343, the purveyors of Microsoft's Halo franchise, had the awesome idea of offering some sort of in-game trinket to celebrate Juneteenth, the US holiday that commemorates emancipation. Sadly, 343 somehow named the trinket something really racist.
343 had the cool idea of beginning Juneteenth celebrations ahead of everyone, too bad they seemingly rushed it so hard they didn't even bother reading up on what Juneteenth was about. Turns out it is a celebration of the emancipation of black slaves, so probably something we should be celebrating through a cosmetic named after the Bonobo, which, some apparently don't know, is a kind of ape…
…343 employees state that "Bonobo" is a name given to a toolset used by the company to develop some aspects of the game, so there's the possibility that someone just left it as a placeholder there – for the first time in the company's history, at the one time when it would pose a problem. What a very interesting coincidence. Other anonymous members of the team note that the cosmetic aspects of the game used to be led by a guy who'd left in the previous month, so the terms of his departure may hold some clues into whether or not he would leave such an abhorrent easter-egg behind.
The heads of 343 have all apologized for this situation, but we're yet to get an official statement from the company. It looks like the games aren't the only reason 343 will never measure up to Bungie.
