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Thursday, September 27, 2007 |  |
33 Days of Halo, eh?
Canadians often get the short end of the stick when it comes to contests - but Anton P. Nym found a contest sponsored by Xbox.com-sponsored Canadian-only contest. Looks pretty juicy, too. (Louis Wu 21:13:41 UTC) (permalink)
Machinima Makers - Read This
Okay, so I've got good news and bad news for you, if you make Halo machinima, and you want to know how to put your weapon down. The good news is, we've got that info for you, thanks to madmax. The bad news? It only works locally or in system link - it will NOT work over Live. Sorry. So: here's the trick (and it really is a trick, you need a lot of fingers): hold down both bumpers, both sticks, A and DPad-Down for 3 seconds. (Three fingers per hand should do it.) To bring the gun back up, just pull a trigger. And oh, yeah - this works in both Multiplayer... AND Campaign. Update: Chris Burke, from This Spartan Life, sent in a correction - you don't actually need to hold down the right stick. The other 5 buttons do the trick. (Louis Wu 19:41:03 UTC) (permalink)
Halo 3 Premiere in Sweden
Thanks to Joakim Ericson, who let us know about a film on YouTube that shows the Halo 3 kickoff event in Sweden. (Louis Wu 19:30:31 UTC) (permalink)
One Final Push is All that Remains
Heh - this one's bizarre. A company has made a custom Halo 3 inhaler, for folks with asthma, and put it up for sale on eBay - 50% of the final price will go to the American Lung Association of Washington. Thanks, JC! (Louis Wu 19:19:16 UTC) (permalink)
They did it again.
Edge Magazine doesn't call a lot of games 'perfect'. The first Halo was one - and before today, there were four others. Halo 3 just became the sixth game in the magazine's history to earn that coveted score. In other words... one third of all games to ever receive an Edge rating of '10' came from Bungie, in their Halo series. Not bad! (Louis Wu 18:43:13 UTC) (permalink)
Last news round-up of the day
From here on, I'm caught up - news will be posted as it comes! w00t!
- Heh - the New Zealand Herald has a story about how dangerous videogames can be, and warns parents to keep an eye on their children in the wake of Halo 3's release.
- Cinema Blend says Halo is the perfect dance of bullets and dead bodies, and gives it a 5/5 rating.
- Whoa - these are really cute.
- I know I said we were going to call the launch events 'covered' and move on - but the London Gala was pretty extravagant, and Feenix took some great pics and delivered some nice commentary.
- Kotaku's pretty amazed that there's at least one store in Japan that has sold out of Halo 3 (thanks, Red_Breast), even though the advertising campaign there is... a little weak.
- bs angel found this great song on YouTube - MollieJane misses her boyfriend.
CAUGHT UP! I'M CAUGHT UP! (For a minute or two, at least...) (Louis Wu 16:55:13 UTC) (permalink)
3 for 3, Round 3
JawReich and DisciplineN2k team up to remind you that the Halo 3 for 3 Sweepstakes Round 3 starts today. (Might not actually be live yet; I'm having trouble getting a confirmation.) (Louis Wu 16:20:43 UTC) (permalink)
Hey-Low the Halfling Rogue
McKeeganWRX noticed that Goblins has a new Tempts Fate comic with a character that looks awfully familiar...
(Louis Wu 16:16:16 UTC) (permalink)
I was sleeping, dude.
If you've got friends like Warbow, today's Calvin and Halo might remind you why they need a smack in the head occasionally. (Louis Wu 15:51:56 UTC) (permalink)
Prima Guide Preview
Black Six pointed out a preview for the Halo 3 Official Strategy Guide, over at Xbox.com. It's a 10 mb, 9 page PDF download, and it makes it pretty clear that this guide is GORGEOUS. Go look! (Louis Wu 15:50:32 UTC) (permalink)
Stealing from the Neighbors
I visited Rampancy.net last night, and found a bunch of interesting articles I'd missed:
- Chevmeister on Bungie.net has gone to the trouble of removing all default objects from Bungie's maps, so that you can start with blank slates for your Forge creations - what a bonus! (R.net story)
- The Sydney Morning Herald has an interview with Damian Isla, a Campaign Engineer on Halo 3, discussing how the AI works in Halo - with some nice examples. (R.net story)
- Pro-G talked to a couple of Bungie employees recently; Joe Tung stated that Halo 4 was not in development (R.net story), and Lee Wilson explained that Bungie's not trying to recreate a photorealistic world (R.net story). Since these were posted, Pro-G has put up the full interview with these two guys; there are a number of other tidbits they get to (like how lousy Lee is with a non-grenade weapon).
- Wired posted an article about how Epitaph is based on Chartres, a medieval cathedral in France (R.net story). Since then, Wired has posted another article - this one looks at Halo 3's AI, like the SMH article, except this time, it's Max Dyckhoff discussing the issues they faced.
Just remember: Rampancy.net has been there since the very beginning of Halo fandom (they were the Core before they were R.net, and it's not completely clear whether they, or we, were the first site on the scene) - if they're not on your Halo rounds list, they should be. (Louis Wu 15:41:27 UTC) (permalink)
News Catchup
News dump, yet again (I don't know about you, but I'm looking forward to the day when coverage can go back to commentary on every item):
- The Seattle Post-Intelligencer thought Halo 3 was good, but not great; there were plot holes. Three stars out of four.
- 3of9 found a very cool UNSC logo shirt at MyTeeSpot
- Gamespot created a graphical comparison between the three games; it's a little unfair because they did a far better job getting screenshots for Halo 3 than for the other two, but the general idea is sound (thanks, Marcus-626)
- Scott Hanselman reviewed the game for his blog, and declared it 'balanced'
- Britain's Telegraph reviews Halo 3, and says that "Halo 3 crosses into the "essential" category effortlessly".
- TheStreet.com warns that enthusiastic launch events do NOT say anything useful long-term for investors; they're taking a 'wait and see' approach.
- Apparently, the US Air Force took advantage of the launch to try to do some recruiting in a small town in New Hampshire
- Yahoo Games has posted a Halo 3: First Tips article
- The New York Times posted a 'ho hum' article; I must include this quote:
For all its grand panoramas and its galaxywide narrative, Halo 3's plot feels like a bit of a throwaway, a rather short adventure with a predictable story and dialogue that is sometimes as hokey as something from an old John Wayne war movie.
The author felt that Halo 3 was simply Halo 2 with better graphics. - Binary Bonsai thought the story was a little obscure, but that the game was really fun anyway
More news coming soon - this was just a way to TRY and clear out the bulk of the backlog. (Louis Wu 14:46:17 UTC) (permalink)
Halo 3 Launch FAQ
Bungie's got a Halo 3 Launch FAQ posted; the answers to some of the most common questions they're seeing can be found in there. Worth a look, even if you're not having trouble - you might learn something! (Louis Wu 04:19:00 UTC) (permalink)
Singapore Launch Rundown
We got mail from a couple of people about some recent Halo 3 events in Singapore; Spu7n1k sent along info from his blog (17 September | 19 September | 22 September), showing the progress on his launch party costume - winner of best costume got a Legendary Edition, which isn't even sold in Singapore; I don't know if he won), as well as links to videos of the Believer 3 and Believer 4 events (these were filmed by Duelist). Finally, he sent along pics of the schwag from these events (a Halo 3 cap from 3, and a wristband from 4). Qdepartment went to the launch, and sent along a whole bunch of pics - the best of the bunch were a shot of a Master Chief statue at the event, and a pic of the nice bag all the schwag came in. Nice deal for those guys! (Louis Wu 04:13:39 UTC) (permalink)
Watch the World Light Up with Halo 3
Sunburned Goose, from 2old2play.com, sent along this animated gif showing the Online World Map (visible with real-time data on Bungie's Online page) over the course of 24 hours, from Monday afternoon through Tuesday afternoon. For a slightly different view of the same sort of data, Tieno, over at the Neogaf forum, put up a similar image from the night of the launch (thanks, GhaleonEB). Update: Sunburned Goose posted some video links in our forum, and XerxdeeJ put up a QuickTime vid of this, as well. (Louis Wu 03:42:32 UTC) (permalink)
MLG Goodies
3Suns pointed out a couple of hot links at MLGPro.com - their Halo 3 Launchtacular page, and a recap page from Orlando, including a spotlight on Str8 Rippin, the 4v4 champs this time around. Check it out! (Louis Wu 03:24:02 UTC) (permalink)
Exclusive Halo 3 stuff for Gold users on XBLM?
According to this story at 1Up, there is new content on Xbox Live Marketplace that's free to Gold users. However, following the image shown in the story gets me to a page that has 5 theme/gamerpic items available - all of which cost money (well, points). There are supposedly also videos coming later this week - we'll see what happens there. Thanks to Zeouterlimits for the heads-up. (Louis Wu 03:16:56 UTC) (permalink)
Shack looks at Forge
Shacknews has posted an article about Forge, and what it can do. It's a great read - go check it out! Thanks, Chris Remo (Louis Wu 03:04:18 UTC) (permalink)
Another shoutout for a community member in need
trigger119 pointed out the GTV Spotlight over at GamingTV - it focuses on Zukan, a longtime community contributor who is suffering from Hodgkin Lymphoma - he'll be starting chemo soon. Stop by and give the guy some support! (Louis Wu 03:02:05 UTC) (permalink)
Halomen
Samir Patel pointed out Halomen, an adult-rated Flash vid at Newgrounds which comes up with an alternate storyline for Halo. Animation and artwork are great, story... not so much. (Louis Wu 02:59:37 UTC) (permalink)
Lego Zanzibar - finished
Kooberz let us know he's finished his Lego Zanzibar video - you can see it on YouTube. It's a 9 minute walktrhough, showing how closely he matched the Lego stuff to the in-game map. Even the bridge works! Insanity. It also contains tons of info about the building of the project - if you're into Lego construction, this is amazing. (Louis Wu 02:47:52 UTC) (permalink)
Halo 3 OST - Coming in November, Probably
We've received news from a couple of fronts about the upcoming Halo 3 Official Soundtrack. SeannyD got email from Risa Malkinson, from Sumthing Distribution, letting him know that the release date will be in November. This is corroborated by Aj6627, who noticed that the Amazon listing for the soundtrack has a release date of November 16. (It also says '1 Disc', and we know from last week's interview with Marty O'Donnell on Music4Games that this information is probably wrong... so take it all with a grain of salt.) (Louis Wu 02:42:19 UTC) (permalink)
Wednesday's news in brief:
Tuesday's news in brief:
