Halo 3 Skull Locations

Hopefully this might help someone who hasn't captured all the skulls yet on Halo 3. There are a total of 13 hidden skulls in Halo 3. There are 9 skulls that are gold and 4 skulls are silver. And there are two unknown skulls or blind skulls that don't seem to unlock anything.

Skulls were first introduced in Halo 2, where picking up a hidden skull in the “Legendary” game difficulty would create an undesirable effect against the player; such as not being able to see anything on their HUD.

In Halo 3, skulls can be found scattered throughout the levels on Normal, Heroic, and Legendary difficulty settings. Picking up “Golden” skulls will also unlock an achievement on the Xbox 360.

After picking up a skull in the game, you can enable the skull’s effects in Meta Games, which will in turn multiply your meta game score.

Overall, Skulls can make for a very interesting play experience, and really help to show who is the Master of the game through meta game scores.

Click here for more details on all 13 hidden skull locations.

Here is also a video on YouTube that shows 13 out of 12 skulls plus the Marathon Man achievement.


Since the YouTube Video doesn't actually show the name of the level the skulls are found on here they are:

Gold Skulls

1. Iron Skull: This skull is located at the very end of the first level, “Sierra 117"
2. Black Eye Skull: This Skull is located in the beginning of the second level “Crow’s Nest”, the very room you start in.
3. Tough Luck Skull: This skull can be found on the third level, at the point in the level when the huge covenant cruiser flies overhead.
4. Catch Skull: This skull can be found on the fourth level, in the first area where you need to destroy the Wraith tanks.
5. Fog Skull: The Fog Skull is found on the level “Floodgate“, at the very beginning of the level.
6. Famine Skull: You can find this skull on the sixth level, near the point where the path you follow branches off into two sections; This skull requires a bit of grenade jumping skill/luck.
7. Thunderstorm Skull: This skull can be found on the level, “The Covenant”, after you take command of one of the Hornet vehicles.
8. Mythic Skull: It is located in the very beginning of the final level in Halo 3.

Silver Skulls

1. Blind Skull: This skull the first of the Silver Skulls in Halo 3, and can be found in the first mission, “Sierra 117″. It is located relatively close to the beginning of the mission.
   After your first encounter with the Gold Armor Brute, Two enemy dropships will appear a bit further down the stream. Go towards the dropship that is furthest away, and stay on the right side of the stream. Continue along the right (towards the cliff edge), and a rock will jut out a bit over the large lake. The Blind Skull is located on this rock.
2. Grunt Birthday Party Skull: This is one of the more fun Silver Skulls in Halo 3. This skull is located on the second mission, “Crow’s Nest”, just before the area where you team up with the Arbiter (it’s the piping area where you see Drones buzzing in and out of an array of pipes). just before you jump down the pipe to meet up with the Arbiter, stop at the ledge, and look directly below you. Along the wall that you drop down, there is a small ledge with a green arrow pointing backwards. Jump onto this ledge (rather than all the way down), and go inside this secret room. The skull is in the dead center of the room.
3. Cowbell Skull: The “Cowbell Skull” is found on the level “The Ark”, and marks the third Silver Skull found in the game. It’s fairly far into the level, so it takes a bit of time to find it. Begin by heading all the way to the part of the level where you battle the Scarab. After defeating it, look in the middle of the desert area which you battled it in for a fairly large structure (it’s the building you see if you are at the bottom of the ramp you are supposed to go up, and turn to look in the opposite direction). Inside of this structure are several Gravity Lifts (shown below). Take one of these for later. Next, head up the huge ramp, and head inside of the building (the one with the cartographer inside). Pass through a few of the rooms in this building, and you’ll eventually come to a room with a whole lot of Explosive crates. Right after this room is a Staircase/Hallway that leads to the level below. The Skull is located at the top of the room, at the point where you turn on the staircase to head for the next part of the slope. There are four platforms above you, the Skull is on the uppermost of these platforms. Use the Gravity Lift to jump up to it, and there you have it!
4. IWHBYD Skull: The Skull is located in the level, “The Covenant”. After defeating the Scarabs, and going inside, get to the location with all 7 Ring Holograms. You must jump through the rings in a specific order. That order is as follows (1 is at the entrance, 7 is at the end): 4 - 6 - 5 - 4 - 5 - 3 - 4 . After jumping through them in this sequence, you will be awarded the “I Would Have Been Your Daddy Skull”. It will be right next to the bridge that brings you over to the Prophet of Truth.

Tyson Green from Bungie.net has confirmed that the Hayabusa, or “Samurai” Helmet is unlocked with the skulls.