http://kotaku.com/5303624/halo-odst-features-an-open-world-reach-could-use-natal-tech

Upcoming Bungie shooter Halo ODST won't be a straight forward linear shooter, rather blending elements of traditional shooters with the open world exploration of Grand Theft Auto, Bungie told he Seattle Times in a recent interview.

"We're doing a lot of pretty neat things in terms of mixing it up, introducing some non-linearity, some free exploration," Staten told the Times. "This is also a mystery story so there's a lot more clue-finding and mystery-solving than you would normally find in a game of this kind - nothing that strays too far from the fun 'Halo' experience, but we definitely decided to take a little bit of risk and have some fun with this one."

ODST allows players to explore the world trying to piece together clues to unravel what happened to the other members of the ODST team. When a player wants to drop into a more straight forward mission they just have to head to specific sites in the city to trigger a flashback, according to the Times article.

The Seattle Times article also touches on the future of Bungie and a bit more on the little known Halo game Reach.

Bungie told the paper that they got an early look at Project Natal. Studio head Harold Ryan said it could be used in "Reach." "I absolutely think 'Reach' could be enabled with it," he said.

Finally, Bungie told the paper that they are in the midst of relocating their offices to downtown Bellevue, Washington. The new offices would be located in the 80,000-square-foot former Galleria multiplex theater.


I think that means they will use Natal otherwise they would have just said no.

well not necessarily Matt

this will stir up soem interest in it. I'm sure that Microsoft told all of its 1st and 2nd party studios to mention natal

Sounds like a solid plan for MS to get Bungie to include functionality for Natal in Reach.

Oh I have no doubt it will be used in many of their exclusive games, even shooters. I can't wait to see if it is just leaning, melee, stuff or if we will actually see something even better!

But...but...Natal is all smoke and mirrors! It can't work!!!! Bungie doesn't know anything, I do, and I say it was all staged!!!!!11one

Lolz. Wonder what they have planned.

it means nothing

this the journalist that asked the question and they didn't want to disappoint so it just saied :

"it COULD"

...

EDIT : hum, they talk about Reach, not ODST, so you can forgot my post ... they have plenty of time to put in it

It would be interesting to see how it would work on Natal control wise.

like someone said already, it would be very interesting to see this in action with Natal.

Great! I don't like Halo at all, but I least I knew why people liked it: a multiplayer FPS with lots of action.

Now that it will become exploratory... I don't know anymore...

I'm much more interested in the free range aspect of ODST than I am the Natal in Reach. The open world aspect might really make it feel like a warzone where you never know exactly what is going to happen where. As for Reach and Natal, I imagine it would just be complimentary use. Voice commands, face recognition, a few motions and maybe some puzzles. I'm trying, but unless Natal comes with some handheld peripherals to make it Wii/PS3 motion thingly like, I just don't see it being that great outside a few specific applications.