A group of dedicated Halo 5: Guardians players have discovered a secret Mongoose Race Easter Egg in the campaign, over five years after the game initially released. Kart Racing has long been a fun alternative gamemode in Halo custom games, and its inclusion in the Halo 5 campaign comes as a welcome surprise.
In the spirit of the Easter holiday, Game designer Jan Willem Nijman went to Twitter on Sunday to ask game developers what the greatest Easter Eggs were that they ever hid in a game. A litany of responses soon flooded in from developers ranging from the indie scene to the AAA space. Acke Hallgren, an open world level designer on Tom Clancy's The Division, pointed out that he put the four famous Ninja Turtle weapons in different spots throughout the game. Senior level designer at CD Projekt Red Max Pears noted that he named the sexshop Max-mum Pleasure in Cyberpunk 2077 after himself.
In the same Twitter thread, Patrick Wren, a multiplayer designer at 343 Industries, claimed he hid a four-player co-op Mongoose Race in the Halo 5 campaign mission Evacuation that was never found. Players immediately began the hunt to trigger the elusive Easter Egg. After a day of failure, Wren posted a cryptic poem on Twitter written by Halo franchise and narrative writer Jeff Easterling as a hint for the struggling community. It wasn't long before Twitter users ducain23, GamerPeepFreaks, RocketElijah, and rocketslothluke found the Easter Egg during a Twitch livestream. Ducain23 later posted a video tutorial for the Easter Egg on his YouTube channel.
To trigger the Mongoose Race, four players must first load into the sixth campaign level, Evacuation. The difficulty apparently does not matter. As soon as four players load in, they have three seconds to sprint behind the yellow and black line on the ground in front of a gate directly to their right. Groups who make it in time then have to stand behind the line for 117 seconds, the number that coincides with the Master Chief's designation. If the requirements are met, all four players should suddenly spawn on Mongeese at a starting gate, a timer will count down, and the race is on. Enemies are despawned for this section of the mission, and whoever finishes first claims a rocket launcher to help with the rest of the level.
Halo is a narrative-driven franchise, but it is also beloved for its Easter Eggs sprinkled throughout the series that often break the fourth wall in charming and clever ways. Whether it's finding a Brute DJing at a New Alexandria nightclub in Halo: Reach or flying to a skyscraper for a Scarab Gun in Halo 2, players can always look forward to discovering secrets tucked away by their favorite developers. It's an exciting prospect for fans that Easter Eggs are still being found in a Halo 5, a game that launched in 2015. Determined players will likely find a new set of Easter Eggs when Halo Infinite launches later this year.
Source: Patrick Wren, Ducain23