While we've already had Microsoft's response to the news of the Halo 2 "leak", Bungie were a bit more restrained, until now. As soon as a mention of the leak came up on the developer's Halo 2 forums, the company came out with all-guns-blazing.
Bungie was quick to speculate on the person responsible for the leak and claims This is almost positively the work of some jerk in the manufacturing plant who pocketed the game as it is being printed in mass for world release on the 9th of November.
The company however has other worries on its mind and seems especially concerned about spoilers reaching the ears of fans of the game. In order to protect its own home and its forums, Bungie used strong language to describe its response. Clearly, this leak is highly illegal. By posting links to where it can be downloaded, or even by posting links to screens of the leaked game, you're contributing to the problem by spreading the leaked information. Further, you may spoil the game for people who have worked hard to keep their first experience of Halo 2 pure.
As such, expect harsh reprimand for the posting of leaked information. A link or offer to give out a link via private media on the forums will get you banned permanently. The same goes for any kind of leak-related spoiler information. Further, you risk having your XBox Live account's ability to play Halo 2 crippled as we can and will ban gamertags from access to vital parts of Halo 2's online experience. We are NOT kidding around here. There will be no warning, no appeal, you'll just be gone.
In fact Bungie is, pretty much, warning most fans of the game off their site, until the game is released since ...we all know that won't stop some idiot from running in here with a screen of some huge spoiler. My suggestion? Avoid Halo 2 forums if you want to make 100 per cent sure that you don't see any major spoilers. If you must visit forums, make sure you're very choosy about which threads you read. Avoiding spoilers is up to you, now.
Bungie were also very eager to let people know that their big partner has a reputation to protect and the machinery to do so There's no doubt in my mind that Microsoft has people tracking down whoever was responsible for this. I hope whoever it was thought that leaking the game was worth his job, I hear the Microsoft legal team employ some very effective ninja.
That in-depth understanding of Microsoft Legal techniques can only come from a company that has worked with them for a while...
Almost a month before its scheduled release, Halo 2 has surfaced on a variety of newsgroups and websites for download. The game, a PAL version with French dialogue, has followed a route taken by many popular games which sees them available for download immediately following the Gold announcement.
Although illegal, this is the fate of most popular games, in recent months The Sims 2, FIFA 2005 and even as I write these lines, Tribes : Vengeance have all found their way to the same websites.
Most developers and/or publishers however, continue to rave on about the successful sales of their titles, with the most recent example being Konami claiming that 1.5 million units of PES 4 were needed for the European launch, even though the game has been up for download for over a week. In some cases the online element of the game is enough to make most gamers buy the original since online play is (usually) not possible in pirated copies. This is always the case when the highly regulated environment of XBox Live is involved.
Even though the emergence of pirated copies is unlikely to do Halo 2 sales any serious damage, Microsoft has issued a very strong-worded comment regarding the available copy:
Microsoft has learned that a version of Halo 2 has been posted to various newsgroups and web sites. We consider downloading this code or making it available for others to download as theft.
We are currently investigating the source of this leak with the appropriate authorities. Pending the result of our investigation, we do not have further comment. Microsoft takes the integrity of its intellectual property extremely seriously, and we are aggressively
pursuing the source of this illegal act.
The launch of Halo 2 worldwide remains unaffected.
