There’s been a lot of discussion lately about the decline of Grifball interest and how to reverse the trend, or at least slow the hemorrhaging. One of the most talked about tourniquets is the existence of Grifball in Halo:Reach. While everything at this point remains speculative, the evidence is mounting for Grifball being incorporated into the “definitive” game in the Halo series.

The first hope for Grifball in Reach comes from the insane potential and popularity of Forge. Bungie has encouraged forgers to be ambitious and creative by featuring their work on Bungie Favorites and most recently by hosting the double XP weekend Maption Sack – an entire playlist of slayer and objective games on community-made maps. Bungie also released maps that were created first and foremost for forging, i.e. Sandbox and Foundry. Forge has been confirmed in Reach and where there is Forge, there is the possibility of Grifball.

The next possible hurdle are the tools of the trade – the energy sword and the grav hammer. Anyone who has read the Reach book knows that Elite, and therefore Covenant energy swords, are in abundance. But what about the Brutes and their hammers? The latest ViDoc comes as close to confirming the existence of hammers as possible short of Bungie coming out and saying it. About halfway through, this image appears:

It begs the question: Why design Brutes if they’re not going to be in the game? Please Bungie, don’t be a tease.

The latest teaser was released yesterday in Bungie’s Weekly Update. Among several other audio clips by Jeff Steitzer (the voice of multi-player) there was this one of him saying, “Grifball”. Other clips included serious phrases such as “you suck” and “cool spawn bro”. Are we being teased or are the guys at Bungie giving us a coy, knowing nod of confirmation?

Additionally, Rooster Teeth announced their Grifball Expansion video on Halo Waypoint. It is rather interesting that RT would choose now to launch a Grifball mini-series, to put those kind of resources into something that is quite obviously on the decline. Is this RT simply trying to give Grifball a boost or maybe a collaboration with their BFF’s over at Bungie in keeping the Grifball hyper alive?

Overall, the prognosis for Grifball in Reach looks positive, although far from certain.