From “I Love Bees” to “Iris”, the Halo franchise and Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) seem to go hand-in-hand these days — a trend that appears to be continuing with Halo 4, if a recent ad on ESPN.com is to be believed.

Last Friday, a flash ad for Halo 4 begun appearing on the top of ESPN.com’s front page. The ad played a Halo 4 trailer, as one might expect, but here’s where it starts to get strange: after awhile, the ad appears to take over the entire screen, blasting tons of strange information ranging from hexagon symbols to raw code, all in an orange color.

The ad, which can be viewed directly from ESPN’s servers here, already has fans of the Halo franchise and ARGs as a whole talking and working together to try and learn more. As of now, however, nothing significant has been discovered — although that surely will change in the near future.

Halo’s previous ARGs have involved plenty of community interaction and relished rewards for some lucky fans. We’ll have to wait and see what’s ahead for Master Chief, but when more is discovered surrounding this ad, we’ll be sure to let you know. Since the actual ad doesn’t show up on ESPN.com as of now, we’ve included a video of it “taking over” the main page of ESPN.com, which you can view after the break.Read More