Halo for Gizmondo?

You may remember IGN touting a version of Halo for the Nintendo DS, perhaps the most ridiculous dark-stabbing to have emerged last year, trumped only by other sites ripping the news off without credit.

IGN impressively, if misguidedly stood by its claims which now appear to be off target, with the Internet rumour mill claiming Gizmondo wil play host to the Xbox FPS blockbuster.

However, it would seem that the chatter, as far as SPOnG can tell, stems from various mistranslated foreign rewrites of an IGN Gizmondo hands-on piece which, in reference to the deal struck with Microsoft for software support reads, “including -- according to the product's producers but not yet confirmed or, as far as we can tell, in public record -- the rights to do a version of Microsoft's Halo.”

Which means that Gizmondo staffers, at this critical point in the console’s lifecycle, have been claiming they are about to announce a Halo rework.

This sits in contrast with comments made by Bungie several months ago in which the firm stated it had been, “…told Microsoft does have a relationship with the handheld maker, but we can tell you right now the arrangement does not include Halo.”

Of course, this may have changed now but at time of press, nothing has been confirmed, in spite of reports surfacing elsewhere.

One point of note: If the Halo is confirmed for Gizmondo, it will lay the issue of portable Xbox development to rest. To back a machine with its most important game offering ever, Microsoft is doing more that spinning additional revenues for existing IP. It is staking a significant claim on the handheld market.

We’ll bring you clarification as soon as we get it.