Future Windows Phone 8.1 users may get the chance to play Master Chief. Well, in their heads at least.
MSFTnerd has word that Microsoft's Siri-rivaling voice companion, codenamed Cortana, will enter beta on Lumia in April, becoming available for "US developers" at that time.
That's interesting enough, but here's the kicker: Jen Taylor, who voiced Halo's AI character Cortana in the game series, will apparently lend her pipes to the smartphone assistant.
We don't know if Cortana will be her sassy self on phones, but the April release lines up with the expected Windows Phone 8.1 update, which in turn matches with Microsoft's Build 2014 conference.
Cortana cometh
According to MSFTnerd, which cited no sources in its report, Cortana's march to other device will continue after spring.
First, it will come wrapped in the iPhone Bing app starting in the fall, though only in the US.
Xbox One and Windows PC users will be next, welcoming the assistant in 2015 with the Threshold (believed to be Windows 9) update.
After that, it seems Cortana will travel to other English-speaking shores through the remainder of 2015 year and into 2016.
Kinect intelligence
The Cortana voice assistant made her first appearance last September as a rumored app, but this is the first time we've heard it was coming to anything other than Windows Phone.
On mobile, Cortana is reported to be a faster way to change settings. The assistant could also be smart enough to anticipate appointments and automatically map out the route to them for users.
These features could easily be replicated and useful on Windows 8.1 computers, but who knows what sort of Kinect integration Microsoft is cooking up for Xbox One.
Even with supposed insider information, we're going to take these rumors with a grain of salt until we hear Cortana on our own Windows Phone devices.
