Grifball Phenomenon

Halo 3 is one of the first games out there to offer a wide range of custom games and custom maps to players and to do it effectively. Just recently a custom gametype has taken hold in the Halo online community. Grifball is a very simple game. It's just a neutral bomb assault variant in an open room map with no objects to use for cover. Weapons available to players are the gravity hammer and the energy sword, both melee weapons.

As simple as the game is, many players have taken to it. Subtle strategies have emerged and those teams who can master those strategies seem to dominate all others. Simple things like learning how to use the shock wave from a gravity hammer can give a team a decided advantage. The designer of the gametype, Rooster Teeth Productions' founder Burnie Burns, even went so far as to organize a league with playoffs and everything for this gametype. Bungie Studios has even setup a whole playlist for just this gametype. Considering the popularity of the gametype I really think Bungie needs to go ahead and make the Grifball playlist a permanent addition to Halo 3's matchmaking lists. So long as the playlist has the popularity it does now, which rivals that of the Team Slayer playlist, it needs to be available to the online community.

Perhaps it will fall out of popularity. Perhaps some other gametype will take hold of the community's attention. Until that happens, this is a playlist that needs to have a permanent place, right alongside the MLG playlist that was recently implemented.