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March 2009

March 2009 Archived News

News March 31 2009

Dank Bloopers and Bags
naveeda let us know that Dirty Hairy (nee IamDank) put together 'Dank Bloopers and Bags', a collection of funny Halo moments mixed with a bunch of weird clips. 12 minutes long. (Louis Wu 22:03:25 UTC) (permalink)

Prophetic.
Hardcasual brings its journalistic cred to bear on a potentially explosive situation - the humiliation of a sitting Prophet. Will they get Earth glassed, or does Truth have a sense of humor? I guess we'll have to wait and see. Thanks, Bongo. (Louis Wu 21:55:59 UTC) (permalink)

Mythical Mythic Challenge III: Tsavo Highway
Daniel 'Tyrant' Morris provided the Bungie Blog with full details about the next Mythic Challenge - the bare bones are these: you've got 24 hours, this Saturday, to run through Tsavo Highway in 'Mythic' difficulty. The fastest time submitted will win a Mythic Map code. Go read the full rules at Bungie.net! (Louis Wu 21:51:18 UTC) (permalink)

A Prologue to Disaster
Adam Susskind dropped by to announce that he's made an official trailer for his weekly comic, 'Chaos Theory'. It's called 'A Prologue to Disaster', and it gives you a nice flavor of the story beginnings of Chaos Theory. Go watch! Voice work seems to have been done by Christian Bale. (No, not really.) (Louis Wu 21:46:45 UTC) (permalink)

Joe Staten Interview at Halopedia
Over at Halopedia, CommanderTony sat down with Joe Staten to talk about the upcoming Halo 3: ODST. He's coy (as always)... but there certainly are a few new details. (There's a female baddie, for one thing...) Go give it a read! Thanks, UNSC_Trooper. (Louis Wu 21:42:24 UTC) (permalink)

The Shocktage
CaLL Me ZeNy stopped in to mention The Shocktage, a montage from Hemdall, who is French. Gameplay is by GuN Sh0K, and the content is Halo 2. This is old skool... I'd almost forgotten that Battle Rifle. Nice editing! (Louis Wu 21:27:06 UTC) (permalink)

Big Team Battle for Life
Bungie.net's Average Joe series takes a look at Zagwire, a B.net denizen. Go see what he enjoys when it comes to Halo! (Louis Wu 18:44:13 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 Montage 1 from HelplesBunny
urk pointed out a montage from HelplesBunny, featuring a lot of MLG gameplay... you could call this an Extermination Montage, I think. (Louis Wu 17:03:07 UTC) (permalink)

I don't think this wears off.
Hawty McBloggy ran across a pretty cool faceplate/schwag combo on eBay - have you ever thought about an active camo faceplate for your 360? It ain't cheap... but it's pretty unique! (Louis Wu 13:06:50 UTC) (permalink)

Classic
Nexus is Mental grabbed some of Phurion's practice clips, and tried his hand at fancy slow-mo editing. The end result is pretty nice! Check out Classic. (Louis Wu 13:05:36 UTC) (permalink)

HBO News Widget Updated
terminator182 stopped by with news of updates to the HBO News Widget he's built for the Mac OSX Dashboard. It's a convenient way to get your fix of our news! (Louis Wu 12:58:42 UTC) (permalink)

Luke Mckay's Multi Fun Round II
A crowd of Rooster Teeth fans got together for a second round of multiplayer fun recently - and you can watch the fun from a couple of different sources, thanks to the Bungie Blog. Lots of cool custom Mythic fun! (Louis Wu 12:58:17 UTC) (permalink)

News March 30 2009

Needs Moar Legendary - Status
Congratulations to McCronin29, who was picked by Domino Theory as the winner in the Needs Moar Legendary contest - he gets a nice LIVE code for buying those Legendary maps! Thanks, as always, to Domino for the amazing generosity that keeps these contests funded! (Louis Wu 19:09:33 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Movie Contest Status
Just a quick update: The deadline for submissions to the Mythic Movie contest passed last night, and after cleaning up the uploads folder, we have several dozen valid submissions. Our judges are hard at work watching these as we speak - if all goes well, we'll have winners announced in Friday's Bungie Weekly Update. Stay tuned! (Louis Wu 18:57:35 UTC) (permalink)

Saw Extremity
Gamer720 created an interesting obstacle course he calls 'Saw Extremity'; the video on YouTube shows off what you have to do to complete it (you should read the description for full details). Expect to die a lot. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 18:48:17 UTC) (permalink)

Tag and Release: Mark VI
It's Monday, so there's another Tag and Release feature at Bungie.net - this one looks at 'Mark VI', which turns up some epic shots of your favorite Master Chief. Go see what you can find! (Louis Wu 18:44:30 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Mythic Challenge: Met!
We got word from Daniel 'Tyrant' Morris about the recent Mythic Challenge for the final level of Halo 3 - a number of people were able to finish the level, but it was Quest 4 Mythic's very own Pahat Pojat, with a time of 12:27, that took the crown. That's FAST! Mythic III is coming up this weekend - it'll take the place of the ordinary Monthly Mythic Challenge, and should be more obtainable. Details when we get 'em! (Louis Wu 18:42:18 UTC) (permalink)

No Country For Bad Kids 2
Z let us know that there's a new Dualtage from Leezy and BurN - resolution's great and editing's pretty slick. 13 minutes long, available in a couple of different sizes. (Louis Wu 14:41:07 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 becomes most popular LIVE game... ever.
Multiplayerreport.com has a system whereby they rank Xbox LIVE games by popularity - you get points for being in the top 5 games for any given week. Gears of War has been at the top of their list for a long time, since it went a full year at number 1... but this week, it was passed, by Halo 3. Not bad! (Louis Wu 14:40:29 UTC) (permalink)

Monday Comic Update
Just a small comic update today: The Catfish told the Bungie Blog that 2501 Episode 33 went live on Saturday, and TTL Demag0gue let our forum know that Reclaimer 172 is now up. I guess there were better things to do this weekend than whip up comics! (Louis Wu 14:40:03 UTC) (permalink)

News March 29 2009

When Fans build on Fan Work
Ragnarok pointed out an article at Kotaku about a video worth watching. A couple of weeks ago, we mentioned a fantastic Red Hot Chili Peppers parody by the guys at Palette-Swap Ninja. A fan, usethefork, created a video to go along with that song - and he did an amazing job of matching up the action to the lyrics. (The Palette-Swap Ninja guys LOVED it.) Go watch - it's absolutely worth 6 minutes of your time. (Louis Wu 20:47:35 UTC) (permalink)

MVAA - Fostering Collaboration
ODST Sarge stopped in to announce the Machinima Voice Acting Association forums, a site to find voice actors for your machinimas (or to find projects that want to use you). Not a bad idea! (Louis Wu 20:37:30 UTC) (permalink)

Panos
Jdars whipped up a pair of montages, visible at DeviantART - check out Garage and Thus I Refute Thee. (Louis Wu 20:37:12 UTC) (permalink)

Halopen Halo 3 Clantage
OMGIts Renegade sent word that Halopen's Reclaimer52 has released a Halo 3 Clantage in two parts - you can find Part 1 and Part 2 on Vimeo.com. (Louis Wu 20:36:47 UTC) (permalink)

X - Captesteaser
CROSSFIRE let us know that he's put together a new teaser to test out his HD capture card... go see what you think. (Louis Wu 16:18:59 UTC) (permalink)

HBO Mythic Movie Contest - Deadline Coming Soon!
Just a reminder - the HBO Mythic Movie Contest is accepting entries only until midnight tonight (GMT) - that's less than 8 hours from when this post is being written. If you want to get your content in... now's the time! Update: Firestrorm12 pointed out that the contest page has listed 12 AM PDT - not GMT. Since That's an 8-hour discrepancy, we'll honor the later time - you have until 12:01 AM PDT (which is just under 15 hours from now). (Louis Wu 14:39:47 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 Fails Episode 15
chris10023 was the first to let us know that Halo 3 Fails Episode 15 is online. Definitely some failin' in there. (Louis Wu 14:32:17 UTC) (permalink)

Flaming Ninja Challenge - Met!
Fyrewulff announced the winner of his contest based on pete_the_duck's Flaming Ninja Challenge 3 - congrats, NartFOpc! (Louis Wu 14:31:58 UTC) (permalink)

A Halo Kitty Tattoo? Whoa.
I'm having trouble imagining how I'd explain this tattoo to, say, my grandkids. Thanks, Hawty. (Louis Wu 14:31:37 UTC) (permalink)

Turning an Elite into a Warhammer 40k Statue
Hikaru-119 and a buddy grabbed a Halo Wars figure and made some pretty nice modifications for Warhammer 40k. Check out their work! (Louis Wu 14:31:13 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 Headshots - a Leaderboard
tor desax let us know that he's kicked off a website devoted to comparing your Halo 3 headshots to those of other players. Pretty specific! (Louis Wu 14:30:41 UTC) (permalink)

More Banjo Kazooie Halo Vehicles
Grimlock decided to show off some of his Banjo Kazooie vehicles, as well - Pelican, Sparrowhawk, Elephant. (Louis Wu 14:30:20 UTC) (permalink)

News March 28 2009

Funnier than they ought to be
Red vs Blue made a list of X vs Y classics over at Entertainment Weekly - thanks, Burnie. (Louis Wu 20:08:27 UTC) (permalink)

Hard Justice S2: Episode 1
AvatarAang pointed out that Hard Justice Season 2, Episode 1 is now online - you gotta wonder why Bernard even bothers... but he IS making progress. (Louis Wu 17:15:56 UTC) (permalink)

He needed a weapon.
The weather outside here in New England today is a balmy 65 degrees... but it wasn't that long ago that we had snow on the ground. Hawty McBloggy found a couple of shots of a Master Chief snowman from February... nice! (Louis Wu 17:09:41 UTC) (permalink)

Banjo Plays Halo
Dustbunny27 continues to work on Halo vehicles in Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts - take a look at his output! (Louis Wu 17:09:22 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Pixel Art
Doc Shaftoe has been creating Halo-related pixel art avatars for Gaia Online users, and decided to show 'em off to a different audience. Nice work! (Louis Wu 17:08:57 UTC) (permalink)

OddPods
Looks like McFarlane is getting into the 'cute' market with their Halo toys - check out this announcement for Halo OddPods. (Farther down the page, there's also a gallery of winning entries to their 'show off your Halo helmets' contest - cool shots!) Thanks, InnerRayg. (Louis Wu 17:08:18 UTC) (permalink)

Halopen Pencast 07
Firestorm12 let us know that the Halopen Pencast 07 is up - in honor of its Bungie-relevant number, it focuses on Halo exclusively. You can listen (or grab a copy) at podbean. (Louis Wu 17:07:22 UTC) (permalink)

News March 27 2009

Another Week, Another Update
The Bungie Weekly Update is live (both at Bungie.net, and in our Weekly Update Archive) - go read a wrapup of the week's news! (Did YOU grab that free Mythic code... or was someone faster?) Read it all carefully - there's a new contest in there, doors close Monday. (Louis Wu 23:25:24 UTC) (permalink)

The Rumor Mill is Churning
8bitjoystick.com has a new rumor for you - a new halo product will be announced at the Emerald City Comic Con in Seattle on April 5. In the past, he's been pretty good with rumors... we'll have to see how this one turns out. Thanks, geekinabox. (Louis Wu 21:30:33 UTC) (permalink)

I'm ready for my closeup, Mr. DeMille.
Late... but still Friday. Hawty McBloggy posted a new round of Friday Caption Fun this week - go see what people came up with last week, and then try your hand at captioning this week's... bizarro image. (Louis Wu 19:51:04 UTC) (permalink)

Red vs Blue vs You
A pretty cool Halo 3-related Community Playdate is coming up - April 10, the Red vs Blue team will be online to play with you! Swing by Xbox.com for full details. Thanks, KP! (Louis Wu 18:40:18 UTC) (permalink)

Friday's Video Bonus
A few new movies for you over in the Bungie Blog:

• Master Chief: War - the blood flows like... air. (it's nearly 19 minutes long.)
• Infrared Cruise - this one's actually a downloadable Sandbox-based racetrack, but there's a movie showing how it plays.
• A Friend Montage - playing's always more fun with friends.

Enjoy! (Louis Wu 17:47:43 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Map Pack Review, from TPT
jake108 sent word that the Teabag Prevention Team has posted a full review of the Mythic Maps over at Geekscape - swing by and see what they thought! (Louis Wu 14:25:44 UTC) (permalink)

Howling Steel
jdars1804 thought you should see this pretty cool pic created by CSutherland, over at DeviantART - very nice piece of work! (Louis Wu 14:25:09 UTC) (permalink)

Friday Comic Update
Comic Friday!

• The Catfish let Bungie.net know that 2501 Episode 32 (It's Like Cabin Fever) is live; looks like something might be happening...
• Elnea's been pretty busy over at Halo Action Figure Theater - Episode 163 (Party Crashing) went up late Wednesday (set design continues to become more complicated), and Episode 164 (Lone Wolves) went up early this morning. That fourth wall is getting tenuous...
• TTL Demag0gue stopped in with word of Reclaimer 171 (From the Archives) - a look into the past. (There's also a new t-shirt available, if you're interested.)

Go read! (Louis Wu 14:19:23 UTC) (permalink)

Top 10 Halo 3 Moments of Season 4
Hawty McBloggy pointed out that Anoj has posted Episode 28 of his Top 10 Halo series - this one is the last episode of Season 4, and contains higlights from Episodes 22-27. If you've been following the series, you've seen all these - but they ARE a really impressive group of clips. (Louis Wu 14:16:33 UTC) (permalink)

Bringing your A Game
Zee-V70 was right on the ball yesterday afternoon, pointing out a new Breaking In post at Bungie.net. This one looks at Javier, a Technical Artist/Rigger - go see what brought him to where he is! (Bring a tolerance for baseball metaphors.) (Louis Wu 14:15:16 UTC) (permalink)

Friday's Fan Fiction
Nine new pieces available in today's Fan Fiction update - some of them quite meaty! Check 'em out. (Louis Wu 14:14:15 UTC) (permalink)

News March 26 2009

MS Engineer discusses testing on Halo 3
John Hopson, an engineer with Microsoft Game Studios' Games User Research Group, talked at the Game Developers Conference about the testing that helped shape some of the gameplay in Halo 3. Thirty five separate lab tests, with a thousand game testers, were used to fine-tune how some of the gameplay was presented to consumers. Interesting reading! Check out more at Gamespot. (Louis Wu 21:22:29 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Mythic Challenge
Tyrant, heartened by the success of his Floodgate Mythic Challenge, has reissued the challenge with a new map - Halo. Swing by Bungie.net to read all the details - but the short version says that the fastest Mythic run of that level submitted on March 28 gets a Mythic Map pack code. (Really - read the details; the starting and ending times are pretty important, if you want to be eligible.) (Louis Wu 21:19:23 UTC) (permalink)

This Week In Co-Op: A Boy and His Halo
Marc Allie wrote an article for 'This Week in Co-op' (a column at Co-Optimus.com) called 'A Boy and his Halo'. It's all about getting maximum enjoyment from Halo titles (from Halo 3 to Halo Wars) with his 7-year-old son. Fun pics! (Louis Wu 19:00:31 UTC) (permalink)

Impact: Halo 3 Montage 2
urk highlighted a pretty slick montage from Impact - the credits start just over halfway through, but there's plenty of decent gameplay after that point, so it's not too unreasonable. Most of the gameplay is from the MLG playlist... and the BRs are fast and furious. (Louis Wu 18:48:16 UTC) (permalink)

Double XP Weekend - Rocket Race
Nearly forgot - it's Thursday! That means it's time for another Double XP Weekend to kick off - this week, it's Rocket Race. Get your game on! (Louis Wu 18:36:42 UTC) (permalink)

You give me something I can feel
Retarb1ter built a map called 'Vertigo' which, when used in conjunction with the game type 'Brute Jumper', provides a Halo player with a fun obstacle course that takes you through all three levels of Sandbox. You can see Retarb1ter running through it in this YouTube vid. All hail the Bungie Blog! (Louis Wu 17:40:08 UTC) (permalink)

Is 'Teabag' a vocab word?
Halo as a vocabulary tool? Apparently! (Louis Wu 17:27:02 UTC) (permalink)

The Unlucky Elite 6
Jamie98s is back with another episode of The Unlucky Elite - all he needs now is a Wile E. Coyote mask, and it would be perfect. Absolutely worth watching - fun music, great filming. LOVED the ending. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 17:19:45 UTC) (permalink)

Needs Moar Legendary
Domino Theory is back, with another Legendary giveaway. Same deal as last time: throw your name into the hat, we'll pick one at random, and that person will be able to buy the Legendary maps (and maybe a bit more). You've got until Sunday night - but don't enter twice! (Louis Wu 15:13:23 UTC) (permalink)

Make people happy, they'll make good stuff
One final outtake from Murray's talk can be found over at Kotaku - it's a summary of seven principles that BUngie has adopted towards production, post-Halo, and if you like what you read... they're hiring. (Louis Wu 13:05:52 UTC) (permalink)

Bungie's not done with Halo
Another interesting tidbit from Allen Murray's talk at GDC... Murray said

"Halo 3 took two and a half years to make, and we're still working on it," Murray said. "We'll probably be working on it for two more years."

Most of us had assumed that Bungie was moving on from Halo after ODST was released... but apparently not? Thanks to GrimBrother One for noticing this. Update: Sketchfactor stopped by our forums with a small clarification:

I'd expand on Allen's comment a bit by adding that while we're certainly not planning to walk away from Halo 3, it doesn't necessarily mean we have plans to continue producing new additional DLC, etc.. beyond the release of ODST. We have a team who works on Halo 3 all the time in terms of updating matchmaking, investigating potential exploits and swinging the banhammer as needed. If anything I'd say we're excited to look to the community to carry the torch for new Halo 3 content via Forge and Sandbox further down the road. We've already seen some great stuff and the Mythic maps aren't even widely available yet.

While that doesn't specifically say "we're not working on any Halo-related product releases after ODST", it certainly implies it. (Louis Wu 13:05:01 UTC) (permalink)

Things Left Behind
IGN posted an interesting article recapping some of the stuff Allen Murray discussed at the Game Developers Conference yesterday. Seems Guardian was originally part of a campaign level that was cut for time constraints. Go read the rest of the article for more juicy details. (There's a sizeable thread discussing this article on our forum, as well.) (Louis Wu 13:04:02 UTC) (permalink)

Making a Movie about Halo
Hawty McBloggy sat down to talk to Pete Cooper, the face of the Operation Chastity live action film/Warthog project. Great read! (Louis Wu 13:01:28 UTC) (permalink)

A sad heads-up
According to this message at FileFront, the long-time hosting site will be suspending operations on March 30, 2009. If there are some files that you've been meaning to download... now's the time, they're gone in 4 days. Thanks to Ryan Stone for pointing it out. (Louis Wu 13:00:44 UTC) (permalink)

Alrighty, then
Over at Bungie.net, Sk1ll4xEd points out a clip from 1995's 'Ace Ventura 2' which might trigger some familiarity in Halo fans. (Before you start feverishly typing that this sounds NOTHING like the Halo theme... take a deep breath, realize that for most people a Gregorian chant is a Gregorian chant, and smile along with the rest of us.) (Louis Wu 12:59:50 UTC) (permalink)

Death From Above Top 10 #1
A new Top 10 series has kicked off - this one's known as 'Death From Above' and it highlights kills made from flying vehicles. No voiceover. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 12:59:18 UTC) (permalink)

News March 25 2009

I'm not sure I'd call it SCIENTIFIC, but...
Hawty McBloggy is looking for help to put together a Periodic Table of the Halo Universe - sounds like a cool project! Go see what you can contribute. (Louis Wu 21:06:38 UTC) (permalink)

Community Spotlight: Ready Up Live
Today's Community Spotlight focuses on Ready Up Live, a group of movie-making crazies who want more of your attention. Go read - then check out their files in Bungie Favorites. (Louis Wu 21:06:11 UTC) (permalink)

Dropped Force
Another montage for you, courtesy of the BuBlog... this one's a Jumping montage, put together by Team Mad Hops. These are the kinds of jumps that drive you nuts when the other team tries 'em in Matchmaking... (Louis Wu 16:44:40 UTC) (permalink)

Top 10 MLG Plays, Ep 5 - St. Patrick's Special
B Mc Gann and Static Hazard have put together their fifth montage of MLG Plays - this one is a St. Patrick's Day Special. Thanks again to the Bungie Blog for the heads-up. (Louis Wu 16:37:12 UTC) (permalink)

Click, Boom, Boom (Boom Boom)
What do you get when you put 4 Marines with rocket launchers in the back of your Transport Hog? You get a Domination Cage. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 16:34:33 UTC) (permalink)

Rude Awakening
Bzerker01 wote to let us know that Outpost: Isil Episode 11 is now online.The Elites meet a surprise visitor, who's rather flummoxed by how things have been going. Check it out, in any of a slew of formats. (Louis Wu 14:51:12 UTC) (permalink)

How important are exclusives?
Edge has an interesting analysis piece about exclusive games on the 360 - the Halo IP plays as significant part in the story. (Louis Wu 12:01:43 UTC) (permalink)

Caring about more than the gameplay
Destructoid has an article entitled 'Expanded Universes: Halo, and why I give a damn'. Go see what intrigues the author about the universe outside the games. (Louis Wu 11:59:02 UTC) (permalink)

Comic Wednesday
Wednesday's comics:

• urk informed us that The Catfish has released 2501 Episode 16 - Keep Moving.
• Dennis Powers sent word that Shipwrecked 60 - Dominion - is now online. Be careful what you wake up.
• Bloogyo stopped in with word of the latest Rat's Nest.
• Hawty McBloggy reminded us that ODS Steve 19 - Detour - is up, since it's Wednesday.

Funnies to go with your coffee... Update: TTL Demag0gue stopped in to announce that Reclaimer 170 - Accelerated Losses - is also up. Some funky stuff being reported by ONI...Update 2: According to the Bungie Blog, I guess Chaos Theory Episode 17 is up, too. (Louis Wu 11:58:38 UTC) (permalink)

Luke McKay's Invitational Multiplayer Mayhem
The Bungie Blog highlighted a few films from a multiplayer get-together hosted by Rooster Teeth's Luke McKay. It's a great chance to see some of the fun creations people have come up with in Sandbox, among other things! (Louis Wu 11:58:22 UTC) (permalink)

News March 24 2009

dazawho?
It's Tuesday, Average Joe day at Bungie.net. Up today: dazarobbo. If the name isn't familiar, you probably don't spend a lot of time on the Bungie.net forums. Swing by and read about what makes him Average! (Or not.) (Louis Wu 19:02:14 UTC) (permalink)

Become a Bungie Fan - someone gets a Mythic code!
Bungie's Facebook page is currently at 9,965 fans - they've just posted that they'll post a Mythic Map Pack code when they hit 10,000. Go be one of the last 35 needed! Thanks, Speedhuntr. (Louis Wu 17:09:04 UTC) (permalink)

Running Riot Podcast Live
According to the Bungie Blog, the next Running Riot podcast will be recorded live on March 31, at 9:30 EST. Special Guest is Bryan Simon, Halo Songster Extraordinaire. Swing by their website if you want to be part of it. (Louis Wu 17:00:58 UTC) (permalink)

GI-Joe Halo
Treeskunk's Bzerker01 put together a Halo Wars/GI Joe mashup you might find interesting. Great choice of clips! (Louis Wu 16:14:04 UTC) (permalink)

Flaming Ninja Challenge 3 - Demonstrated
pete_the_duck recorded himself running through his Flaming Ninja Challenge, if you're interested in seeing how this might be done. I'm pretty sure this sort of thing is out of my league... (Louis Wu 16:08:35 UTC) (permalink)

Stuff, Stuff, and More Stuff
Last year, we mentioned a Halo schwag collection owned by Seraph XXVII. He's back... with more stuff. (Louis Wu 16:07:18 UTC) (permalink)

News March 23 2009

Total Bugs in Bungie.net CMS: [CLASSIFIED]
Bungie officially confirmed the release date of the Mythic Map Pack on XBL Marketplace (not that Major Nelson's confirmation wasn't official) - but the REAL reason to read the newspost is because it's chock-full of cool stats about Halo 3 matchmaking to date. Did you know that there are more than 70 million screenshots available on Bungie.net, taken in Halo 3? Or that if you totalled up the running time of all the film clips currently stored on Bungie.net, you'd have almost 750 MILLION seconds of footage? Go read the rest. (There's a reminder about our Mythic Movie contest at the bottom, as well... don't forget, you've got until Monday!) (Louis Wu 22:58:04 UTC) (permalink)

Grifball Matchmaking Highlights - March
mikinater1 put together some matchmaking highlights of the last Grifball Double XP weekend, along with some footage of the new Grifball arena NOKYARD built on the main floor of Sandbox. This one seems to be full of trick plays. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 22:53:00 UTC) (permalink)

HBO Mythic Movie Contest
Check this out:

mythicmoviecontest.bungie.org

What is this, you ask? Simple: it's a new contest looking for fan-made trailers showing off the Mythic maps... with winners getting all sorts of goodies (Recon armor, Bungie Pro for their File Share, extra Mythic codes for friends). The rules are all there - read 'em. Read 'em carefully, because we're going to get a lot of submissions, and I promise you, if we can weed your entry out because you didn't read the rules, we're gonna. (No, we're not mean - we're just doing all of this under a little bit of time pressure, so we can't afford to be flexible.) Make your trailer, upload it to us, and then wait until next week for the results! Do it quick - submissions end late Sunday night/early Monday morning (depending on where you are). (Louis Wu 17:51:06 UTC) (permalink)

Bungle Blag
Good stuff today over at the Bungie Blog:

• americanista123 whipped up a second Bungie Employee Bloopertage - fun (silly) moments culled from Bungie employee fileshares.
• Greenskull and SMG90 shared a machinima they call 'What The...' You'll probably say the same thing if you watch it.
• ooohemgeeeFTW compiled a short montage of footage from the Valentines Day Massacre weekend - fun in HD.
• Today's Tag and Release term is 'Commando'... wow, what pics.

That's it, until urk finishes his coffee... (Louis Wu 17:45:41 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Map Release Date on XBLM: It's Official
If you hadn't been clued in by the postscript on last Friday's Bungie Weekly Update, Major Nelson spells things out for you this morning - the Mythic Map Pack drops on Xbox LIVE Marketplace on April 9, for 800 points. Thanks, onebitrocket. (Louis Wu 14:19:07 UTC) (permalink)

Floodgate Mythic Challenge: Met!
Daniel 'Tyrant' Morris sent word that the Floodgate Mythic Challenge he issued last week was met... by many. Over 100 entries were submitted, with several times around 4:10... but Xd Bud bX pushed past the crowd with a time of 4:06 - faster, even, than any of the current Mythic Conquerer times! For his efforts, Bud gets a Mythic Map code from Tyrant - congratulations! (And remember - the next full challenge kicks off on April 1!) (Louis Wu 14:17:17 UTC) (permalink)

Monday's Comic Update
Lightweight Halo comic update today - just a couple for you.

• Elnea updated Halo Action Figure Theater with #162: Chuck Roast. Now that Norris is down... what's going to happen to the poor little Pokemon?
• TTL Demag0gue stopped by with word of Reclaimer 169: An Offer Refused. Portent doesn't trust Ferial enough to accept gifts...

My guess is, Wednesday's update will be larger. (Louis Wu 14:16:13 UTC) (permalink)

Recon Helmet Renders
spartanx5 stopped in to point out that he's started modeling a Recon helmet - you can see the WIP images over at 3dtotal.com. (Louis Wu 14:14:56 UTC) (permalink)

Have fun, win maps
I was sort of joking about being sad that there were no prizes to give out for pete_the_duck's Flaming Ninja Challenge 3... but FyreWulff stepped up anyway and is offering a 1200 MS Point card to the fastest time submitted to him by midnight Friday. Read his post VERY carefully for rules - it would be no fun to be disqualified because you were careless. This is NOT a bungie.org contest, and we have nothing to do with the prize distribution or winner picking - but we do think it's pretty cool when fans jump in like this. (Louis Wu 14:13:22 UTC) (permalink)

First Person Jumping
You might remember 'Look Before You Leap 2', a wild Halo 3 jumping vid released a month or so ago. Yesterday, urk linked to a pretty cool followup - it's called 'Look Before You Leap 2: First Person View', and it shows the same jumps, but from the viewpoint of the jumper. If you're trying to learn to DO some of these jumps... this is the film for you. (Louis Wu 14:12:34 UTC) (permalink)

News March 22 2009

The Flaming Ninja Challenge 3
Home just in time for one more cool project today - swing by our forum and check out pete_the_duck's 'Flaming Ninja Challenge 3'. I promise you, you've never navigated a Halo 3 obstacle course like this one. I wish we had great stuff to give away to folks who complete this - but we don't, so you'll have to do it for the bragging rights alone. (Those should be pretty amazing, though.) (Louis Wu 22:56:00 UTC) (permalink)

Gone Fishin' (sort of)
No Halo news today - today's a day for travelling long distances to buy a cool birthday present for a teenager. Enjoy your Sunday, play lots of 3 Ball, and we'll be back with some pretty exciting stuff tomorrow. (Louis Wu 13:00:18 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 Fails: Episode 14
Halo 3 Fails, Episode 14, is now live - you can watch it on YouTube, but it uses music that the creator's not happy with. It's also streamable (and downloadable in hi-res for members) at Vimeo, with original music, and downloadable from FileFront. Some great clips this time around. I loved the heat-seeking fail on Valhalla, and the flag offense win on Standoff. Thanks, Chris10023! (Louis Wu 12:37:03 UTC) (permalink)

News March 21 2009

Reality Mistaken
Tommy921 put together Reality Mistaken, a creepy film about a weird dream... that might not be a dream. (Louis Wu 14:40:34 UTC) (permalink)

What The French Episode 2
CaLL Me ZeNy stopped in to announce What The French: Episode 2 - a French 'Halo 3 Fails' with some funny clips. Take a look! (Louis Wu 14:40:06 UTC) (permalink)

Wii Fit outsells Halo 3
Kotaku has a story about the sales of Wii Fit in the US - and how it's exceeded the sales of Halo 3 over their respective lifetimes. (I'm not sure how relevant this is, really; the installed base of the Wii is nearly double that of the 360, and the audience for the two games has a reasonably minimal overlap... but hey, news is news.) Eiii started a thread about it in our forum, if you want to comment. (Louis Wu 14:39:29 UTC) (permalink)

Halo weapons in Deadpool?
Starscream found a page of a Deadpool comic that shows the character holding a pair of Halo-inspired weapons (a Battle Rifle and a Halo 3 pistol). Odd... (Louis Wu 14:39:00 UTC) (permalink)

HBOFFPotW - March 20
A Halo Fan...natic stopped in to let us know that Azrael has written up the latest HBO Fan Fic Pick of the Week - go see what he thought of this week's submissions! (Louis Wu 14:38:30 UTC) (permalink)

Retro Review: Halo CE
RuneOfRed has kicked off a series of 'Retro Reviews' - he's playing older games and seeing how they hold up today. First up: Halo CE. Go see what he thought. (Louis Wu 14:38:02 UTC) (permalink)

Haloramics (a video)
A group of fans dedicated to making Halo panoramas has created a video that shows off a bunch in an HD YouTube vid. Me... I like my panoramas all on one screen, at one time... but if you like pan effects, check this out! Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 14:37:25 UTC) (permalink)

Bungie Weekly Update, March 20: A Mouthful
The Bungie Weekly Update contains lots of tasty info for you this week: hints about Halo 3: ODST's release date (and other release dates), some information about another Sandbox variant that's headed for Matchmaking, information about the Scarab screenshot contest they ran last week, information about a NEW screenshot contest they're running right now (goodies for the winners), info about another secret project which needs your help, results from the Valentines Day Massacre (lots of Recon awarded, awesome achievement names), new Banhammer info, GDC info, and more! Why are you reading this teaser? Go read the update! (You can, of course, read it here in our Weekly Update Archive.) (Louis Wu 01:10:28 UTC) (permalink)

News March 20 2009

Leo would love 'em.
grantix decided to walk around with homemade Halo artwork on his feet - check it out! (Louis Wu 19:07:28 UTC) (permalink)

Top 10 Halo 3 Free For All Kills: Episode 27
Anoj has posted the latest in the Top 10 Halo 3 series - this one focuses on Free for All kills. Some impressive gameplay, when everyone wants you dead! Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 18:58:41 UTC) (permalink)

Human Cortana
JeSteR 343 found a cool piece of art on DeviantART - Cortana, in human form. Check it out! (Louis Wu 14:49:18 UTC) (permalink)

Teabag Prevention Presents: Halo Vol.2 - Sandbox
Jake108 sent word that the newest Teabag Prevention article is up at Geekscape - this one gives you tips for playing on Sandbox. Go read it! (Louis Wu 14:43:47 UTC) (permalink)

Clearly, MRI scan
Hawty McBloggy has returned to her Rorschach Inkblot Test series, since there are new maps to be had. First up... Assembly. What do you see? (Louis Wu 14:41:48 UTC) (permalink)

Hang 'em High - in UT3
Thanks to NeoGAF's Kibbles, who ran across a video of gameplay on a Hang 'em High remake in Unreal Tournament 3. Looks great! (Louis Wu 14:41:16 UTC) (permalink)

Friday Comics
Comic summary for Friday:

• Clefton Twain made a funni about the Game Fuel story we posted recently.
• anthraxgoon told us that X36 Chapter 2 Issue 8 is online, in PDF format.
• The Catfish announced that 2501 Episode 29 (Error) is up - with a new monologue to ponder.
• Elnea posted Halo Action Figure Theater 161 (Duty Before Love) - looks like Chuck Norris gets betrayed!

See you Monday with more! Update: showed up just seconds too late for the update... but TTL Demag0gue let us know that Reclaimer 168 (An Offer Made) is up now, too. (Louis Wu 14:40:48 UTC) (permalink)

New Digs for Bungie?
According to this article in TechFlash, Bungie will be moving offices, from their current digs in Kirkland to a former movie cineplex in downtown Bellevue. As one of the commenters pointed out, this site is a much higher-traffic location... assuming it turns out to be accurate, how will they keep the fanbois out? (Louis Wu 14:40:02 UTC) (permalink)

Noob Indicators, Round 2
finalcutmin stopped in with word of the second episode of 10 Ways to tell if you're a Noob (Halo 3). Make sure you know what sort of equipment you're carrying! (Louis Wu 14:39:34 UTC) (permalink)

Sovereign Episodes 1-3
ODST Sarge let us know that the first three episodes of Sovereign are now up (we mentioned a teaser back in January) - go check 'em out! (Louis Wu 14:37:58 UTC) (permalink)

GameDibs Mythic Contest winner announced (and more)
Ritz let us know that GameDibs has announced its winner for its Mythic Map code giveaway (we mentioned it last week), as well as provided info on new giveaways, in this week's Dibcast - swing by and listen! (Louis Wu 14:28:51 UTC) (permalink)

Where's the Giant Slingshot app?
Bungie put up an official page on Facebook - you can join them as a fan there, if you so choose. Today Facebook, tomorrow... the world. (Louis Wu 14:28:31 UTC) (permalink)

Friday's Fan Fiction
Eight new pieces for you this week in the Fan Fiction section - go read! (Louis Wu 14:27:34 UTC) (permalink)

A team where all players are MVP
Yesterday was Thursday, so it was time for another Breaking In piece at Bungie.net - this week, it's Christian Diefenbach, a Senior Software Engineer. Go see how he got there! (Louis Wu 14:25:49 UTC) (permalink)

My Halo Life: Episode 2
The Cyberline Films guys put together a second 'My Halo Life' collection - the Bungie Blog brought it to our attention. (Louis Wu 14:23:34 UTC) (permalink)

News March 19 2009

No Carney Holes on Desolation...
Dan Amrich, who's one half of Palette-Swap Ninja (a parody band), sent word about Halo ((All I Play-Oh)), a Halo parody of the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Snow ((Hey Oh))". I grabbed a local copy; we'll host this if the site goes down [up now because though the site's up, the song's not -lwu], because it's AWESOME. Go listen. (Anyone giving props to John Frusciante can't be all bad...) (Louis Wu 19:22:20 UTC) (permalink)

Get him off of me!
This Halo 3 Dragon optical illusion is quite cool. (Be sure to check out the blog post for the origin of this particular style of illusion.) (Louis Wu 19:17:01 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars becomes best-selling console RTS (sort of)
LoneRanger 2.5 noticed a press release announcing the fact that Halo Wars has sold 1 million copies. Not bad for three weeks! (The 'Best-selling RTS' claim came with an additional qualification - "on any current generation console." I guess that means there might be a PS2 RTS that sold more...) (Louis Wu 19:11:59 UTC) (permalink)

Bungie Blog Blastacular
Was out this afternoon, came back to a monster collection of material on the Bungie Blog:

• Jamie98s (or Koko98s, as he's known on Bungie.net) has released The Unlucky Elite 5 - that poor dude can't catch a break. Great effects.
• Halo3BigApple whipped up a montage from Mythic map footage - seriously short (it's 1:40 long, and the actual gameplay is less than fifty seconds of that), but nice clips.
• Real Life Halo 3 is a pretty amazing piece of work - the crew at the Granger Community Church put two real players inside a game for some awesome bomb-planting action. Check this one out.
• urk's got word of another Mythic Map code giveaway, this time at The 7th Wonder. Register to win.
• Juggernaut is really short, so its one laugh works out to a decent laugh-per-minute rate. (Not sure what urk saw in this one.)
• 3 Ball is live as this weekend's Double XP Weekend playlist - go earn an achievement or two.
• Greenskull and SMG90 continue their Rube Goldberg-style golf courses - this one actually starts in the Crypt, and ends up in the Sky Bubble.

Aren't you glad urk's looking out for your free time? (Louis Wu 18:50:56 UTC) (permalink)

Lots of Goodies from Kotaku AU
Kotaku Australia is hosting a giveaway in which the top prize is a 360 console, a copy of Halo 3 Legendary Edition, and a copy of Halo Wars Limited Edition. Write a Halo haiku before tomorrow, and you've got a shot. (Well, if you're an Australian resident.) Get to writing! (Louis Wu 11:34:07 UTC) (permalink)

ODST Giveaway
Scotty stopped in to announce that the Virulent Aesthetics blog is planning on giving away a copy of ODST the day it's released - just swing by and add a comment (with your email address), and you'll be registered for the drawing. (Louis Wu 11:30:43 UTC) (permalink)

Friend
The Bungie Blog pointed out a Halo 3 Machinima called 'Friend' yesterday - great music, great camera work, touching story. Go watch! (Louis Wu 11:28:37 UTC) (permalink)

News March 18 2009

Trunks likes you.
Trunks stopped in with three goodies for you: the first is a Half-Life 2 Deathmatch map for which he took inspiration from Wizard and Derelict, the second is some fanart, and the third is a wallpaper created from the Halo Wars artwork we mentioned this morning. Enjoy! (Louis Wu 21:15:26 UTC) (permalink)

Operation Chastity - Warthog build update
Pete Cooper stopped by to announce that there was a new update on the Warthog being built for Operation Chastity - scroll down to 'UPDATE 16th MARCH2009' for full details on the blog. The framework is looking great! (Louis Wu 20:49:23 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 Wheelmen give you more goodies
It's Wednesday, so it's time for another update of Bungie Favorites - this is the second week of material from the Halo 3 Wheelmen. Swing by Bungie.net to read about one of their custom maps! (Louis Wu 20:48:53 UTC) (permalink)

Blocking out the scenery, breaking my mind
The folks at xDead at Dawnx Films wonder if signs have a purpose. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 16:45:40 UTC) (permalink)

A Halo 'bible'... for real?
Hmm... General Vagueness found an old post on ComicMix discussing a comment made by a consultant at the New York Comic Con in 2008. Apparently, a company called Starlight Runner Entertainment was commissioned by Microsoft to create a 'bible' for the Halo universe. There's nothing on Starlight's website about this project, and as far as I know, it's never been mentioned since... it's unknown if it's gone anywhere in the past year. (Louis Wu 16:37:29 UTC) (permalink)

Cover Art - and Halo's Place
Psdtuts put up an article called the 'Top 40 Video Game Covers of All Time' - the three Halo FPS titles came in at #13. Thanks, Tech Artist. (Louis Wu 14:37:41 UTC) (permalink)

Nice Halo Wars Art
Errod stopped in with a really nice piece of Halo Wars artwork - it was used as a cover image for a Danish gaming mag originally, but he managed to get an unmodified version from the magazine's layout editor. Check it out! (Louis Wu 13:06:32 UTC) (permalink)

Dodgy
Scotty stopped in with word of some new Dodgeball variants, built on Sandbox. The pictures look intriguing! (Louis Wu 13:06:03 UTC) (permalink)

Wednesday's Comic Roundup
A summary of the Halo comics released since Monday's update:

• The Catfish came by yesterday with word of 2501 Episode 28 (Trial)
• Dennis Powers told us about Shipwrecked Episode 59 (Emergence) - things look to be heating up
• Adam Susskind let us know that he's released Chaos Theory Episode 16 (Such Bright Darkness) on its standard Tuesday schedule
• Hawty McBloggy passed on word that ODS Steve 18 (Intrusion) is up - the Super comes up with an interesting technique for fighting back
• Bloogyo told us that Rat's Nest Episode 4 4 is live (and provided links to archived material)
• TTL Demag0gue stopped in with word of Reclaimer 167 (Dealmaker), with Ferial paying a visit to Portent.

That's a hefty batch! (Louis Wu 13:04:20 UTC) (permalink)

Game Fuel - Coming Back
When Halo 3 was launched, one of the product tie-ins was Mountain Dew Game Fuel - a cherry-flavored variant of Mountain Dew. Some people loved this - but after the game's launch, the product left the market. According to the Escapist, though, it's coming back this summer... albeit with a World of Warcraft label instead of a Halo 3 label. Hooray for caffeinated cough medicine! (Louis Wu 12:51:52 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Zero - Now with Multiplayer
quququ1 stopped in to announce that the multiplayer functionality of Halo Zero (a fan-made 2D sidescroller) has been enabled; check his post for links on where to download the game, and where to find info about the new multiplayer stuff. (Louis Wu 12:51:23 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Panoramas
Decadence Night visited yesterday to announce that he'd created a bunch of Mythic panoramas - swing by his website to see them! (Louis Wu 12:50:51 UTC) (permalink)

Online 4v4 MLG Objective/Slayer Tourney
Nathan Moeller wrote to tell us that Competitive Video Games is hosting a 4v4 Slayer/Objective tournament, March 21 at 1pm CST. Swing by for more details. (Louis Wu 12:50:15 UTC) (permalink)

The Road to Mythic General
oooh em geee edited a new 'Mythictage' (a montage made from Mythic map footage) - the extra effects are really, really slick. This one's totally worth watching in HD. Thanks to urk for highlighting this! (Louis Wu 12:48:33 UTC) (permalink)

News March 17 2009

Bring out the Helveck, and bring out your best.
It's Tuesday, so it's time for another Average Joe on Bungie.net - and today's victim is Helveck. If the name doesn't ring a bell, swing by and figure out what he's done for you lately. (Louis Wu 18:11:39 UTC) (permalink)

HMB's Video Game March Madness - Round 1
I'm not sure I understand what's going on... but Hawty McBloggy is hosting a 'March Madness' video game tournament (with games competing with each other), and Halo 3 is in the first round, kicking off today. It's up against Street Fighter II - she's got tons of info for you if you want to follow along! (As of this moment, Halo 3 is kicking some butt - 20 votes to zero.) (Louis Wu 18:05:27 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Gameplay for Mythic Maps
Daniel 'Tyrant' Morris let us know that nobody won the extra-long two-week Mythic Challenge in March - so there's a new challenge afoot. This current Saturday, March 21, you'll have 24 hours (from midnight to midnight PST) to complete Floodgate - the easiest Halo 3 level to do on Mythic Difficulty. The fastest time turned in during the time period will win a Mythic Map code. You need to have your results to Tyrant within 24 hours of the end of the contest (ie by 11:59 pm PST on Sunday) in order to be eligible. (And remember... you can always check Tyrant's Mythic Walkthrough here on HBO for pointers on getting through!) Get to practicing! (Louis Wu 17:31:42 UTC) (permalink)

What's out there for Sandbox? Ask Forsaken.
Forge Hub's Forsaken has put together a database of Sandbox Forge creations - swing by and see what you can find! Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 17:14:28 UTC) (permalink)

Montage Mania
It's like it's Montage Day on Bungie.net:

• Pogra celebrated a birthday in January by playing for 24 hours straight - folks dropped in when they could. Clearly, they tried some weird stuff.
• An older 'sticktage' from Bipolar Nick (originally posted in October) made the Blog today.
• "Ooh, Stick You" is a real song. That has nothing to do with Halo. (Well, before now.) Warning: overexposure can be dangerous.

That might be it, for a while... (Louis Wu 17:08:09 UTC) (permalink)

ODST WIP
Tony 'ubald' Marcotte let us know that he's been working on a new ODST render - you can check it out in his gallery here. Don't mess with these guys! (Louis Wu 10:43:58 UTC) (permalink)

Tweet, Tweet
agdtinman says it's on: when he gets to 2x as many Twitter followers as Stosh, he'll post a Mythic Map code. Of course, the downside is you have to follow him on Twitter... Update: Luke has decided to make it a little more interesting... there are potentially LOTS of codes available, if only you'll reject tinman and stosh. Go read the details! (Louis Wu 10:36:12 UTC) (permalink)

Wow... that's just corny.
Hawty McBloggy found a shot on Flickr of a Master Chief created from... canned vegetables. (He's even got a stickydoom plastered to the side of his head, courtesy of Gatorade and some backlighting.) My question is... which of those guys first held a can of creamed corn in his (or her) hand and thought... hmm, I wonder what the Master Chief would look like if I used these? (Louis Wu 10:35:29 UTC) (permalink)

It's Darker.
jdars sent us word of a Wallpaper he'd created, and posted at DeviantART - it's Bungie-focused, but pretty Halo-related. (Louis Wu 10:35:00 UTC) (permalink)

News March 16 2009

Halo 3 Bungie Employees' killtage 3
americanista123 has created a third 'Bungie Employees' Killtage' - this one consists of double-kills, though there are plenty of bigger multikills. (In case anyone hadn't figured out how these are made - he's been snagging clips from employees' fileshares and working with those.) Nice editing, and fun clips! Thanks, urk. (Don't worry about being watched - that's just the money you could have saved with Geico.) (Louis Wu 22:22:50 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Trek - Second Trailer
BlueNinja took the latest trailer for the new Star Trek movie, and added Halo graphics to the trailer soundtrack. Watch them in sequence for maximum effect. Nice work! (Louis Wu 21:48:23 UTC) (permalink)

PT Hosts Halo 3 on the 7s - and offers fudge
kilaM0Mjaro let us know that tomorrow, in honor of the '7' in '17', PraetoriaGuard is hosting a 'Halo 3 on the 7s' event - join in, play Halo for fun, and for a few gamers, there's a chance to win some of kilaM0Mjaro's homemade fudge! (Having received a batch of this in the past, I can say with confidence that it's DEFINITELY worth signing up for.) Full details can be found in this forum post. (You might have to register on the PraetoriaGuard website to be able to see it.) Update: the post is now publicly viewable - you can check what's going on without setting up an account. Thanks, MOM! (Louis Wu 19:01:35 UTC) (permalink)

'Abstemious' just didn't sound right.
It's Monday, so it's time for a new Tag and Release at Bungie.net - this week, the tag is 'Ascetic'. Cool armor, cool pics! Go find more. (Louis Wu 18:28:41 UTC) (permalink)

Halocharts Campaign Challenge: Floodgate
Halocharts.com continues their Campaign Challenge series - now up: Floodgate. It's like Tyrant's Mythic Challenge, but a little easier (and only one level at a time). Check the page for full details, and check Bungie.net for background on the Challenge! (Louis Wu 17:27:56 UTC) (permalink)

Bryan Simon Says Goodbye
Bryan Simon hosted a farewell concert this weekend on Ustream this weekend - if you missed it, it'll be up eventually for rebroadcast. In the meantime, though, Bryan's posted an encore/thank you song, saying goodbye and offering shoutouts to friends and inspirations. We've made it available in mp3 format (3.1 mb), if you'd rather listen than watch (though the Christmas tree in the background is an awesome touch). Thanks to the Bungie Blog for the heads-up. (Louis Wu 17:19:43 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 2 Done Segmented. Really, Really Fast.
Cody Miller stopped in this morning to announce a truly impressive speed run - a segmented full game run of Halo 2 on Legendary, in just over an hour and a half. That's... pretty ridiculous, if you ask me. Check out his post for an explanation of what a 'segmented speedrun' is all about - and what sorts of tricks they employed to set this absurdly fast time. And then follow his links to either watch it online, or download it and watch it on your own computer. Don't forget the bib to catch the drool. Update: this is on Bungie.net now, too. (Louis Wu 13:36:52 UTC) (permalink)

Master Chief shows up at SXSW
The Interactive portion of SXSW (The South by Southwest Music and Media Conference) kicked off this weekend in Austin... and the boys from the 405th were there to celebrate. Swing by and see some funny pics! Thanks, Adam. (Louis Wu 13:23:23 UTC) (permalink)

Monday Comic Summary
Monday's comic roundup:

• The Catfish stopped in Saturday with word of 2501 Episode 27 (Under The Dark Forest).
• Elnea posted Halo Action Figure Theater 160 (Beware the Ides of March).
• TTL Demag0gue stopped by this morning with word of Reclaimer 166 (Arrival).

Light update! (Louis Wu 13:22:16 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 now a Classic
Looks like Halo 3 has been relabeled as a 'Classic' title; according to this story at MCV (in the UK), it's been officially dropped to £19.99 there, and a quick glance at retailers in the US show that its retail price here is in the $35-40 range, as well. Not bargain-bin prices... but definitely cheaper! (Louis Wu 13:18:40 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars Developer Blog Opens
The Halo Wars website has kicked off a Developers Blog (interesting, since the developers have been disbanded), and the first entry is an article about Halo Wars ranks and skill levels. Give it a read! Thanks to Planet Halo for the heads-up. Update: There's also some entertaining reading over at Graeme Devine's personal blog - he calls it fan fiction, but it was written 'to support the story and help the team get the vibe of what it was like to be on "Spirit of Fire".' Thanks, sharpsniper99. (Louis Wu 13:14:00 UTC) (permalink)

Beautiful - A Screenshot Montage
I've never really been a fan of screenshot montages; it never seemed like the right medium for that sort of content. Maybe that's just because I never saw one done in a way that really caught my imagination. MLG Slush sent word that he'd finished a screenshot montage called 'Beautiful', and I must say... it's really, really nicely done. Great shots, great editing. Most of the screens were taken by his brother, Chilaxing, and the overall effect has changed my mind about screenshot montages. (Or maybe it just raised the bar some more.) You can find this at Eve-Films, but he's also put up a copy at WeGame.com, and for those in a hurry, it's available on YouTube. (Louis Wu 12:48:53 UTC) (permalink)

News March 15 2009

What the French, Ep 1
Kral, from Halo.fr, let us know about the first episode of WTF (What the French), a sort of Halo 3 Fails for French players. (Failure is universal, it seems; you might not understand the titles, but the gameplay is pretty straightforward.) (Louis Wu 16:39:08 UTC) (permalink)

I refuse to pun about this.
Hawty McBloggy found what is probably the wrongest custom action figure... evar. Seriously. (Louis Wu 15:10:22 UTC) (permalink)

Halo 3 Fails: Episode 13
The Halo 3 Fails series continues - I'm not sure if they specifically picked some bad luck examples for this thirteenth episode... but many of the 'Fails' are really just awful luck. (Some are totally legitimate failures - the Rat's Nest splatter attempt(s) made me laugh a lot.) Thanks once again to Chris10023 for the heads-up. (Louis Wu 15:09:29 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Bible site kicked off (again)
StrengthInFaith wasn't happy that the Halo Bible site set up last year died... so he's started over. The concept is that only information that's been confirmed as canon will be collected - and all information will be referenced. This is only as good as the community can make it - so if you want it to succeed, stop by and help him out! (Louis Wu 15:08:36 UTC) (permalink)

Marbles Rock.
urk highlighted a couple of 'marble mazes' yesterday - been more than a year since we saw one of these! (Louis Wu 15:06:28 UTC) (permalink)

News March 14 2009

HBO Legendary Map Code Giveaway - Results
We're a little later than we'd planned - but the winner in the HBO: Legendereh contest has been chosen. Congratulations to Boltstriker - Domino picked him at random from the nearly 2500 entries we got. And thanks, Domino! Because of you, all the Legendary-required playlists just got bigger pools! (Louis Wu 20:50:56 UTC) (permalink)

Lawsuit Settled
Last week, we mentioned a story about Microsoft getting sued for patent infringment that involved code that was supposedly used in Halo games. Apparently, the suit has already been settled... neither side is disclosing details, but Microsoft said it was "an amicable agreement", and PalTalk "is quite pleased with the outcome," according to one of its lawyers. Over... and done. (Louis Wu 13:47:56 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic maps reviewed at 360Evolved
360Evolved has a review of the Mythic Map Pack up right now. Always good to get another opinion! (Louis Wu 13:42:39 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Toys for Cheap
InnerRayg pointed out a site that's selling McFarlane figures for some significant discounts - swing by if you're in the market! (Louis Wu 13:40:56 UTC) (permalink)

GameDibs giving away a Mythic Code (and more)
Another opportunity to pick up a Mythic Map code: GameDibs kicked off a contest last week, with a winner to be announced next week - looks like there's still time to register. Swing by for details! (Louis Wu 13:37:42 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Tourney in Pocatello, ID today
314 Tattoos is hosting a fundraiser for Idaho veterans in Pocatello today - Saturday, March 14 at noon. Details can be found in this story. (Louis Wu 13:33:28 UTC) (permalink)

A bunch of Twittered Giveaways
ikillbambis let us know that he's got a Flame Warthog (from Halo Wars), a Mythic Map code, and a 48 hour LIVE code to give away today - he'll be twittering them in random order beginning at 5 pm EST this afternoon. (That's 2pm Pacific, or 9 PM GMT - or adjust to your own timezone.) Be sure to visit at that point for your chance to win! (Louis Wu 13:24:30 UTC) (permalink)

Relic
FireDragon04 sent word of 'Relic' - a Halo 3 short about a mysterious device found buried in the sand. Well-filmed! (Louis Wu 13:23:49 UTC) (permalink)

New Halo Figures from McFarlane
fragclone noticed that Spawn.com has posted up a bunch of pictures of the upcoming Series 5 figures from McFarlane - nice stuff! (Louis Wu 13:22:59 UTC) (permalink)

Wait... Cipher? Who's Cipher?
The Bungie Weekly Update is up, as usual, since it's a Friday night - custom Mythic maps, questions from fans (and answers from Bungie), and a code for at least ONE fast typist. Was it you? As usual, the update is available in our Weekly Update Archive, for those who prefer white backgrounds to black. (Louis Wu 00:00:50 UTC) (permalink)

News March 13 2009

Teabag Prevention Presents: Halo Vol.2 - Assembly
Jake108 let us know that the latest Teabag Prevention feature is up at Geekscape - this one gives you tips on Assembly. Go read 'em! (Louis Wu 17:49:30 UTC) (permalink)

Adam's Podcast 5
The 405th's Adam Grumbo let us know that Adam's Podcast 5 is now live. Master Chief tries to get a date, Adam gets a sculpting tip from Blue Realm's Devin White, and a winner for the Assault Rifle contest is announced (though I can't actually find it). Go watch! Update: this is the video that won the contest. Thanks, Adam! (Louis Wu 17:43:33 UTC) (permalink)

Master Chief Picks up Halo Wars
Biff let us know that a video showing off the Master Chief buying Halo Wars at the Midnight sales event in College Station, Texas is now online. Fun night! (Louis Wu 16:53:06 UTC) (permalink)

Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb
Is it Friday again? I think that means there's another round of Friday Caption Fun over at Hawty McBloggy's. Check out last week's top captions... and come up with something clever for this week's truly bizarre pic. (Louis Wu 16:40:59 UTC) (permalink)

chips, oh delicious chips
This is totally random - but nice and short, and pretty funny. (An extra cookie for those who get the title reference.) (Louis Wu 16:37:21 UTC) (permalink)

Moonlit
Zy1on submitted a three and a half minute montage to the Bungie Blog - it's heavy on the editing, but has some nice gameplay. (I kept looking for synching between the music and the gameplay... but you're gonna have to be happy with the play itself.) (Louis Wu 16:33:53 UTC) (permalink)

I'd wear that.
Remember Bob? JeSteR 343 has made some Facebook flair for him. That's actually a pretty cool button! (Louis Wu 16:27:09 UTC) (permalink)

Edge's Top 100 Games to Play Today
Edge Online listed what they considered to be The Top 100 Best Games to Play Today (it's an abridged version of a full-length article in their 200th print issue) - and across all plaftorms, and all time, Halo 3 pulled in at the number 9 spot. Go check out the whole list! Thanks, LoneRanger 2.5. (Louis Wu 16:25:03 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Map Review from Loot Ninja
Loot Ninja wrote up a review of the Mythic Maps - go see what they thought! (Louis Wu 16:16:23 UTC) (permalink)

Friday's Fan Fiction
Six new pieces are available in the Fan Fiction section this week - some monsters, even. Go read! (Louis Wu 16:14:25 UTC) (permalink)

Friday's Comic Update
It's Friday, so it's time for another Comic update...

• The Catfish let us know about 2501 Episode 26 (Decisions)
• Chronicles of ODS Steve #17 (Onward to Bravo) was up on Wednesday, but we heard about it after the Wednesday update
• Bloogyo told us that there were updates for both Rat's Nest and Vendetta (hopefully, one of these days he'll figure out that actual links to the new comics help people find stuff)
• TTL Demag0gue stopped by with word of Reclaimer 165 (Understanding)
• Elnea updated Halo Action Figure Theater with Episode 159 (My Favorite Sergeant), and her newest figures

The Halo comic world is definitely active! (Louis Wu 16:07:24 UTC) (permalink)

News March 12 2009

Stats, and offices, and video, oh my!
There's a brand-new 'Broken In' article (I guess that's what you get when you talk to someone who isn't BREAKING in at the moment) - this one focuses on Roger Wolfson, the Server Software Development Lead at Bungie. He's the guy that makes stats (and such) work so well on Bungie.net. Go see what got him where he is today! (Louis Wu 22:19:35 UTC) (permalink)

Double XP: Legendary Brawl
It's Thursday, so it's time to start a new Double XP Weekend! This week is a return to Legendary Brawl - 12-player FFA on mostly-DLC maps. Go play! (Louis Wu 19:28:28 UTC) (permalink)

Stab, Stab, Boom
The GrifballHub.com crew put up 'Pup and Friends - March 2009 Double XP', a video showing Grifball enthusiasts being enthusiastic. Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 17:08:46 UTC) (permalink)

How many light bulbs does it take to kill a Spartan?
Wanna see how silly you can be and still earn achievements? Check out Rooster Teeth's Geoff and Gav as they work on the Tank Dropper achievement. I think there must have been alcohol involved. (Louis Wu 17:04:55 UTC) (permalink)

Alpha Zombie
The Bungie Blog got word of 'Alpha Zombie', a machinima from Ze Royal Viking Productions. It's a bit long (12 minutes, spread out over 2 segments - Part 1 | Part 2 - with about three minutes of credits between them), but it's a coherent story. Give it a shot. (Louis Wu 16:50:31 UTC) (permalink)

New work from Luke McKay
Luke McKay continues to play with Halo images - a couple of weeks ago, he sketched up a great angle on the Master Chief, and today he released a shot done in a new style he's been experimenting with. Pretty nice work! We've added both of these to his Gallery here. Update: Oops, almost missed this Cortana detail of the newer pic. (Louis Wu 12:56:08 UTC) (permalink)

GDC Summary - The Bungie Edition
The 2009 Game Developers Conference kicks off in a little over a week - and here are the Bungie/Halo related presenters:

• Max Hoberman (former Multiplayer Lead for Halo games) has a talk called 'From Bungie to Bootstrapping - Starting an Independent Developer Studio'.
• Allen Murray (Producer, Halo 3) is sharing production challenges in a talk entitled 'Building Your Airplane While Flying: Production at Bungie'.
• David Hunt (Lead Character Rigger) is discussing 'Modular Procedural Rigging'.
• Artist Seth Gibson is participating in a panel on Technical Art Techniques.
• Luke Smith is participating in a panel on Game Design.

There might be more - but the search function isn't nearly as friendly as it's been in previous years. Thanks to Ssparks, over at NeoGAF, for the initial heads-up. (Louis Wu 12:31:56 UTC) (permalink)

This Spartan Life - Coming (Back) Soon!
It's been a while since we've heard from This Spartan Life - but they're coming back! There's a new trailer up on their website, showing off their unique combination of interesting interviews and... well, bullets to the head. Thanks to finalcutmin for noticing! (Louis Wu 12:17:19 UTC) (permalink)

Mongoose Commercial
The Bungie Blog posted a fan-made video showcasing the Mongoose - it's a lot of fun. Go watch it in HD! (Louis Wu 12:17:00 UTC) (permalink)

Expanding the Emotional Universe
Wow. Just... wow. vector40 (who was once a large contributor to our Fan Fiction section) stopped by last night to mention that the textbook being used in a course he's taking on video game structure contains a Halo-based fan-written poem... taken from our Fan Fiction section. In fact, it was written by UNSC Trooper, who's currently on our Story Page staff. Fan Fiction showing up in a textbook on game design... that blows my mind. (Louis Wu 12:16:30 UTC) (permalink)

News March 11 2009

Bungie Blog Bonanza
Went out to buy a new headset for my phone, came back to a batch of new posts on Bungie.net. Lessee here...

• There's a writeup on My Halo Life, a series of montages being put together by a tight-knit community (though they're happy to include your fun clips). Episode 1 is online now.
• There's some news about a final live show coming from Bryan Simon - read it for details on when and where, and what.
• There's a new Community Spotlight on the Halo 3 Wheelmen, including what sorts of fun they're having, along with a new batch of files they like in the Bungie Favorites section. (There's also a 'hogtage' from them.)

That urk... he's a busy one. (Louis Wu 18:43:52 UTC) (permalink)

Pals
Bungie.net moderator Achilles1108 put together a montage called 'Pals' - it's what Halo's all about. Lots of betrayals, lots of cool kills and clutch saves, lots of wtf moments to laugh about with your friends. (The Rat's Nest hog-on-a-bridge clip was way cool.) Streaming and download links can be found in the Bungie Blog. (Louis Wu 16:28:02 UTC) (permalink)

If all these guys joined the Peace Corps...
If all these guys joined the Peace Corps... Okay... this is just silly. Very cool... but silly. Update: this is the same kind of film - a long setup for a well-planned payoff. In this case, it's a suicide instead of a hole in one... but the concept is the same.) (Louis Wu 16:22:33 UTC) (permalink)

Frag a Friend - this Friday
The PraetoriaGuard Frag a Friend series is resurrected; if you're the leader of a fan community, you can use this event to meet leaders of other groups, and play some Halo 3 at the same time. Game night is Friday the 13th, 9 PM ET - read the forum post for details on how to get involved. Thanks, kilaMOMjaro. (Louis Wu 15:24:55 UTC) (permalink)

More Weight
Ascendant Justice took a look at the story of Halo Wars, in their usual extremely detailed style. It contains spoiler for the game; if you haven't experienced it for yourself, you might want to hold off. Otherwise, though - it's a six-page treatise on how well the Halo Wars story fits into the Halo timeline as we know it, and how good a job Ensemble did telling that story. Thanks to mendicantbias00 for the heads-up. (Louis Wu 15:19:12 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars: What's Wrong with Multiplayer?
OXCGN took a close look at Halo Wars, and came up with some ideas that they think would have made multiplayer better. (Louis Wu 15:14:42 UTC) (permalink)

A Mythic Map Code, in exchange for your opinion
That VideoGame Blog is giving away a Mythic Map code to someone who can give them an opinion on a question they've got. Read the rules for full details. (Louis Wu 14:57:10 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars coming up roses
Narcogen found a couple of positive Halo Wars reviews at large site - Spong liked it, and so did Slashdot. (Louis Wu 14:52:57 UTC) (permalink)

Top 10 Halo 3 Exterminations: Episode 26
The Top 10 Halo 3 Series continues with Episode 26 - Exterminations. It's a lot of deaths... thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 14:51:47 UTC) (permalink)

More Halo Wars Concept Art
InnerRayg noticed that the Conceptart.org thread that we mentioned a couple of days ago (with Ensemble-employee-posted concept art for Halo Wars) has been updated with another batch of images, from another artist. Check out page 2! (Louis Wu 14:45:26 UTC) (permalink)

Master Chief Theater 3000: Episode 302
Pyrosmile has uploaded Master Chief Theater 3000: Episode 302 - the rest of the Pillar of Autumn cutscenes are covered in this one. If you're a Pyrosmile member, you can watch outtakes on their website. (Louis Wu 14:41:55 UTC) (permalink)

Wednesday's Halo Comic Update
It's Wednesday, so it's time for a comic update. Here's what we've got.

• The Catfish let us know about 2501 Episode 25 (Communication) - not so good for all involved.
• Elnea updated Halo Action Figure Theater with Episode 158 (Admiral's Choice) - and some entertaining speculation about council members.
• Adam Susskind stopped by with word of Chaos Theory Episode 15 (No Seasons in Space) - 5.4 mb and 23 pages of story goodness.
• Dennis Powers updated Shipwrecked with Episode 58 (Indiscretion Revealed) - sometimes it's better not to know.
• Bloogyo dropped in with word of updates to Rat's Nest - and a new chapter.
• TTL Demag0gue took advantage of the fact that it's Wednesday to update to Reclaimer 164 (Reckoning) - it looks like the Reclaimer is drawing a line in the sand. Er, fire.

That's it for this update - more on Friday! (Louis Wu 14:38:51 UTC) (permalink)

News March 10 2009

Biscuits, gravy, and the Perfect Storm
It's Tuesday, so it's time for another Average Joe interview on Bungie.net. Today's victim is LouieBlack, a driver with H3Wheelmen.com. Go see what makes him go! (Louis Wu 18:14:35 UTC) (permalink)

Halopen Pencast 06
Firestorm12 let us know that the Halopen Pencast 06 is now online - including impressions of the Mythic Maps. Discussion and comments always welcome on their forum... (Louis Wu 18:06:43 UTC) (permalink)

Applied to Life: Capture the Flag
One of my favorite new series is 'Applied to Life' - and they've got a new short up. This one is called 'Capture the Flag', and it proves you can find excitement in the most mundane of activities. I found it on Bungie.net. (Louis Wu 16:06:13 UTC) (permalink)

What's your handicap?
Greenskull and SMG90 spent who knows how long setting up a golf course on Sandbox - just so they could score a ridiculous hole-in-one from the Sky Bubble to the Crypt... with a LOT of stuff in the middle. Stick with the Bungie Blog - it'll post these for you so you don't have to build them yourself. (Louis Wu 16:04:57 UTC) (permalink)

Speed Forging
There's a whole community of folks that have fun building Forged maps as quickly as possible. Check out this video that showed up on the Bungie Blog for an example. (Forget the Forging... that DRIVING is amazing!) Then check out their YouTube channel for more. (Louis Wu 16:02:38 UTC) (permalink)

ForgeHub's Best of Forge: Fall/Winter 2008
ForgeHub has posted their 'Best of Fall/Winter 2008/09' competition - the best of the best, in 16 categories (plus a pair of runners-up in each category) means lots and lots of cool maps to try out! Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 15:49:47 UTC) (permalink)

Ultimate Gamer kicks off tonight
Back in January, we mentioned 'Ultimate Gamer', a reality show focused on gamers competing in a variety of games. According to USA Today, the first episode (with Rock Band 2 being the game of choice) airs tonight at 10 PM on Sci-Fi. We'll mention it again when the Halo episode shows. (Louis Wu 15:44:49 UTC) (permalink)

A Side Note with Paul Shelley Episode 1
Paul Shelley, of Treeskunk Productions, sent us a link to his first Side Note - it's pretty crude, but in the spirit of Dirty Harry, it's not offensive to one particular group - they hate everyone equally. It's as close to an apology for any delay in content from Treeskunk as you're likely to get. (Louis Wu 15:35:47 UTC) (permalink)

RvB: Relocated Part 4
Rooster Teeth has posted RvB: Relocated Part 4 - an old friend returns, and a slow one becomes creepy (well, creepier). Shooting Grifs never gets old... and they're nicely set up for the next series. Thanks, PsycoJoe. (Louis Wu 13:03:46 UTC) (permalink)

A paper rifle takes shape
sbear stopped in with some pics of a pepakura rifle he's building, from a source file he got from the 405th. Great start! (Louis Wu 13:03:14 UTC) (permalink)

Wait... Halo had dial-up communicating?
A company called 'PalTalk' is suing Microsoft for patent infringement on a pair of patents it bought from MPath Interacive; it says that the technology it now has the rights to was infringed upon by the Halo games. According to the article,

Microsoft said it did review the inventions and chose a different path in developing its games. The technology is for an older dial-up method of communicating between computers and "the patents don't cover the way the Halo games work," Pritikin said.

Bungie isn't even MENTIONED in the story. Doesn't sound like it'll go very far - but it's interesting to see what happens when you get big enough to be a target. (Louis Wu 12:35:08 UTC) (permalink)

Lando - First Blood Part II
Lando Griff1n sent word of his second Halo 3 montage - it's called 'Lando - First Blood Part II', and you can read about it (and download it) at Halo3Montage.com. Heavy on the effects, available in both a massive 470+ mb HD version, and a smaller (80 mb) version formatted for iPods - take a look! (Louis Wu 12:32:31 UTC) (permalink)

Inferring games from job listings
Hawty McBloggy ran across a Microsoft job listing for a software development engineer to help build what sounds like a successor to Bungie.net. An "immersive Halo world that follows the dedicated Halo fan wherever they go"? Hmm... (Louis Wu 12:32:12 UTC) (permalink)

News March 9 2009

Legendary Map Code Giveaway
Domino Theory, undaunted by the insane amount of reading he needed to do to pick a winner in the Ask a Rookie contest last weekend, has kicked off ANOTHER contest - this one is for a Legendary map code. All you have to do is enter. Do it only once, and do it before Friday night. Read the page for full details! (Louis Wu 22:58:15 UTC) (permalink)

Just Kazoo It.
Bryan Simon is hosting a contest - cover one of his Halo 3 songs, and you've got a shot at a bag of sunflower seeds, a year of Xbox LIVE, and a spot on his Friends List. What more could you want? Thanks to urk for the heads-up. (Louis Wu 22:38:33 UTC) (permalink)

ODST Speed Painting
urk highlighted a very cool speed painting of a Halo 3 ODST, done by Sean McCoy - I love watching these things, especially when they're done by great artists! (Louis Wu 18:56:40 UTC) (permalink)

M2@F
sniper2477 pointed out a video by Sp00nerism which takes those 'Message to all Friends' messages on LIVE to task. If you're tired of hearing them... well, don't watch this video, because there are a bunch of them here. (Wait, I'm pretty sure that's not the right way to promote this vid...) (Louis Wu 18:34:29 UTC) (permalink)

2
Jamie98s is back to Machinima-making, and this one's a little... different. He's got a full explanation for it - but you're better off watching it, and seeing what you get out of it on your own. It's called '2', and it's available on his site either streaming (via YouTube), or downloadable (from RapidShare). Because we like his work, we're making the downloadable .AVI available from our servers... as well as a QuickTime and a WMP9 version. (All downloadable versions are about 40 mb.) Go watch! (Louis Wu 18:22:09 UTC) (permalink)

Tag and Release: Night
It's Monday, so Bungie's got another Tag and Release feature for you. Today's tag: 'Night'. Did they find some cool pics? You bet your nightvision they did! Go see if you can grab anything better! (Louis Wu 17:45:29 UTC) (permalink)

More Mythic Codes from RUL
Ready Up Live is giving away ANOTHER pair of Mythic Map codes - all you have to do is come up with a good acronym for 'MYTHIC'. Swing by the Bungie Blog for details (or go straight to RUL's contest page). (Louis Wu 17:43:41 UTC) (permalink)

I don't need GPS, because I am the map
skullkruncher13 and patfan8326 put together a Halo 3 rap called 'Halo 3 Rimz'. Some of the rhymes are a little sketchy, but overall they did a nice job! Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 17:40:26 UTC) (permalink)

Hot Chick Sells Halo Goodies
Hawty McBloggy found a life size Halo 2 Master Chief for sale on eBay... being sold by an adult film star. Not sure why that's relevant (except that she shows up in the image pics, with clothing)... but hey, if you're looking for a reason to browse this sort of listing... there you go. (Louis Wu 16:08:24 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars Concept Art
gunluva noticed a post at Kotaku that contains a large collection of Halo Wars concept art. They got it from conceptart.org, where it had been posted by Marco Nelor, apparently an artist with Ensemble who didn't want to see this material lost when the studio doors close. The conceptart.org versions are larger - but I'm guessing the Kotaku bandwidth will last longer. Go look - because some of these pieces are amazing. (Louis Wu 16:02:30 UTC) (permalink)

Comics - and a change
We're going to shift the way we report Halo-related comics; there are simply too many of them to provide a newspost for each. So: every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, there'll be a summary of all releases since the last update. This should keep total comic-related posts to a tolerable level, while still keeping readers informed of updates to their favorite strips. Therefore: comic updates since the last comic update -

• Bloogyo stopped by yesterday with worf of Rat's Nest and Vendetta, two new strips at Halo3Webcomics. Rat's Nest is a comedy, and is 6 strips in. Vendetta is a downloadable PDF-style comic, and is two episodes in.
• TTL Demag0gue announced the release of Reclaimer 163 ("Nodal Disruption") - and things go boom.

Okay, the next comic update will be on Wednesday! (Louis Wu 15:58:04 UTC) (permalink)

News March 8 2009

Halo 3 Fails: Episode 12
chris10023 was the first to let us know about Halo 3 Fails, Episode 12 - but be aware that this is the first episode since Episode six that has earned the Hawty McBloggy seal of approval (she's really happy they've gone back to clips that we all can connect with, and that haven't been totally overdone in other videos). Go watch!@ (Louis Wu 13:56:01 UTC) (permalink)

Better than pie.
Missed this yesterday - and sorry I did. Hawty McBloggy discovered a cake created by a DevianARTist that looks AMAZING. Halo in all its glory... and edible! (Louis Wu 13:55:44 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars Timeline and Backstory
A couple of fans on our forum have provided some help with the Halo Wars timeline - HaLo2FrEeEk transcribed the beginning of the 'Halo Timeline' available in the main Halo Wars game menu, and Bry unveiled a document that contains not only the full timeline, but detailed biographies of the characters, as well. Nice work! (Louis Wu 13:55:20 UTC) (permalink)

More map codes up for grabs
Missed this yesterday - Xbox360Achievements.org is giving away 10 Mythic Map codes - email them with the answer to a relatively simple question, and you're in the running. Thanks, urk. Update: ran across two more. ViP Gaming (a CoD blog) is giving away a code to the funniest ORIGINAL Halo joke - swing by the 360Junkies forum to enter. And Ripten has a code available, as well - swing by to see how it can be yours. (Louis Wu 13:54:53 UTC) (permalink)

News March 7 2009

Str8 Rippin Team Montage
Z wrote to let us know about a Str8 Rippin Team Montage over at Halo3Forum.com. If you can handle the 640 MB HD download... you should grab it. (Watch it at whatever size, if you can't manage the big one - but that one's incredible.) The gameplay (not surprisingly) is amazing, the editing is quite good, and the video quality is to die for. Editing was done by Zola, and the whole thing is just over 11 minutes long. Go watch the pros do what they do best! (Louis Wu 16:59:44 UTC) (permalink)

Deaf Ears
Halo Action Figure Theater 157 went up last night - 'surreal' doesn't do it justice. Go read. (Louis Wu 16:39:31 UTC) (permalink)

Arby 'n' the Chief S3E08 - Cheater
DigitalPh33r has put up a new Arby 'n' the Chief - the Chief decides to try cheating... with disastrous results. Thanks, vlad3163. (Louis Wu 16:39:18 UTC) (permalink)

Here It Goes
The Catfish told us that 2501 Episode 24 is out - go see! (Louis Wu 16:39:02 UTC) (permalink)

Edge's 200 Covers
In celebration of their 200th issue, Edge Magazine whipped up 200 covers. Three of them (starting with 14 in this show) are Halo-related. Thanks, GatchamanUK. (Louis Wu 16:38:46 UTC) (permalink)

Panmanjaro
nomis78 dropped by with a bunch of new panoramas - check 'em out! (Louis Wu 16:38:18 UTC) (permalink)

Superluminality
TTL Demag0gue stopped in with word of Superluminality, a fan fiction that expands the Reclaimer universe. (Louis Wu 16:37:41 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars in 90 Seconds
BlueNinja was the first to notice a piece at GamesRadar that boils the Halo Wars story down to 90 seconds... and reveals a 'spoiler' which would be funnier if so many readers weren't taking it seriously. (Louis Wu 16:36:18 UTC) (permalink)

The Weekly Update: full of maps and jerky
The Bungie Weekly Update went up as expected yesterday - there's a recap of the week, a look at an upcoming Sandbox variation, a Q&A for folks looking to get their maps into Matchmaking, some interesting news tidbits, and some very funny news submissions that didn't quite make the cut. Oh, yeah, and a pair of up-for-grabs Mythic Map codes. (They're both gone.) You can, as usual, check this out in our Weekly Update Archive, if you so choose. (Louis Wu 16:35:48 UTC) (permalink)

United Kingdom Carnage
urk highlighted a montage composed of UK gameplay last night - nicely put together! Go watch. (Louis Wu 16:35:22 UTC) (permalink)

News March 6 2009

RELEASE - rec0's Server app for HCE 1.08
TheGhost sent word about rec0's server administration app - it was originally built specifically for the HIV Clan server, but has now been released to the general public, and will work on any Halo CE 1.08 server. If you run a dedicated server, you want this. (Louis Wu 19:10:12 UTC) (permalink)

Recon Causes Cooties
Bryan Simon has written one last Halo 3 song... all about Recon armor. We're gonna miss these, Bryan! (Louis Wu 19:03:48 UTC) (permalink)

Put your lips together... wait, that's something else
A Bungie.net regular put together a guide to playing Grifball - use it this weekend, in good health! (Louis Wu 19:02:09 UTC) (permalink)

Montage-o-mania
A pair of fun montages culled from the Bungie Blog - Mini Waz put together some nicely timed gameplay on the Mythic Maps, and B1gM4cB1gPimp1n and GOT NO chAncE do some nasty vehicle-based killing in a seven-minute splatter montage. (Louis Wu 19:00:03 UTC) (permalink)

Sandbox in SketchUp, just for you
WhtButterflyLiz went to the trouble of building Sandbox in SketchUp (Google's free 3D modeling program) - so you can plan out your masterpiece before you actually build it. Very nice! (Louis Wu 18:54:07 UTC) (permalink)

Recovery Process
TTL Demag0gue dropped in to announce Reclaimer 162 - a little late, but none the worse for wear. Ferial continues to be an enigma... (Louis Wu 18:05:03 UTC) (permalink)

Legit Gaming PSA
Tommy92L created a PSA to encourage legit gaming... don't boost, kids. (Louis Wu 13:07:28 UTC) (permalink)

Teabag Prevention, Halo Vol.2 - Orbital
jake108 wrote in to say that Geekscape's Teabag Prevention series is back, with Volume 2 - and the first map up is Orbital. Give it a read to see how you can best avoid that unpleasant gesture! (Louis Wu 13:06:57 UTC) (permalink)

Friday Caption Fun, Round 38
Hawty McBloggy continues her Friday Caption Fun series - Round 38 has a Spartan and an unusual pose. The captions from last week's Arbiter/Sarge matchup panned out as expected, for the most part. (Louis Wu 13:06:37 UTC) (permalink)

Carrots and Sticks
This week's Breaking In article at Bungie.net focuses on Chad 'Shishka' Armstrong, a fan who lived the dream and went to work for the company he followed. Go learn more about him! (Louis Wu 13:06:14 UTC) (permalink)

More Mythic Impressions at TGR
TheGameReviews.com has posted their Mythic Map Pack impressions - go see what they thought. (Not sure why the screenshots that go with the article are of Halo Wars...) (Louis Wu 13:05:24 UTC) (permalink)

Gaming Hours
The Gamer Limit decided to figure out what Halo 3 players COULD have done with all the time they used to play Halo 3. (They didn't even do the math right; they guesstimated 5,000 total years of playing time, when Bungie pointed out that the real number was above 64,000.) While it's true that that many man-hours could have put a whole bunch more faces on Mount Rushmore... I'm thinking we're better off without Mario up there. (Louis Wu 13:04:48 UTC) (permalink)

Friday's Fan Fiction
Five new stories up in the Fan Fiction section today - go read! (Louis Wu 13:04:00 UTC) (permalink)

News March 5 2009

If I owned Mombasa
7heSuper's back with a new message for you... Ever wonder what Dr. Seuss might sound like in 500 years? (Louis Wu 19:39:45 UTC) (permalink)

405th Source, March 2009 now available
Sean Bradley let us know that the March issue of the 405th e-zine is now online - it's 45 pages long, and chock-full of goodness like a the inside story of the building of Sean's Arbiter costume (fantastic photos!), an interview with SkullCandyGirl, a spotlight on 405th member Moz, a bunch of fan fiction, a tutorial on smoothcasting... and more. Go grab a copy! (Louis Wu 19:16:33 UTC) (permalink)

Voicemail Diarrhea
Bryan Simon has posted Volume Five of his Voicemail Chronicles - this looks to be the last one! Go enjoy the messages this man gets. And be happy you're not him. (Louis Wu 19:14:56 UTC) (permalink)

Bungie Blog Roundup
Step out for lunch, come back to a mountain of new content on Bungie.net. Stuff that caught my eye:

• Random's Halo 3 Funtage focuses on sticks and mongoose kills.
• M1STA WU1FY has a Brute Shot montage for you. (Soundtrack is starting to sound overused...)
• Elephants Never Forget To Kill expands the concept of the Elephant Cannon. Things go boom.
• americanista123 continues his 'Bungie Employee Montage' series with a Blooper reel.
• This week's Double XP Weekend is Grifball - the last Winter League Weekend! Go enjoy it.
• 360Sync has offered up three Mythic Map Pack codes... but it looks like B.net might have killed them.

There's more there... but we've either posted it already, or... it's not really postworthy. Go explore on your own! (Louis Wu 19:06:40 UTC) (permalink)

End the shameless glorification of the tall!
Awesome story over at Destructoid today - "How Killzone 2 is blatantly better than Halo 3" is full of the sort of sharp insights, logical conclusions, and serious reporting that has made game journalism what it is today. (In all seriousness, it's very funny.) (Louis Wu 15:08:29 UTC) (permalink)

Another Mythic Code Giveaway
If you've got a minimum of 60 posts already on the XboxGameZone forums (they're a UK Xbox site), you should read this news post - qualified members have a shot at a Mythic Map Pack code to be given out in two weeks. (I suppose you don't have to have 60 posts NOW - you simply have to have 60 posts by the 19th.) Don't spam! (Louis Wu 15:08:11 UTC) (permalink)

Game With Flame kicks off
Using a name that should have been obvious MONTHS ago, Bungie has morphed the 'Humpday Challenge' a little bit into a community 'play with Bungie' night. If they win, they write it up, in all its glorious detail. If they lose, they'll ban the other team's players and purge the stats. (Not really. Probably.) In any case, you'll end up with an entertaining writeup of SOMETHING, coupled with some great pictures. Swing by to read the first one now. (Louis Wu 15:05:05 UTC) (permalink)

1UP's Mythic Game Night, on film
1UP gave out 50 Mythic codes last week - and held a massive game night for the winners. The video of the evening is up now - it's an hour-long discussion of the maps, interspersed with copious amounts of gameplay. minasodaboy (who won one of the random codes we gave out) participated, and stopped in last night to announce the video. (Louis Wu 15:02:55 UTC) (permalink)

On top of the world
The first screenshot in this post is epic. (Louis Wu 15:02:01 UTC) (permalink)

Autographed Halo Poster Giveaway
Hawty McBloggy got her hands on a pair of very cool posters created by the wizards at the 405th - and she's giving them away. Swing by to see how you can win them! (Louis Wu 15:00:52 UTC) (permalink)

Assistance Served
The Catfish came by to announce 2501 Episode 23 - with guest stars. (Louis Wu 14:56:43 UTC) (permalink)

Older
Bungie.net has word of a montage from Bagel, which has some nice gameplay synched (really well) to a really catchy tune. Worth the watch. In HD. (Louis Wu 14:55:47 UTC) (permalink)

Art for Fans' sake
Fan-generated artwork today:

• NG put some of the Halo work he's done in the past three years into a video - go watch it in HD.
• Cody Gordon created some interesting Mythic panos - they're up for viewing on his Flickr stream. Not your typical pano fare...
• PsH Bling added a bunch of shots to his pano thread over at High Impact Halo.

Nice work, all around! (Louis Wu 14:54:33 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars news roundup, Thursday
Halo Wars content today:

• Virulent Aesthetics put up a review (thanks, Scotty)
• The official site has released a Tech Tree (a 4-page PDF detailing all of the tech available in Halo Wars) - thanks, Psychophan7.
• LIVE is offering a premium theme for 250 points. No preview I can find. Thanks, Exanubisleader.
• CNET'S Crave blog has reviewed the game.
• 411mania.com has reviewed the game.

Still a lot of buzz... Update: Jase Dakota found Fidgit's Ten reasons to play the Covenant in Halo Wars this morning, too. (Louis Wu 14:53:52 UTC) (permalink)

Ask The Rookie: Results
Last night, I got word from Domino Theory that he'd made it through all of the entries for the Ask the Rookie contest, pared it down to his favorites, and picked a winner. Just to give you an idea of the work he faced: all of the entries, added sequentially to a Microsoft Word document and formatted at 10pt Times, with all identifying information removed, filled 492 pages. He sorted a BOOK. The winner he chose was a poem in iambic pentameter, written by David Newton:

Dear Rookie,

Alas, for I'll be scarce e'er you arrive,
To Installation Five will I be gone.
Against the Covenant must I to strive;
This New Mombasa's fate to you is pawned.

Of what you'll face can I no sight presage,
But 'gainst the threat thine task asserts be braced.
From me must thou be lent a single page:
Kick ass and might you live to see my face.

- Master Chief

We'd like to thank all 700 entrants for this one - and to congratulate David on his poem! And a huge thank you to Domino Theory, for offering the code in the first place... and performing the monumental task that judging turned out to be. (Louis Wu 12:39:52 UTC) (permalink)

News March 4 2009

Blast Gets Mythic
Blast has a short Hands-on with the Mythic Maps - go see. (Louis Wu 21:00:53 UTC) (permalink)

More Favorites to Download
It's Wednesday, so it's time to update the Bungie Favorites - the second batch of Black Water Ops files have gone up, along with an interview with the group's Commander-in-Chief, Ironskull. Go read, and look! (Louis Wu 21:00:35 UTC) (permalink)

Noobus Maximus 2
Eve-Films' Nexus is Mental sent us word of Noobus Maximus 2, a 'recent funtage with clips from FPS Glimmer & friends'. You can watch it on YouTube (in HD), or download it from the Eve-Films.com forum. There's something awfully familiar about this - I feel like I've seen these clips before. (I can't find any record of having posted about it, though.) Nice quality, fun clips. Check it out! (Louis Wu 15:28:27 UTC) (permalink)

Which game did YOU come in on?
Hawty McBloggy found the recent 1 billionth Halo 3 game stat to be interesting - because it means that 20% more Halo 3 games have been played than Halo 2 games, in half the time. And when she looks at her own stats (8500 Halo 2 games, 3500 Halo 3 games), she realizes that she's not the norm... are you? Swing by and add your voice! (Louis Wu 13:51:47 UTC) (permalink)

Comic Wednesday
Comic Roundup for the morning:

• Adam Susskind stopped in yesterday afternoon with word of Chaos Theory 14 - Truths from a Saint. His description sounds complicated!
• Hawty McBloggy reminded us that it's Wednesday, so it's time for another episode of ODS Steve - Episode 16 is called 'A Shade of Earl Grey', and it provides one possible explanation for how Gears of War came into existence.
• TTL Demag0gue had word of not only Reclaimer 161 (with the naming of another member of the Cavalcade), but also a contest - come up with a new set for Reclaimer, using Sandbox, and you can win a bunch of goodies! Read the contest page for full details - both of the rules and the prizes.

Need some coffee for those funnies? Update: Somehow I missed Shipwrecked Episode 57 - sometimes you just gotta run. (Louis Wu 13:51:03 UTC) (permalink)

GamePro's Halo Wars Giveaway
GamePro's giving away a bunch of Halo Wars action figures - you just have to tell them what your favorite weapon is. Swing by for full details. (Louis Wu 13:50:36 UTC) (permalink)

More Halo 3 Panos
jdars1804 let us know that his Halo 3 Images blog has a Panoramas section with some pretty nice shots in it - go browsing! (Louis Wu 13:50:18 UTC) (permalink)

Lost Levels Episode 5
Slim30 stopped by to point out that Lost Levels Episode 5 is up on YouTube. According to the description in Episode 1, "John, Anthony, and Danny have become trapped in the game known as halo 3. Watch their adventures as they try to find a way out while evading a mysterious organization who has taken an interest in the trio." (Louis Wu 13:49:53 UTC) (permalink)

News March 3 2009

Master Chief - His tale is not yet (fully) told
I read this story in USA Today this morning, and came away with one thing - the Halo Wars giveaway (mentioned in the Halo Wars news roundup a few hours ago). Ars Technica read it, and did a better job - they noticed the quote from Frank O'Connor:

"I doubt we have seen the last of Master Chief."

It's been clear for a while that there's more Halo coming from Microsoft down the road... it's just a little bit of a surprise that the Master Chief will be there, too. (Louis Wu 19:28:42 UTC) (permalink)

Urrrrrkkkkkkkk....
Goodies this morning on the Bungie Blog:

• Stop-Motion Snake: I thought this was pretty darned cool. scott14755 recreated a game of 'Snake' in Forge, via stop-motion photography. (Well, screenshotography.) I loved it.
• Halotech.org is streaming gameplay on Mythic Maps for folks who don't have their own to play on.
• Skillz Like AI whipped up an artistic and restive display on Foundry... restive, that is, until you get hit. Then it's rather explosive. Nice work!

Time to look for our own content again... Update: two more from Bungie.net (is it time to retire?)... MLD (Major League Driving) Top 10 #3 is out - this one focuses on Warthogs. How bad does a gunner feel when his DRIVER picks up a Vehicular Manslaughter (10 splatters without dying) in the time that the gunner takes down 3 enemies? And a new Average Joe interview is up - this time with Predator5791 (who I was SURE had already done one of these, but I'm guessing I was just misremembering the Screenshot Artist Spotlight or maybe even Hawty McBloggy's interview). Go see what makes him do what he does! (Louis Wu 18:32:01 UTC) (permalink)

The Institute
anthraxgoon stopped in with word of X36 Chapter 2 Issue 6 - nice shots of Orbital... (Louis Wu 18:31:42 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars Strategy Guide Preview
If you want a sneak peek at the Halo Wars Official Strategy Guide, grab it from us - here are 12 pages of PDF goodness, straight from Prima. Enjoy! (Louis Wu 18:11:50 UTC) (permalink)

Assembly... boring?
PC Magazine put up a review of the Mythic maps today... and while they loved Sandbox, they found Orbital and Assembly to be disappointing and tiresome. I guess it takes all kinds! (Louis Wu 17:08:26 UTC) (permalink)

Wonder if he paid full price?
Schedonnardus went to his local Gamestop last night in College Station, Texas, and ran into a Spartan-clad fan with a Brute Spiker. I dunno... the salesguy looks a little intimidated... (Louis Wu 14:51:42 UTC) (permalink)

MicroMachinima Episode 2: HeadGON
Arm The Flag has posted the second in their 'MicroMachinima' series - this one is called HeadGON. It's only a minute and a half... go watch it! (Louis Wu 14:50:28 UTC) (permalink)

Hawty's Goodies
Hawty McBloggy has a couple of goodies for you today - she's put together a set of eight Halo-themed 360 mods (some are great, some are awful, some are just plain funny), and she's uncovered a true Halo transformer on eBay - it's a Warthog that transforms to a Spartan (well... sort of a Spartan). Check it out! (Louis Wu 14:50:05 UTC) (permalink)

Checking In
The Catfish stopped in with word of 2501 Episode 22. (Louis Wu 14:49:44 UTC) (permalink)

HW News Roundup
Halo Wars news this morning:

• oriol003 stopped by with a list of new guides Grunts R Us have posted
• USA Today is giving away five copies of the Limited Edition - register to win
• The Poughkeepsie Journal has a review of the game

Okay, back to BUNGIE-related stories... (Louis Wu 14:49:19 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars Universe Expanded: Act 3 - Ascension
Impervium was the first on our forum to notice that IGN has posted Part 3 of the Universe Expanded series of Halo Wars documentaries - this one is called 'Ascension'. It's a nice closeout of the series. A quote from Frankie: "Every time we add, we embrace." The Halo Story canon is definitely expanding... (Louis Wu 01:15:57 UTC) (permalink)

Catching up to McDonalds
DarkSky Forever noticed it Sunday morning... but Bungie got around to posting fun stats on Monday afternoon. Sometime this weekend, the one billionth online match of Halo 3 was played, and recorded by the tireless databases living under the bedrock of Redmond. (Okay, I know they're not really in Redmond. Shut up.) RocketMoose did some calculating, and figured out that since Halo 3 hit the net a year and a half ago, more than 64,000 years of playtime have been spent playing Halo 3 by fans on LIVE. (Bungie also gave away two more Mythic codes in that newspost... all the more incentive to read closely!) (Louis Wu 01:12:50 UTC) (permalink)

News March 2 2009

Death from Above
A good banshee driver is a pleasure to watch - and x Foman123 x has done a wonderful job of capturing some classic moments. Swing by the Bungie Blog for straming and download links to his Bansheetage. (Louis Wu 23:54:54 UTC) (permalink)

Sometimes, you just gotta go for style points.
The latest episode of Red vs Blue: Relocated is now online - Part Three shows what the Rooster Teeth boys can do with the Mythic maps. (Caboose is starting to worry me, too.) I'm wondering if Lopez's Spanish isn't getting WORSE, over time... (Louis Wu 23:24:21 UTC) (permalink)

Monday Mythic Map Review
More Mythic Overviews - GameZone has taken a quick look at the maps (very quick), but a fan blog, Virulent Aesthetics (a blog offshoot of Halo Social) is going a bit more in-depth. Their Orbital and Sandbox reviews are up now, with Assembly coming tomorrow. Check 'em out! Update: Assembly is up now - quite a bit earlier than expected. (Louis Wu 22:49:01 UTC) (permalink)

Tag and Release: Sunset
It's Monday, so it's time for another flexing of the Bungie.net tag system's muscle - this time, urk's picked 'Sunset' as the key. Great shots! (Louis Wu 22:48:16 UTC) (permalink)

This is getting out of hand.
More Halo Wars stuff - Maybe Luke's right, maybe we should change our domain to Halo.ensemble.org...

• mendicantbias00 found an official Halo Wars flash site on Xbox.com - high on glitz, pretty low on actual information. Fun to browse, though. A pair of Wallpapers (one UNSC, one Covenant) are available for download, once you're past the region/faction choosing phases.
• Joystiq's giving away copies of the game - one per day for the next three days. Swing by for today's chance.

Who was that other company that made Halo games? (Louis Wu 20:49:33 UTC) (permalink)

How many marines is too many?
Last week, we got word from Sk1ll4x3D of a rather bizarre glitch he experienced in The Storm - it was a case of multiplying marines. He'd kicked off a thread on Bungie.net... but there were no videos, and I was in no shape at the time to go watching in-game videos. I set it aside... and forgot about it. This weekend, another user, rewep, went in and captured the footage and put it on YouTube, and Sk1ll4x3D let us know about it this morning. The video's really long (almost 10 minutes)... but you can get a good sense for what's going on in just a few of those. Pretty weird - I wonder if anyone will figure out how to re-trigger it? (Louis Wu 19:41:08 UTC) (permalink)

Inertia
Over at the Bungie Blog, a really interesting film is highlighted - it shows off a jump style that takes advantage of kinetic transfer of energy. These guys got to some great places in the Halo campaign! (Louis Wu 19:34:23 UTC) (permalink)

Now, all I need is a road.
sorahn had a friend who worked for a street sign company last year... it's always good to take advantage of your friends. (Louis Wu 19:09:31 UTC) (permalink)

Hard Justice Episode 13
Hard Justice, Episode 13 (Resignation Act Three) is now online - it closes out the series. This series began as a light-hearted farce (almost too MUCH of a farce)... but it was pretty serious by the time it wrapped up. If you've been following, go watch the end! Thanks, urk. (Louis Wu 19:01:54 UTC) (permalink)

Think Jack and the Beanstalk... with lasers
pete_the_duck looked into the issue of building towers that start on Sandbox's ground level... and climb into the skybox. What he found was pretty interesting. Check out the post! (Louis Wu 14:56:50 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars Soundtrack Review
Fangoria has reviewed the Halo Wars soundtrack - they gave it a 2.5/4 (I think). Read the full review (and listen to sample tracks) on their site. (Louis Wu 14:52:51 UTC) (permalink)

Halo-related Art Roundup
Bunch of art news this morning:

• PsH Bling tried his hand at the whole tilt photography thing - you'll find the results over at High Impact Halo, or in his DeviantART gallery.
• Tony 'ubald' Marcotte sent word of another new render, which we've added to his gallery here - this one looks a little scary for the Marine!
• Decadence Night stopped by with word of some brand new panoramas... and one of the best games of his life (with pics). It's all viewable at his blog, Decayed Panoramas.

Pretty, pretty! (Louis Wu 14:33:06 UTC) (permalink)

Cogs in the Machine
TTL Demag0gue stopped in with word of Reclaimer 160 - it's Part Nine (and the last part) of Reclaimer: Mythic Edition, and it's one last look at Viper's no-so-happy origins. (Louis Wu 14:31:09 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Babies Mythic Haiku Winners
Halo Babies has announced the winners of its Mythic Map Pack Code giveaway for Haikus - they got 1500 entries, and three of those won a code. You can see the winners, the runners-up, and even the top 36. There are also some of the WORST entries... some are hilarious. (Louis Wu 14:28:24 UTC) (permalink)

4v4 MLG Team Slayer Tournament
Nathan Moeller let us know that Competitive Video Games is running a 4v4 Team Slayer tourney, on March 7th, 3pm CST. Swing by the site for more details. (Louis Wu 14:27:51 UTC) (permalink)

Master Chief is a Bully
FireDragon04 and some friends created a short video for a competition in the UK - it was a project to promote legal downloading, starring the Master Chief. Since the competition is over, he's put the video up for public consumption. (He was behind the camera, not in the suit.) (Louis Wu 14:27:23 UTC) (permalink)

Officer's Mess
Halo Action Figure Theater updated again this weekend - you ask me, things are getting tense. (Louis Wu 14:26:58 UTC) (permalink)

Blog Banter - Melding Worlds
Hawty McBloggy would love you to weigh in on a discussion about non-gaming spouses, and what's reasonable in terms of getting them on board with your gaming obsession. This article is the first in a week-long series of pieces from the gameblogging community, and it involves the tale of a man who attempts to bribe his wife into playing Halo. Would this work for you (or your significant other)? (Louis Wu 14:26:24 UTC) (permalink)

Unlucky Elite 4
Jamie T did a fantastic job of incorporating the recent Christian Bale meltdown into an episode of Unlucky Elite - go watch Unlucky Elite 4 and smile. (Or cry for the poor Elite, I guess.) (Louis Wu 14:25:49 UTC) (permalink)

Halo Wars News Roundup
Bunch of Halo Wars tidbits came through the wires today:

• Xbox.com is hosting a Play & Win Sweepstakes - register (by downloading a gamer picture off of Xbox LIVE), then play a multiplayer game online between March 6-8. 29 people will win, with prize packages ranging from 500 MS Points all the way up to a 52 inch LCD, plus home theater system.
• Grunts R Us has posted a Halo Wars Skull Guide. As always with this sort of things, you're best served looking for them on your own... but I guess it's here, if you need/want it.
• blackouTT let us know that TheDigitalSet.com has released their first podcast, and one of the topics in this week's 'cast is Halo Wars.
• The official Halo Wars website has a global stats page - and total gametime has already exceeded 4 years. Wow. Thanks, Spartan-056.
• WorthPlaying reviewed Halo Wars - they said it's the "closest that an RTS console game has come to success in recent memory." (They gave it a 7.7/10.)
• The St. Petersburg Times also reviewed Halo Wars - they called it "an RTS for the crowd that doesn't like RTS games," and were overall quite positive.
• NeoXDonut remixed released Halo Wars footage into his own trailer, in anticipation of release here in the US.

That's it for this morning... (Louis Wu 14:24:17 UTC) (permalink)

Catching up with Halo 3 Fails
Tons of stuff fell through the cracks this weekend - let's see if we can scrape some of it back up. chris10023 let us know about a couple of new 'Halo 3 Fails' videos - Top 10 of Season 1 went live on Friday, and Episode 11 (which I suppose is the start of season 2?) went live yesterday. (Louis Wu 14:23:47 UTC) (permalink)

News March 1 2009

Ask the Rookie Update
The Ask the Rookie Contest ended as planned last night at midnight EST - there were nearly 700 entries, so it's going to take Domino and friends a little longer than expected to pick a winner. Please be patient! And that's it for me this evening... no more energy. Back tomorrow! (Louis Wu 23:32:04 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Map Previews
A bunch of new Mythic Map previews:

• GamesRadar
• Console Monster
• MDK Blog

Apparently, Inside Xbox also did a preview - it features HP's Facing Worlds map, so Devin Olsen put a copy on YouTube for those who can't see it on Marketplace. (Louis Wu 23:31:05 UTC) (permalink)

More Tilt Photography
OcR GimpTactics jumps into the Tilt Photography game with some great Halo campaign shots. Check 'em out at OutCast Reborn. (Louis Wu 23:30:21 UTC) (permalink)

Mythic Madness takes its toll
A few people are making sad videos about Foundry - Matthew Rivera has one here, Sniper2477 has one here, and another here. I think people are overreacting... (Louis Wu 23:29:27 UTC) (permalink)

A found Halo artist
Ross Mills ran across an artist at a Convention who does a lot of Halo work - check out his DeviantART site! (Halo stuff is here.) (Louis Wu 23:28:39 UTC) (permalink)

Weekend Comics
Comics posted this weekend:

• 2501 - 21: The Brig (thanks, The Catfish)
• Reclaimer 158: Wasted Lands (presented on Saturday)
• Reclaimer 159: Storage (presented on Sunday)

New ones tomorrow! (Louis Wu 23:27:44 UTC) (permalink)

Bob - for real
The general Halo public met Bob, the Killball Dude, in Friday's Weekly Update - but pete_the_duck (who came up with the concept in the first place) wanted it to be perfect. Some great shots in this post. (Louis Wu 23:26:48 UTC) (permalink)

Views from the Edge goes Mythic
BlueNinja let us know about some Mythic map panoramas he posted on his Views from the Edge blog. (Louis Wu 23:26:07 UTC) (permalink)

Opticast Episode 1
Still struggling to dig out of this nasty flu - temperature is down to 101 today (topped 104 yesterday), so let's try and clear SOME of this news out of the queue. Apologies for any lack of detail... first up, FyreWulff told us about Opticast Episode 1 - contains an interview with Octodeath. (Louis Wu 23:25:21 UTC) (permalink)

March 2009

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