I stumbled across a blog entry from someone named Ryan Fitzgibbon, who highlighted a short video created by Nicholas Werner called ‘Break: Halo 3‘. It’s a short Halo machinima, no voice acting at all… but he’s done a fantastic job of tying together the multiplayer maps in a way that feels right. I enjoyed the chase.(Louis Wu 13:47:05 UTC)

ReleasetheMonk created a cutscene montage tied to the St. Crispin’s Day speech from Shakespeare’s Henry V. It works surprisingly well. Check it out!(Louis Wu 13:46:11 UTC)

The Winter Pentathlon finished in spectacular style, apparently – complete with the presence of a live goat. (No word on whether the goat was eaten after the festivities.) Pictures and results are now in the updated Bungie.net article. Check ’em out!(Louis Wu 13:45:42 UTC)

The Winter Pentathlon is now in full swing at Bungie Studios – Newbies take on Grizzled Ancients for glory and the power of the Bungie Fist. Go read about it! (Because of this competition, there won’t be a Weekly Update tonight – this is the last you’ll hear from the crew until next week… at which point SOMEONE will be licking wounds, and plotting about next year.)(Louis Wu 20:41:13 UTC)

Looks like The Cole Protocol is a hit – Tobias Buckell points out a few sites with bestseller lists. It’s #4 on the New York Times Trade Paperback list, #6 on the Publishers Weekly Trade Paperback fiction list, among others. Nice! Thanks to TTL Demag0gue for the heads-up.(Louis Wu 19:14:59 UTC)

Computerworld’s Dan Tynan found a site hosted by a conservative Christian investment group which rated recently-released videogames on their child-unfriendly content. Dan was offended by what he saw as a narrow-minded attempt to apply morality to video games – but I think I have to agree with the first commenter, who saw the Timothy Plan’s list as a resource that can be used by parents who want to know what’s in the games their kids are playing. (Halo doesn’t rate high enough to make their ‘graphic guide’ – it scored only a 6 out of a possible 39, with points for mild sexuality (presumably the naked Cortana), medium violence and bad language, and mild game addiction.) While I’m usually unhappy with the way videogames are portrayed in general by the Christian right, in this case, I’d have to say the guide can be useful if you’re a parent who worries about these things (and doesn’t play enough games to find out directly).(Louis Wu 15:25:45 UTC)

Hawty McBloggy hijacked a bungie.net thread for her community feature today – go see what she wants you to think about!(Louis Wu 14:45:41 UTC)

TTL Demag0gue stopped in to let us know about Reclaimer 120 – we’re getting more of the big picture.(Louis Wu 14:45:22 UTC)

Bungie.net continues their ramp-up to the 2008 Winter Pentathlon – there’s a short preview of the events in this year’s competition up now. Halo (the first one) is one of the games. Check out the nice poster!(Louis Wu 14:44:59 UTC)