Halo 3 and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Halo 3

On September 25th, 2007, Video game developer, Bungie. released the third installment of it’s very popular first-person shooter video game, Halo, exclusively for Microsoft‘s XBOX 360. In it’s first day of sales it took in a record $170 Million dollars and by the end of week one, it had taken in a cool $300 Million breaking all kinds of sales records.

Caught up in the hype and excitement of the game (and the joy from previous incarnations) I decided to splurge on a XBOX 360 and the Halo 3 game, a few days after it’s release. That very night I set up an Xbox Live online account and ended up playing until 5:00am. I was hooked from the very first Big Battle Battle (now called Big Team Social, which consists of two teams of up to eight battling it out in various modes such as Slayer, Capture the Flag, Territories and VIP).

After a couple weeks of some serious game play I began to notice that other people online dressed their characters in a very cool Japanese armor called Hayabusa. A quick googlin’ taught me that anyone could achieve this armor through Easter Eggs (hidden features) throughout the story mode of the game. There are 13 of these Easter eggs in all, in the form of…hidden skulls.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (Spoiler alert)

Indiana Jones came back for a 4th installment of the incredibly successful franchise, based on the fictional adventurer and archeologist who always seems to be chasing a coveted “supernatural” prize, on May 22nd, 2008. This time Indy comes across one of the most intriguing and lesser known (but perhaps more mysterious) artifacts of the so called “supernatural” world, a crystal skull.

Indy’s discovery of the “Macguffin” (a plot device, in this case the crystal skull, that motivates the characters or advances the story, but the details of which are of little or no importance otherwise.) takes him to the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull where they eventually discover a circular chamber tomb filled with thirteen crystal skeletons, with one missing a skull.

In all, there are 13 crystal skulls.

I find it more than a coincidence, some would use Carl Jung’s term synchronicity, that these two highly successful and non-collaborative projects would not only have an element regarding skulls in their storylines. But that they would both incorporate the same number of skulls, thirteen.

At the moment, I'm not truly sure what the significance of the thirteen is in regards to skulls. I hope to find out in time.