Following the shocking leak of Halo 2 code in Europe last week, development studio Bungie has opted to comment on the matter, detailing the team’s thoughts.
“Needless to say we think this really sucks. Aside from years of hard work being stolen from us, we've gone to great lengths to ensure that the details of the Halo 2 campaign remain a mystery for players to experience for themselves on November 9th. Microsoft is currently engaged in a full scale investigation and to those foolish enough to partake in this piracy, you will soon witness the firepower of this fully operational battle station.”
The official notice continues, “Members of the Bungie community - we need your help. The Underground Army is being called into action; this is not a drill. Anyone who has information regarding the leak of the game or individuals or websites promoting the download of these illegal files is asked to please contact us by sending email to piracy@microsoft.com or calling 1-800-RULEGIT. We also ask that you help us minimize the spoilers for those opting to wait for the retail release by refraining from posting screens, talking about the story and deleting any such posts you encounter. Many of you have already been actively tracking down and forwarding links to us and we thank you for your help.”
On the firm’s official board, the stance is a little more outspoken: The horrible leak of the French PAL build of the game, and the impressive, wonderful, heartening reaction from our fans — who have been closing forum threads, slapping posters on the wrists and even reporting folks who broke the law. Community sites are all over it, and the big sites have been helping too, so a HUGE thanks to all of you guys. Whoever did this is a criminal, plain and simple, but this isn't a pulpit from which to spew a sermon. Suffice it to say that stealing a traceable, Live Aware video game isn't the smartest thing you could do. But the way our community rallied to our support yesterday and the day before was incredibly gratifying. And a note to otherwise regular folks who might be tempted to download a copy — don't. It's really not worth the risk. Fines of up to $100,000 and all sorts of other legal remedies can be assessed against even individual downloaders. You know, we're not Metallica. The cost of this is emotional, not fiscal (jerks would just hack and pirate the game on Nov 9th anyway). Bungie is mostly concerned that this event is going to ruin the plot of the game for the 99.9999999999% of fans who buy the game on November 9th. As you know, we've spent three tortuous years preventing story leaks, hoarding screenshots — not because we want to — but because they'll reveal twists and surprises. Now a few jerks have ruined that for everyone. It's one thing to sneakily pirate software — quite another to yell spoilers from the rooftops. As Napoleon Dynamite would say, "IDIOTS!"”