo 3 online co-op" story was probably written a month or two ago due to the nature of magazines and a lot could have changed since then. Who knows, maybe Bungie has already found a happy balance between including online co-op and still maintaining that Halo feel they were looking for. So, we're just saying that it's possible (although not likely) that online co-op could make it into Halo 3 when it ambushes retailers in September. Our fingers are crossed.
