Microsoft is developing new Halo games right now, and actor Keith David is hopeful Microsoft calls him up to play the Arbiter once more. Across a series of social media posts, David said he’s aware there “may be something new” in the works, but claims he knows nothing official.
“I don’t know any more than all of you. I hear there may be something new and, if so, I’d love to reprise my role as the Arbiter. That’s it. Nothing coded,” he said.
David voiced the Arbiter in 2004’s Halo 2, reprising the role in 2007’s Halo 3 and 2015’s Halo 5: Guardians. He’s also known in the world of video games for voicing David Anderson in the Mass Effect series and as the self-referencial Vice President Keith David in Saints Row IV. This year, David took over for the late Lance Reddick as the voice of Commander Zavala in Destiny 2.
Also on social media, David said he understands if people don’t believe him, but he maintains that he does not know about any future Halo games and has not signed an NDA. Instead, he’s waiting to hear from Microsoft, and went on to say he’d love for one of the new Halo games to be an Arbiter spin-off.
Outside of Halo and video games in general, David is known for voicing the Disney villain Dr. Facilier from The Princess and the Frog, along with his hundreds of appearances for film and TV in projects like Armageddon, The Thing, They Live, and Platoon, among numerous others.
In other Halo voice actor news, it recently came to light that Microsoft was apparently thinking about parting ways with Master Chief voice actor Steve Downes and Cortana actress Jen Taylor for Halo 4. However, Downes said Microsoft decided to hire him and Taylor again after test audiences didn’t like what they heard from the actors hired to replace them.
Earlier this year, Microsoft announced that 343 Industries had changed names to Halo Studios and that multiple new Halo games were in the works and are being made in Unreal Engine 5. None of the games have been announced, though. So far, Microsoft has only released footage from a demo called Project Foundry that aims to show off what is possible with Halo running on Epic’s Unreal Engine.
The latest Halo game was 2021’s Halo: Infinite, which debuted to record-breaking numbers thanks to Game Pass but has since cooled off.
Microsoft’s new Halo leadership is attempting to distance itself from Halo Infinite, saying the way that game was developed represented the “last remnant” of how Halo games were made. “That was our recipe. And what we’re doing right now is changing our recipe,” the studio said about its future projects.
