rockslider has updated his Bad Cyborg website with a couple of warthog joyrides you can do on the second level of Halo (the original). I’m pretty sure I’ve done these – but it’s nice to have them delineated!

The latest episode of Podtacular is this week’s customs and call-ins episode. Go grab it. Thanks, GLewis.

Red vs Blue Episode 66 was posted last night for sponsors; they’ve moved to the H.264 codec for their QuickTime version, which means if your processor can handle it, you can get a great-looking video that’s only 9 mb (vs almost 30 mb for the other two flavors). The episode itself is pretty funny – I’m starting to feel sorry for Simmons. Not REALLY sorry… but a little bit. This ep will be available for non-sponsors by Monday. First heads-up goes to ShdwRngr.

Hehe – last weekend, I attended the birthday party of Miguel Chavez’s oldest son with my kids (Rafi turned 10). The party had a Halo theme… but I didn’t put up any pics or a writeup because… well, because Rafi is 10. The cake, however, was designed by Gruntsbane, over at Halo Babies, and Mig sent THEM a bunch of pics… so go check it out!

1Up has an article comparing (and contrasting) the Dreamcast and the Xbox360 – amazing similarities, in some cases. The differences are where 1Up thinks Xbox360 will get over the hump the Dreamcast never cleared – and one of the biggest is Halo (both older versions, and ‘Halo 3’ – yeah, we know it’s not announced yet). Thanks, DHalo.

Though for the time being, the links are bold and in-your-face, I know how easy it is to overlook stuff that’s been there for a while… even when it’s glowing. So here’s a news post to remind you. The Blow Me Away Charity Auction ends tomorrow – the first auction to finish (the Joyride figures) ends in one day and two hours from the writing of this note, and the last to finish (the I Love Bees signed commemorative DVD) is over an hour and a half after that. (There are roughly 5 minutes between auction endings, so there’s always time to jump to the next one if you get sniped.) Total bids are a bit over $9200 right now… but a few items are fantastic deals, and might go up before closing. (Shishka started an interesting thread on our forum recently, wondering why the totally unique Bungie art is selling for less than the signed posters; the thread holds some suggestions for answers, but I’d agree with him that for Bungiephiles, stuff like the Jam Board is hard to beat.) Also closing soon, but not QUITE as soon, is the voting on the 343 Guilt O’ Lantern pumpkin carving contest. 5000 of you have weighed in so far – but that leaves lots and lots and LOTS of Halo fans who haven’t spoken up. There’s no signin required, no email to fork over… all we’re looking for is your opinion on carved pumpkins. Look ’em over, label your top 5… voting closes Tuesday night, late, so there are still a couple of days to think about it.

Wonga. That Weasel has posted a note explaining that the Rockets on Prisoner Awards ceremony is now downloadable. It’s… pretty long. Almost an hour and a half long. Downloadable, in either WMP9 format (228 mb) or QuickTime format (291 mb). I tried to watch it… but my QuickTime player crashed. The forum post contains plenty of other links, including text versions of all the winners, if you missed them.

Bungie’s Weekly Update is posted – stuff on upcoming playlists, plus stuff pulled from user-contributed questions. And a really awful furry Mister Chief. Go read. (Thanks, Frankie. No, really. Thanks.)

We’ve been given permission by Stephen Cawood, author of Halo 2 Hacks, and his publisher, O’Reilly, to bring you a few excerpts from the book itself, in PDF format. (We’ve also added movies that Stephen and his editor, Brian Jepson, put together to illustrate these tidbits.) Look ’em over… if you like what you see, the book has 100 entries like these! (ObDisclosure: I co-wrote the forward to this book, along with Ducain, from High Impact Halo, and Grenadiac, from HaloMods.)

Broken Console Productions have posted The Squadron Episode 9 – the team has almost found a way out of Turf. WMP9 is up now (14.5 mb) – the QuickTime is on its way. Go watch!

Elnea’s been messing with her new Wacom tablet – the last few avatars she’s made have all been created with it. Check this one out – she found out that her dad visits RvB. (Remember that Elnea is a mom herself, in her 40s.) Ouch!

mnemesis, along with a bunch of helpers, has managed to get all but two Halo 2 level transcripts online at the Halo Story Page – only Sacred Icon and Quarantine Zone are missing. Go read both posts for more details, especially if you’d like to help out with the missing levels!

Stuntmutt, ever the cynic, points out that when talking about the upcoming Halo movie, what the fans want and what will actually happen might not be the same thing in today’s One One Se7en.

When I visited the Fan Fiction queue this morning, I was a little nervous – it was huge. Turned out, though, that much of it was spam, and some of it was porn. (Sorry – even if it’s on-topic, I’ve got to draw the line at porn.) At least two entries were folks attempting to get around the 750-word minimum by adding garbage at the start and finish of their piece. When all the extras were stripped away, we were left with 9 entries. Go read.

The Tied The Leader blog has quite a bit of fun reading at the moment… there’s a response to the article we mentioned yesterday, in which a female college student rails against Halo 2 for stealing her boyfriend; there’s a short note about a photoshop contest over at Fark, and there’s a great writeup of a LAN event put on by the 2old2play WEST Clan, in which much fun was had and money was raised for charity. Go read! (It’s interesting; that article about gaming vs relationships has spawned quite a bit of discussion; there was this thread on our forum yesterday, and a new one today.)

This week’s Halo Humpday Challenge pitted the Bungie guys against the Cayote Cavegirls – they lost 2 out of 3 (both teams agreed to call the third game a draw). Ouch! Good writeup, though. Frankie continues to hog credit (though at least he’s getting creative with his FIRST subject lines).

Podtacular has posted its weekly Tips show – this episode focuses on Beaver Creek. Go listen.

char pointed out an article over at Gamepro that looks at things that are wrong with First Person Shooters, in general; Halo is held up as an example of how NOT to get it wrong. Go read!

LegendaryMark wrote an article examining why so many players stick with Halo 2, even though the universe of multiplayer games continues to expand. Swing by halowiki.net to read it!

Over at Halo Babies, some of the DOA girls take shots at poor Spartan 458… meanies. Thanks, mrsmiley.