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A legendary HBO Halo LAN
We all know halo.bungie.org (HBO) is a great resource for Halo news, but did you know they throw some of the best LAN parties on the face of the planet? Recently HBO invited some close friends, community members, and Bungie employees to their "Connecticut HQ" for a memorable Halo 2 throw-down. The LAN was held at HBO stud Louis Wu's house and was packed full of people, televisions, gaming consoles, food, and did we mention people? Cheers to you HBO for pulling off another memorable Halo LANfest ... now only if we could get invited. Full story and lots more photos after the jump.
Halo Lego Elite is brickalicious
Halo.bungie.org got word from Mandalore that he has finally perfected his Lego version of the Halo Elite. The Lego mini-fig is well constructed and even includes a make-shift sword to pwn all those noobs. Any fanboys out there ritually play ... I mean build with Legos and create some video game inspired work? We'd love to see someone create Viva Piñata, Gears of War, or even Geometry Wars inspired creations. Be creative, get building, and send them in![Via HBO]
Stuntmutt says drinking and driving is bad [update 1]
In a continuation of our Christmas wishes and coverage we stumbled upon a new One One Se7en comic that was posted today at HBO for your looking pleasure. Not only has our best buddy Stuntmutt found himself in a certain Halo 3 video, but we finally find out what caused the Mongoose to take a tumble. And, as a bonus, we learn a great lesson from the comic today kids. A drunk Stuntmutt is an extremely enlightening Stuntmutt ... "Happy ... Hic! ... Chrishmush!"Update 1: Drinking and driving makes more grammatical sense ... oops.
Halo snowflakes are all the rage
Over at HBO they've put on their creativity caps and got to work on creating some Halo inspired snowflakes (or as we call them, glistening treasures of joy). Look at that craftsmanship, that effort, and do I see Stuntmutt in one? Go check out all the snowflakes on HBO's forums and maybe you could create your very own Xbox 360 Fanboy inspired glistening treasure of joy. But be sure never to eat Halo inspired snowflakes, because they'll make you want to dance.
Deadwood star replaces Vin Diesel in Hitman movie
No, not Swearengen! Vin Diesel has been replaced by Deadwood's Timothy Olyphant as star of the upcoming Hitman movie, reports Ain't It Cool News. Bullock as Agent 47? Perhaps Olyphant's range as an actor will lend itself to the role of a brooding sociopath -- more so than what "The Pacifier" could bring to the big screen.Whatever the outcome, Skip Woods has completed his script, and the Hitman project has received the greenlight, with Luc Besson (Transporter 2) recently climbing aboard as co-producer. Hitman could be in theatres as early as next fall. We ain't holding our breath.
Halo meets Indiana Jones
We found this movie cruising on HBO (that's halo.bungie.org, not the Home Box Office) a while back, and the slow news day that is Thanksgiving is the perfect time to share it. This (very brief) video answers the age old question, "what would have Raiders of the Lost Ark been like if it was set in the Halo universe." What, you've never asked that question before? Guess it's just us then.
The Sopranos Season 6 hitting Blu-ray, HD DVD December 19th
We thought HBO and Warner might be up to something when they delayed the debut of The Sopranos Season 6: Part 1 from its original November launch date on HD DVD. We don't know if they were just waiting for the PlayStation 3, impressed by the improving quality of Blu-ray releases or what, but now the 4-disc, 12 episode boxed set is back and set to go on sale for both high definition formats December 19th. With a steep MSRP of $129.95 this could make an expensive Christmas gift for the well-connected HDTV owner in your life, but isn't The Family worth it?[Via MovieWeb]
TiVo Series3 and JVC receivers throw DRM fit
Wouldn't you know it. After paying for anger management sessions to deal with those repetitive delays, finding out it wouldn't work right with your shiny new plasma, and wondering if the thing was even worth the $800 to begin with, we've got yet another reason to pass on TiVo's almost-excellent Series3. If your box hasn't been plagued with issues just yet, we sure hope you aren't the proud owner of a JVC receiver, or you could be facing more of those ever-present DRM snafus. During CNET's testing of the Series3 box with the JVC RX-D702 receiver, things were going perfectly smooth as the TiVo streamed video / audio to the JVC over HDMI, and separate monitors via composite / S-Video -- until they switched over to HBO HD. Programming on this channel, as well as HDNet and Universal HD, yielded a gray screen complemented by a (presumably enraging) message stating: "Viewing is not permitted using the TiVo Digital Media Recorder. Try another TV input." Further investigation (read: hitting the "Info" button) spilled the beans on the DRM-laden troubles, as testers were greeted by a statement declaring "regulations of the copyright holder" the villain. While the "glitch" would probably be a non-issue had TiVo included TiVo To Go on the Series3 boxes, the almighty media providers would have none of that, and currently, the problem can only be solved by swapping out your (presumably costly) HDMI-equipped receiver for another brand. Chalk another one up for the content guardians. [Via Thomas Hawk]
HDTV Listings for August 27, 2006
What we're watching: The Emmys are in standard-def tonight, which would be bad enough but since it also bumps preseason Sunday Night Football it is especially irksome. ABC & Fox decide to combat TV awards by showing movies, with Pirates of the Caribbean and Star Wars Episode II both kicking off at 7. The season finales of Deadwood, Entourage and Lucky Louie are all on deck for tonight so it might make sense to skip that 480i awards show, watch shows in HD that will probably grab a statue or two, and check out the liveblogged recap on TV Squad later. Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
HDTV Listings for June 17, 2006
What we're watching: The NHL Finals continue, as Edmonton looks to pull off another miracle and force a deciding Game 7 at Carolina. However, the big sporting event of the night is the middleweight title fight between Winky Wright and Jermain Taylor. The younger, bigger champion Taylor vs. the more experienced, defensive-minded Wright. Which style will win out?HBO will also show the recent light heavyweight fight between Antonio Tarver and Bernard Hopkins prior to the Wright-Taylor bout. The sweet science is on display at 9:30 p.m on HBO-HD.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
Pull up a chair for Deadwood-themed poker
Deadwood, HBO's stellar, curse-infused western, is returning with their third-season and, as a promotion, they've enlisted Fuel Games to create a browser-based poker game called Dead Man's Hand. As Deadwood is to westerns, Dead Man's Hand is to poker games. The developers describe it thusly: "Dead Man's Hand is a first-person 3D Texas Hold'em game that allows you to sit down at the table with the characters from the show: Al Swearengen, E.B. Farum and Trixie. But poker with Al Swearengen is a dangerous game, and he's a less-than-graceful loser. You'll need more than luck to get out of the game alive."Just like real poker, you can raise, fold, call or pull out your six shooter and start shooting bottles, lamps and the people you're playing against. Just be careful who you point your gun at, lest you end up downing a shot of hot lead."As much as I want to be called a c*cksucker by Swearengen, I can't get the durned thing to run. The game requires the Virtools plugin to run and Intel Mac owners will need to run a PowerPC-compiled browser under Rosetta; Universal binary browsers don't work. I'll keep tinkering. In the meantime, anyone else sating their Deadwood-desires with Dead Man's Hand?[Via Wonderland]Read - I hardly know her! (Fuel Games Blog)Play - Dead Man's Hand (HBO.com)
Summer shows in HD
The new summer shows in HD kicked off last night on HBO and for the first time ever HBO brought us 30 minute comedies in HD, which is one more reason to look forward to Curb Your Enthusiasm . For whatever reason the summer is the time for reality shows, but thankfully cable networks bring us new shows in HD. Last night's shows on HBO were to par from previous seasons and the new show Lucky Louie was hilarious, it is married men comedy at its best, without a doubt the funniest since Married with Children. Yes that is a fake gun in the picture that the uncle brought as a gift for the four year old girl. HBO isn't the only one with news shows, TNT and Showtime both have a few HD offerings to look forward to. June 11th Deadwood Entourage Lucky Louie June 12 Closer Saved July 9th Brotherhood July 12 Nightmares & Dreamscapes Did I miss any?
Entourage 720p trailer on Xbox Live Marketplace; Season 3 HD?
One of the laments of my summer drought post was that one of my favorite programs, Entourage on HBO-HD, would not be in high definition since it hasn't for the first two seasons. However today they have posted up a 720p trailer on Xbox Live Marketplace (along with a theme and gamer pics) proudly touting itself as a Hi-Def trailer, so it seems likely that we will get 1080i display of the adventures of Vince & friends. Summer HDTV watching is definitely looking up now.
Widget Watch: HBO Widget
I haven't been this impressed with a widget's capabilities in a long time. The HBO widget is highly functional and eye candy-infused, allowing you not only to check the program guides for both HBO and Cinemax channels, but you can browse and view their 'large collection' of teasers right inside the widget. Top that all off with a really slick minimizing ability to get all this intensive content out of your way when you'd rather save the cycles, and I think I've found the latest widget to receive a 'click of my mouse™.'The widget is, of course, free and available from HBO's site.[via Daring Fireball]
Spartan-458 in action
If you've not managed to get some Spartan lovin' in Dead or Alive 4 yet, never fear; you can still get your fill of the lovely lady thanks to this video, put together by a poster on halo.bungie.org. It goes nicely with the screenshots Major Nelson recently posted. Whether this will tide us over until Halo 3, we're not sure, but it's spectacular viewing in the interim.[Thanks, Mintz]
