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Pre-order Halo 3 for $69.99 Canadian
Best Buy and FutureShop are willing to take your Halo 3 money -- $69.99 to be exact -- right now. Estimated release date November 30, 2007: Releases 30 Nov/07. A world in need of a hero. A mystery to unravel. In a time when the world needs him most, one man will step to the forefront to take his place in history. Product Features Action, adventure, suspense! What does this all mean? We haven't the slightest idea. Really - Bungie and Microsoft aren't saying a word. At this point you're either in or you're out anyway.Not sure where they got that price. Hopefully it refers to some fancy collector's edition, or else Best Buy is just squeezing suckers. Either way, you in? [Thanks Shylock]Update: Several readers pointed out that price is in Canadian Dollars. Duh.
"New" Halo 3 screens
Well, not really. They're just grabs (here and here) from the trailer that I haven't seen before. But they are hi-res enough to be decent wallpaper.
Bungie testing Halo 3 single-player
If you haven't it checked it out already, Bungie's latest Weekly Update finds the nerd gods gameplay testing Halo 3's single-player campaign and touting the 360's AI capabilities with the usual frustrating lack of detail. Among other Master Chief morsels (cribbed from Gamespot's summary): A new and "utterly" terrifying Halo 3 multi-player mode has been developed. The Halo 3 traller mini-documentary from E3 will hit XBLM this week. A few quotes from weapons designer Tom Doyle on how they're updating the Covenant Sniper Rifle. Halo: The Graphic Novel will be unveiled at the July 20-23 San Diego Comic Con and will go on sale this month. A revamped form of matchmaking playlists will be hitting Halo 2, and Bungie is looking for community contributions--because the playlists will be designed by Halo 2 players. That works. Don't miss the Bungie Waahmbulance either.
Bungie busy testing Halo 3 single-player
According to Bungie's most recent weekly update, the team has begun testing elements of Halo 3's single-player campaign. The testing is currently focused on gameplay, specifically, AI encounters.Bungie's Frank O'Connor details a run-in with a pack of Grunts who had wisely flanked Frankie while he was distracted by "something bigger than a Grunt." Frankie describes the Grunts' tactic as "quite a shock," given that their behavior in the past has been half-witted. Frankie reminds us, "Lots of folks focus on what technology can do for the appearance of a game -- but the 360's prodigious horsepower can also be applied to AI."
The original Halo 3 trailer
Sometimes absurd is good. And in this case, it's golden. For whatever reason, this particular Halo 3 trailer parody strikes a chord in the ol' funny bone area. Complete with smoke, Halo 3 music, and a dog acting as Cortana, you gotta love this kid's spirit. If you find yourself bored for a couple minutes, it's worth a watch -- if only to hear the voice and music cribbed from the "official" trailer, which you can view here to compare techniques.
F$%# (bottle) rocket n00b!
Halo fan FyreWulff has created a replica of the SPNKR rocket launcher to celebrate US independence this year. The launcher -- still a work in progress -- takes on the trademark Halo design, including the "HOLD LIKE THIS" image on the side. Describing his project, FyreWulff said: "...This is not meant to be a 1:1 remake of the Halo rocket launcher. I'm basically "skinning" another (fake!) rocket launcher to look like it, as best as possible." The launcher will be used to fire holiday shells and bottle rockets this 4th of July. Whether you're a Halo fan or not, surely there is no better way to celebrate our country than by blowing up a small part of it. Follow the read link for more pictures. Anybody else have any cool holiday projects? [Via HBO]
Ultimate Halo Fanboy
Bungie.net has posted pictures of fanboy Namloco's Halo dungeon. Juggling his family responsibilities and a full time job, Namloco managed to convert his entire basement into some kind of Halo altar. Adorned with huge Halo posters, action figures, books, and even an oddball skull, the room is a Halo sanctuary. The crown jewel of his obsession is the hand painted mural on the rear wall. The technophiles among you will probably cringe when you see his TV lodged in the fireplace, though. Isn't he worried about soot?
Waste your money on more Halo toys
Joyride Studios has released Series 8 (they're up to 8?) of the Halo figurines. Among them are Spartan 117 with Flood infection form, a SpecOps Elite, a Jackal, and the Elite Heretic Leader. Why anyone would buy the Master Chief again just to get a Flood form is anybody's guess. Because I already have Master Chief. I mean, all of you have Master Chief, right? Right? Anybody?[Via Bungie.net]
Red Vs. Blue Vs. XBLM
There's a new piece of Red Vs. Blue content available on Marketplace. The video is entitled "Out of Mind Part One" and is available for free. Does this mean the beginning of regular RvB content? I hope so, but I still hate Grif oh so very, very much. Has anyone already downloaded it?
Halo 3 has a happy ending, or how I learned to love YTMND
The animated .gif addicts over at YTMND have been very busy lately revealing the truthiness behind recent video game rumors. Here are some of those OMIGOD NEWS FLASH! announcements from YTMND's gaming posse: The PS3's 100% official start-up screen REVEALED! Nintendo's bunker busted REVEALED! Halo 3 ending REVEALED! World of Warcraft in space REVEALED! Shiggy's secret N64 formula REVEALED! Half-Life 2's plotline REVEALED! (take that, suckas) YTMND's formula is never going to get old, simply because there will never be a shortage of fanboy ideas and rumors to make fun of. [Via Xbox360Fanboy] More: The Wii zeitgeist, via YTMND, Wiill Ferrell tests Wii accelerometer technology and Dick Hunt!
More Halo 3 footage for your Halo obsessed soul
Bungie has posted a video featuring a behind the scenes look at the creation of the Halo 3 trailer, complete with commentary from several Bungie employees and footage of the orchestra and choir that was used to create the backing music. If, for whatever reason, you can't view the video, here's a quick summary of the content: Amusing quotes if taken out of context: Marty shows early signs of dementia with his paranoid "Where are we? Who is this? What's happening?" sound bite. A few snippets of unseen footage, mainly from different angles of the Halo 3 trailer. This could possibly be proof that the trailer was rendered in real time, although it's very likely that the sound, AI and everything else was pre-rendered. Some more mystery surrounding cortana: dare we say she's gone rampant? A lot of meaningless marketing lines that amount to not much more than hype. Phrases like "dynamic", "real stuff" and "that epic feel" don't tell us much about how Halo 3 is coming along. Overall, there isn't that much new to see here, although if you're a fan of Halo (who isn't?) the video is probably worth a few moments of your time. [Image: Emily Fulford]
Bungie's cord
Nowadays when you think Bungie, you think the Halo series. Thinking about Halo also implies Microsoft and the Xbox: the first game sold nearly as many copies as the Xbox itself, the second game is one of the most played online console games of all time and the as-yet unreleased third title has more hype surrounding it than a Star Wars movie, a Steve Jobs keynote and a season finale episode of Lost all rolled into one. So for some people it's a great surprise to find that if you go back ten years and look at Bungie's history, you'll find that the company started developing games on toy computers Macs.Tuncer Deniz, founder of Mac gaming fansite Inside Mac Games, was project lead on Myth II and from this position he got to see first hand how Bungie founders Alex Seropian and Jason Jones worked. In an interesting posting on his blog, he talks about one situation where Jason refused to back down and add resource harvesting to Myth II - the end result was a game that was much more fun because it ignored the established norm set up by Command & Conquer and its clones. Jason's focus towards a goal of making the game as fun as possible has meant that Myth II is still a popular online game today, eight years after its release and several years after Bungie pulled the support plug.Finally, for your viewing pleasure, Tuncer managed to dig up a "home video" of Bungie's Marathon team (five or six guys) fooling around and swearing (ohmygosh!) in front of the camera. It's strange to think that the developers in that video had no idea that in under a decade they would release two titles that would sell a combined 14 million units, in the process defining Microsoft's entry into console gaming.
The Engadget & Joystiq Interview: Microsoft's Shane Kim [update 1]
If you haven't already watched the video, now you can read the transcription of our interview with Shane Kim, General Manager of Microsoft Game Studios. On Wednesday (in the middle of E3), Vlad Cole and I got some time to sit down and ask him about some of the biggest questions facing Microsoft's early entrant into the next-gen console wars, like whether there are any more developer acquisitions lined up, which Xbox Live Arcade titles will show up on Vista with Live Anywhere, what are the plans for ad-supported gaming, and just how many paid subscribers does Xbox Live has. We're corroborating with several sources: is Peter Moore's [Grand Theft Auto 4] tattoo real? You know, I wasn't there when it was put on there, it's a very personal thing so I can neither confirm nor deny. Okay... so it's real. Prior to E3, people were really looking forward to actual demonstrations of the Wii controller. That was the big buzz coming into the show and, after they unveiled it, I think people were more or less satisfied with it. So how do you think you fared versus that intense excitement towards that controller? I think we fared extremely well. One of the big things we talked about yesterday was all the momentum we're going to have this next generation. We're going to have 10 million units in consumers' hands before the competitor even ships unit one. We're well on our way to 6 million connected members on Xbox Live and we're going to have 160 games in the market by the end of the year. We've got great momentum. We had Bill Gates attend E3 for the first time ever to announce the vision of Live anywhere. Again, demonstrating leadership in the online space isn't just about what we've achieved to date, but also about how we're going to take that forward across multiple platforms and devices. And finally, first and foremost, it's about the games and the content. Yesterday we started with Gears of War and ended with Halo 3, and we sprinkled in a little bit of Fable 2, Forza 2, Alan Wake, and, oh by the way, the Grand Theft Auto 4 announcement as well. So I think from the content standpoint we're definitely doing great there. So, better online, better content, and better pricing than some of the competition; we feel good about where we're at. Do you think it's important to win E3? I think most people say you have, at least in terms of the keynotes. I think it's always great to be recognized for what you're doing, whether it's at E3 or any other point. Sometimes I worry there's too much importance placed on that but since people are saying we won this year, I'll say it's a great thing we won E3.
Rumor: 360 wireless gaming receiver $20; wheel $130; headset $60; camera $40; Halo and Forza faceplates $20 [update 1]
Thanks to a reliable source from Microsoft, we've learned some important details about the new peripherals announced for the Xbox 360, including pricing and a few Halo faceplate (non)specifics. Check out the leaked info and prices below: 360 wireless gaming receiver (which enables wireless 360 controllers, headsets, and wheels on your PC): $20 Wireless racing wheel: $130 Wireless headset: $60 Xbox Live Vision Camera (with headset, one month of Live Gold, and one arcade -- presumably Xbox Live Arcade -- game): $40 New faceplates for Halo (with the Master Chief on 'em, but not Halo 3 specific) and Forza (no word on connections to the sequel): $20 each 256 MB portable memory unit (MU): no official price yet, but definitely not four times the cost of the older 64MB MU Besides acknowledging that the PC is "the biggest gaming device of all," MS appears to be setting an agressive price for its most relevant new PC accessory, the wireless gaming receiver (at least in comparison to the outrageously priced 360 wireless networking adapter). Unfortunately, no price was revealed as of yet for the USB-based HD-DVD add-on.We've speculated in our recent podcasts as to what would happen to the various 360 SKUs when price drops inevitably occur. An interesting theory bandied about by prolific Joystiq Contributor epobirs (on our earlier bump-to-256MB-MU post) was that a $20 price drop for the Core system, coupled with a $20 price drop on the 64MB MU, would finally allow folks to pick up a capable non-Premium bundle for the original $300 Core price point. (Not a bad way to undercut PS2 memory card prices, too.) We hope to get official confirmation on this info in the not-too-distant future.[Update: Sorry, had the camera price wrong in the headline; it now matches the price of the bundle listed in the body of the text below.]See also: 360's Mem Unit getting a bump to 256MB? (Comment from epobirs) Use 360 wireless peripherals with a PC Engadget & Joystiq's live coverage of Microsoft's Xbox 360 E3 event Joystiq / Engadget podcasts from Day One and Day Two of E3 2006
Halo 3 trailer blows up XBLM, MS keynote
All hail Master Chief. The trailer for a little game called Halo 3 is now available for download on XBLM. The pic above is from the MS keynote. I hear the Marketplace is getting slammed, but you can check it out here as well. Does this first glimpse meet your high Halo expectations?
I Love Bees redux? Halo 3 hints? Or just spam?
The timing and subject of an email I received (and posted above) are so coincidental with this season of game fever that I could not but immediately wonder whether I had been targeted for the beginning of some Halo 3 launch campaign. Alas, my Portuguese is lacking. Perhaps a reader can help bunk or debunk this strange missive that arrived in my inbox with the following envelope info? From: APACAME [mailto:convite@apacame.com.br] Sent: Wednesday, May 03, 2006 10:16 PM To: Convite Subject: XVI Congresso Brasileiro de Apicultura - CBA - 02/05 - 8 My hunch is that it's just mis-directed email. The website that it leads to looks too legit. But you never know in this age of ARGs.
Halo 3 at E3, Microsoft to preview at news conference [update 1]
IGN reports that Microsoft will unveil the next Halo title during its E3 news conference on Tuesday, May 9. The preview is reportedly in the form of a 2-minute video. While the exact details of the footage are unknown, expect a doctored in-game sequence.However, beyond this teaser, don't expect to learn much about the game. No one is going to rush this title in order to combat the PlayStation 3 launch. All signs indicate that the next Halo is far from complete and won't be out until 2007.[Update: fixed grammatical errors.][Thanks, SickNic]
Microsoft responds to PS3 news, plus more on Viva Piñata
In this interview with the UK's Official Xbox Magazine, Xbox General Manager Shane Kim holds forth on the upcoming title Viva Piñata while casually dropping in a few words on the PS3's November launch. Kim believes Viva Piñata to be a killer title for the 360, saying that he thinks "that families will buy an Xbox 360 because they want to play [it]", also saying that Microsoft will talk about future Halo plans "at the right time".On the PS3 launch, Kim was clear: "For us, it doesn’t change anything. We’ve had a very clear strategy for a long time now and we’re not going to change that. We’re not going to react to anything that they do." Entirely in line with a second official reaction over at Microsoft's gamerscore blog which claims that the "announcement certainly doesn’t change any of our plans."A lot of reassurances that things are the same as ever over in Xbox land, then; perhaps Nintendo will follow the crowd and post their entirely bland canned response to a competitor's plans next.
Halo 3 no more -- meet Forerunner
An Xbox.com forum poster, DM Duo Maxwell, is claiming to have reproduced, in its entirety, an exclusive Game Informer article from the upcoming April issue that reveals details about Bungie's next project—Duo Maxwell did not supply an actual scan because Xbox.com does not permit images that violate copyright laws. According to the post, Bungie's next project will be a Halo game for the Xbox 360, currently codenamed, Forerunner. In Halo lore, the Forerunners are a technologically advanced race that mysteriously vanished from the universe.The source reports that the game will feature "huge persistent worlds" using a modified Halo 2 engine. The main campaign will still feature Master Chief and will showcase 4-player co-op. The missions, however, will not be linear, nor will objectives been required. For example, if players are tasked with capturing a weapons depot, but decide to forego the assignment, then they will loose the opportunity to seize the additional weaponry and, in effect, will hand these weapons over to the enemy.For now, we have to write this off as pure speculation (read: April Fool's gag). But these new details are certainly tantalizing and in line with Bungie's method of revealing a game piece by piece, until the puzzle is complete. Look to E3 for a major announcement.
Halo 3 possibly back in PS3 launch frame, says analyst
With all the PS3 delay news flying around lately, it seems that a certain big sequel for the Xbox 360 may have creeped back onto the 2006 release window.According to Next Generation, a "lead analyst" from Tokyo is claiming that "big-hitting titles" for the first-moving 360 could be targeted at the PS3 launch "just to sabotage it." He stated that the release of Halo 3 ("timed to PS3") would be "quite damaging for Sony" as well.Well, a preemptive launch of Halo 3 would certainly serve as a distraction to Sony's next-gen launch plans, but people who really want a PS3 probably won't be deterred by Microsoft's premiere FPS appearing around the same time their favorite console does. Gears of War most likely won't stop PS3 fanboys, either. An unexpectedly early release (of either title) would certainly prove to be a perfect holiday present for 360 owners, however. Competition is grand.See also: Halo 3 could be released in '06 according to MS Game Studios GM Halo 3: speculation roundup PS3 worldwide in November Breaking News: PS3 delayed until November!
