Those “hidden” screenshots on Xbox.com? Turns out there were three of them. Gamersyde put up all three; here’s the one that wasn’t obvious to find, a multiplayer shot, seemingly from Sandtrap. Thanks Louis Wu at HBO for the heads-up.

The second part of the new spoiler system is now in place; user account level front page preferences.

Click the My account link near the top of your account box in the lower left-hand column. You should see a tab called “roles”. Here you’ll see a list of all the spoiler settings, just like on the front page: no spoilers, no H3 spoilers, no old spoilers, all spoilers, and only spoilers.

Choose the selection that you want to be your default front page view; the page view you see when you’re logged into Rampancy.net. You can still override that view at any time, from the front page, by choosing any of the spoiler views listed at the top of the front page. This setting doesn’t prevent you from seeing any particular item; it just customizes the front-page display only according to your preferences. Spoilers can still show up on other pages, or in search results. If you want to browse around and still not see any spoilers, use the keyword browsing page and make sure to exclude spoilers.

This works similarly to the spoiler system at HBO which I assume you’re all familiar with, but there is a slight difference, which I’ll try to explain in less than three paragraphs.

HBO does this by setting a browser cookie when you make your spoiler preference selection, just like it does when you set your viewing preferences in the forum. That machines that for the browser you are using, on that particular computer, your spoiler preferences are set. If you switch to a different web browser or go to a different computer, that other setup doesn’t know who you are and doesn’t know your spoiler preferences.

R.net does this according to your account login. This means that as long as you use your username and password to login, the site will remember your front page spoiler preferences regardless of what browser you’re using or what computer you are on. If you click the “remember me” button on the user login page, then the site should keep you logged in until you expressly logout, so your spoiler preferences will always be remembered. NOTE: Only do this on your own computer!

The first time you set these preferences, you’ll be redirected to the default home page, which is the nospoilers view. Just click the home link and you’ll be redirected to your new default page view. As before, the default view is no spoilers, and the default page view for all anonymous users is no spoilers. That, combined with this new system, means that nobody should be seeing any spoilers on the front page unless they really, really want to.

Have fun and let me know if you have any problems.

One, two, three… damn.

Download | Shownotes

This week we talk all about the many videos recently revealed on YouTube and such which reveal lots of details about Halo 3 and Halo Wars. Joining JVB and I this week are Quality Jeverage and Crimson Viper. Show’s about 51:30. Enjoy!

Freeverse’s XBLA port of Bungie’s FPS classic Marathon 2: Durandal recently got an auto-update; you may have noticed the last time you played the game. Freeverse’s web page has a news post up about the update. The highlights are:

• Survival mode in demo
• More sensitivity controls
• FOV setting (for people with motion sickness problems)

For a more complete list of changes, see Freeverse’s site. Thanks haveblue for the heads-up on Freeverse’s post.

According to GameDaily Biz, Bungie Studios’ own Director of Cinematics, CJ Cowan, will be giving a special feature presentation at ADAPT 2007 in Montreal. The presentation will be on Halo 3, focusing on the in-house use of Maya along with Bungie’s proprietary cinematic tools. Cowan’s presentation will be on September 27th; the conference runs from the 24th to the 28th at the Hyatt Regency.

A redesign is taking place over at the Bungie store–check out the work in progress.

Gamers With Jobs urges gamers not to expect too much from Halo 3, because nothing can live up to the hype. While examining the extent to which our appetites are dictated to us by the omnipresence of information about AAA must-sell titles, it does seem that some of Julian “rabbit” Murdoch‘s theses say more about his approach to gaming in specific and entertainment in general than the medium itself.

In response to having one’s expectations brought too high, Murdoch quotes Alice Walker:

Expect nothing. Live frugally on surprise.

However, if Walker had been a gamer, perhaps the more appropriate quote to choose for Halo 3 would be:

What the mind doesn’t understand, it worships or fears.

Thanks for the heads-up to Louis Wu at HBO.

XerxdeeJ at Tied the Leader interviews the Master Chief himself, Steve Downes, for the second time. Head right on over and download it!