Microsoft has resurrected Clippy, but only in Halo Infinite

Now that Halo Infinite’s second season, Lone Wolves, has launched, players have noticed that Microsoft’s Clippy has made a triumphant return, almost. 

As spotted by James Shield, Xbox’s senior product manager for hardware, on Twitter, Clippy is available as a nameplate and armor emblem titled “Clipster” and a weapon charm more appropriately called “Clippy” so there’s no denying that the upcoming cosmetics are faithfully designed after everyone’s favorite virtual assistant that they love to hate. 

Unfortunately for those who can’t wait to get their hands on these Clippy cosmetics, there’s currently no way to acquire the items in-game, with Halo Infinite only stating that the items are to be “released during Season 2.” Knowing Halo Infinite, this likely means that these nostalgic items will be available in the game’s store as microtransactions. 

Disappointingly, and somewhat remarkably, it currently appears that somehow 343 Industries has neglected to create a Clippy AI to use in-game alongside these unreleased cosmetics, so players will, unfortunately, have to do without the helpful remarks of ‘it looks like you’re trying to earn a Killionaire. Would you like some help with that?’ 

While 343 Industries will undoubtedly earn a fair amount of nostalgic goodwill thanks to this appearance of Microsoft’s Clippy and the launch of Halo Infinite’s second season, the game is still far from perfect in its current state with plenty of bugs and missing features hampering players experience. 

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— James Shields (@shieldsjames) May 3, 2022

After being killed off in 2001 with the launch of Office XP, Clippy has made a few attempts at a revival however Microsoft’s office assistant has yet to return to its former despised glory. Most recently, Clippy appeared once again as a pack of stickers in Microsoft Teams, allowing you to annoy your coworkers with the anthropomorphic paperclip.