Ghosts of Halo

The Ghosts of Halo are unidentified and glitched players that spawn out of nowhere on Multiplayer maps. They have been seen in Halo 2 and Halo 3.

Such players tend to behave bizarrely and possess odd features. Among other things, they lack gamertags, do not show up on the scoreboard, and move erratically. They can be hostile if provoked, though some have been known to attack actual players for no reason. On some occasions, they are also invulnerable.

It was once thought that the ghosts cannot be reproduced consistently and are very rarely seen, thus making the reason for their existence impossible to determine. It is entirely possible that no such "ghosts" exist and they are simply hoaxes. However, it has since been discovered that the ghosts are in fact simple to reproduce under the right conditions. Such conditions can be reproduced artificially by overloading a map in Halo: Reach. In previous Halo games, such conditions would be more rare. See Cause.

Cause
Ghosts of Halo are caused by stress on the game engine due to lots of activity going as well as network lag. Under the right conditions, it can cause a single player or multiple players to manifest as ghosts. To the ghost player, they are not aware of what's going on, but to other people it will seem very bizarre. It seems in Halo: Reach you need to overload the map in order to artifically simulate the right conditions for a ghost to manifest. The same rule or some similar condition probably applies to the other Halo games.

Video detailing the exact cause of the ghosts and how to control it.

The more players in the game, the more different the results will be of how the ghost manifests itself.

History
In July 2006, a video was posted on Youtube by a user named "AfRoSaUcE", who claimed that the video was over a year old and was made by Jump Tactic's Anti Noob. The video, taken during an Xbox Live multiplayer match in Halo 2's map Lockout, depicts a white Spartan player jumping around and behaving erratically, and scoring kills that were credited to The Guardians; for the sake of brevity, a full description can be found below.

The video quickly became popular, and speculations were raised that it was some form of mod. AfRoSaUcE denied the allegation, insisting that the phenomenon resulted from some kind of a network problem.

Since the video's first appearance, several new videos have surfaced, each depicting characters without gamertags or running animations, and each exhibiting several Ghost-like traits. However, a number of mods have also surfaced, each providing most, if not all, of these exact traits.

A later video shows a Ghost in Halo 3's map Blackout. The video is described further below.

"Supernatural" Abilities
Ghosts of Halo often possess "supernatural" traits that the normal players don't have, such as,
 * They may not show up on the scoreboard.
 * Their kills are often credited to The Guardians.
 * They can perform tricks and super jumps with ease.
 * They can teleport to any location on the map at any time.
 * They can be docile or aggressive.
 * They never miss when shooting.
 * In some cases, they are invulnerable. Some videos, however, show them being killed.
 * Medals are not awarded when Ghosts are killed. For example, meleeing a Ghost to death will not earn players the Beat Down Medal. This trait is shared with bots on modded maps.
 * They have unlimited ammo and can switch weapons with extreme speed. However, they still have to reload.
 * They may spawn with any weapons, regardless of the weapon sets on map.
 * They can appear during Forge on Local Play, but have also been sighted on Xbox Live.
 * They have no walking animation, turning, or falling animations, and appear to slide along the ground.
 * They do, however, have a jumping animation.
 * They can play as a Spartan, an Elite, or a Monitor (which is a player in Edit Mode on Forge). Spartan "ghosts" are the most common.
 * They can have their own color, even during team games.
 * They are known to be transparent sometimes.
 * They can appear as allies or enemies on the Motion tracker. They sometimes also appear as vehicles on the Tracker or they don't appear on the map at all.
 * They can spawn Forge Objects and equipment out of thin air.
 * They always stay facing in the direction they were when they spawned. When they fire or melee at players, they "snap" to aim at the victim, rather than turning smoothly like normal players; they sometimes "snap" when throwing grenades.
 * They tend to only face the cardinal directions.
 * They have omnidirectional vision, and do not need to look up or down.
 * They can throw unlimited grenades at any angle -- including backwards, allowing them to stick a player standing behind them.

Theories
This is a list of theories to explain the Ghosts of Halo.
 * A hoax, created by the use of Mods and perpetuated by popularity.
 * Extreme lag or some sort of network manipulation/failure, coupled with a player joining the game. That is, the ghost is actually a real player which simply appears glitchy to other players.
 * Possible oversight in map coding, which could explain the spawning of passive ghosts. The Spartan in Autumn is an example of such a technical error, which has been verified by Bungie.
 * Overloading the map can cause "strange" phenomena such as objects randomly disappearing and reappearing; Which players might mistakenly believe was caused by a ghost, particularly if the map was unintentionally overloaded.

Ghost Sightings
This is a list of the verifiable sightings of Ghosts of Halo.

Ghost of Lockout
A video, made by "Anti Noob", uploaded by "AfRoSaUcE", and described earlier in this article, was uploaded to YouTube on July 28, 2006. The video shows two players (Anti Noob and "The Underdogg") playing a Custom Game on Halo 2's map Lockout over Xbox Live.

In the first part of the video, The Underdogg went to go eat, leaving his controller unattended. Anti Noob decided to "jump around" while he waited. As The Underdogg left, Anti Noob crouched and walked into a wall. As soon as he turned around, he saw that The Underdogg had been stuck with a Plasma Grenade. After the resulting explosion occurred, an unidentified white Spartan glided to the corpse and threw another grenade, seemingly without noticing Anti Noob.

The second, third, and fourth parts of the video all show the "ghost" sticking Anti Noob with grenades, with one part showing The Underdogg also being stuck again.

The final part of the video shows Anti Noob fleeing from the ghost. When Anti Noob was eventually cornered, he decided to hide behind a Fusion Core. The ghost glided past him. When Anti Noob shifted to the side to check whether the ghost was still there, he saw that the ghost was right behind the Core. Panicking, Anti Noob backed up behind the Core, accidentally knocking it over. The resulting lack of an explosion allowed the ghost to -- once again -- stick Anti Noob with a grenade.

In the video's description, AfRoSaUcE speculates that the "ghost" was a third player that had been affected by a network glitch. He states that such a network glitch would have prevented Anti Noob and The Underdogg from witnessing all of the hypothetical third player's actions; the third person would have seen himself walking, but the other two players saw him slide. The glitch also gave this hypothetical third player invincibility; some attribute the perfect grenade sticks to the glitch, but (assuming that the "network glitch" explanation is correct) the third player could have just been an expert with grenades.

Ghost of Turf
The Ghost of Turf was filmed by a clan known as "HollywoodHalo". This video is notable, as it shows two Ghosts, each firing at each other (and one of them dying). This contradicts other videos, which show invulnerable Ghosts.

Prior to the Ghosts' appearances, two players (white-armored Spartans) lost connection. The Ghosts seen in this video may have been the result of a network glitch -- two ordinary players, glitched off of the scoreboard and probably unaware of their own ghostly appearances.

Unconfirmed Halo 2 Sightings
There have been numerous other sightings of ghosts in Halo 2, but none are confirmed or have enough evidence to back them up.

Halo 3 Ghosts
The now-disbanded clan "SRDP" claimed to have done extensive research on the Ghosts in Halo 3, and, along with multiple disproven sightings, also claimed to have encountered Ghosts on Sandtrap, Guardian, and Valhalla. A modder on the SRDP's website claimed to have found coding for ghosts on all the mentioned maps as well as on Avalanche, where two ghosts were found, and on Blackout. Of the two Ghosts of Avalanche, one was an Elite wearing Ascetic armor, and the other was a Spartan wearing a Security Helmet.

Another clan, "TGK", does much research on these ghosts. Although they have never found a true ghost, they have found a "half ghost" on Sandtrap.

An older branch on Bungie.net called "FRLN" has supposedly been able to get close enough actually have recorded numerous sightings of rapidly changing Ghosts on Snowbound. Some of their primary researching teams are according to myth trying to actually manipulate the AI, for no known reasons as of late. The lack of information on the reason they are doing extensive research has reportedly led to many theories.

Ghost of Blackout
On April 25, 2008, another YouTube video was posted. This video depicted a ghost on Halo 3's multiplayer map Blackout. Though the ghost was not invulnerable, it did lack a walking animation, gamertag, and scoreboard entry. It appeared to toy with the players; this helps support the theory that the ghosts are actual players, playing as ghosts either via network issues or mods.

Ghost of Sandtrap
Another ghost is discovered on Sandtrap. It takes the form of a pink Spartan carrying a Battle Rifle. Its appearance was short and it merely just stood still for a few seconds. Such a ghost is explainable by the theory that the game coding had a technical glitch and spawned a spartan "bot".

Other Ghost Appearances
Numerous unproven stories of Ghosts in Halo 3 have been told. Valhalla and Sandtrap are supposedly major hot-spots for "ghost activity". On Valhalla, there is rumored to be a Spartan with an Energy Sword that haunts the downed Pelican; this Ghost is the most popular ghost next to the Ghost of Lockout, and it has been the target of many ghost hunts. On Sandtrap, it is said that an orange or yellow ghost haunts the map with a Spartan Laser. The Ghost of Sandtrap is the third most popular ghost.

Minor ghost appearances or "poltergeists" (objects appearing out of nowhere and acting on their own) have also been witnessed. These minor accounts are most likely the results of random and irreproducible glitches, otherwise known as False Ghosts (see below); they could also very well be hoaxes.

Ghost of Forge World
A YouTube video was posted nine days after the games launch, supposedly about a ghost in Forge World. Which FourEyedMonkey has recently revealed was a glitched player. As shown in the video, it does not have a walking animation. However, it does have melee, jumping, reloading animations, and can be killed. It takes the form of a red Spartan in a HAZOP helmet, and behaves very erratically, flying around in monitor mode in random, jerking flight paths, often disappearing for moments at a time. It is highly aggressive; It will relentlessly seek out players, and mercilessly attack them, no matter where they are on the map.

False Sightings
Many bizarre phenomena are attributed to Ghosts of Halo. Most such events, however, are simply the results of random (or even well known) glitches. In some cases, they may be deliberate hoaxes and/or mods -- in fact, nearly everything on this list can be imitated in Forge or with Active Camo.
 * Vehicles moving by themselves.
 * Random grenades, explosions, weapons fire, vehicle fire, equipment activation, and Wraith mortars.
 * Blue flashes, similar to Plasma Grenade explosions.
 * Spartan Lasers firing from out of the ground or from midair.
 * Random fires from Incendiary Grenades that seem to have been thrown from thin air.
 * Random props moving.
 * Ghosts with turning animations or walking animations.
 * Ghosts that show up on the scoreboard.
 * Players that occasionally slide for split seconds.

Trivia

 * The Ghost of Blackout has been featured as a key story piece in a few machinimas.
 * In Halo PC, when playing online, occasionally a player will spawn and not move; they will also be invincible, though they still flinch when fired at. However, they do not always keep their own color, and show up on the scoreboard.
 * In Halo 3 Forge, a player can create a "ghost", or rather a copy of them self, by following these steps. First, set damage resistance to 10%. Forge on any map with shield doors and a ball object (soccer ball or golf ball). Create a small box slightly larger than a soccer ball (forge object) and place the soccer ball or golf ball inside. If the ball is bouncing off the sides very erratically you have built the box the correct size. Walk into the ball and lose your shields. Then, while your shields are still down, rip a turret off of its stand. If done correctly, you will hear a death scream and your body should still be standing up holding no weapon. This is also a way to make "clones" without modding. They don't respawn with the map, and disappear after a while.
 * Similarly, in Halo: Reach, when changing teams or falling to your death, instead of falling over, your body will stay standing up.