Hawty McBloggy has put together a piece on real-life Cortanas – we’ve covered most of them before, but there’s at least one new one, and her take, even on the ones we’ve seen before, it a good read. Check it out!(Louis Wu 16:49:37 UTC)

There’s a new episode of Halo Action Figure Theater available today – our heroes get some help from an unlikely quarter. Carrying unlikely weapons. And suchlike.(Louis Wu 15:51:41 UTC)

Major.Dump stopped by with a couple of eye-popping links – these are movies he created as CG adaptations of existing material. The first is a reproduction of Red vs Blue Episode 1, and the second is a trailer for his interpretation of the ‘Armor Testing’ story seen in the Halo Graphic Novel. Both are astounding – I hope we can get high-res versions of these that we can share. In the meantime, though, go watch the YouTube versions. They’re great.(Louis Wu 15:31:29 UTC)

Bry decided to create some very specific panoramas – these are devoted to Halo 3 vehicles. Specifically, he’s completed the Pelican and the CCS Battlecruiser. Swing by his post for links – there are some gorgeous pics in there!(Louis Wu 15:26:06 UTC)

SonofMacPhisto pointed out a Mongoose Montage, posted at MLGPro.com and highlighted by Bungie’s new blog – you’ll see some pretty amazing driving, shooting, and pwnage in general. Check it out!(Louis Wu 15:22:50 UTC)

The Screen Play blog in the Sydney (AU) Morning Herald has an article about Framework, a game development conference that took place in Melbourne yesterday. A significant chunk of it is devoted to some information from Keith Steury, who was involved in usability testing for Halo when he worked for Microsoft Game Studios. There’s some fascinating info about how decisions were made, and what sort of changes came about because of the testing. Go read! Update: DOH! Didn’t notice Ding beat me to this by a few minutes. Worth the read twice, I guess. (Pretty funny that we focused on the same point for our headlines…)(Louis Wu 15:17:58 UTC)

NartFOpc pointed out a school project on YouTube – someone used Halo 3 to create an overview of the Holocaust. Many of our forumgoers found this in bad taste – but I’d have to say that it’s a well-done treatment. The subject material was handled with respect. Decide for yourself!(Louis Wu 15:11:10 UTC)

RevDotNed suggested some light summer reading – Grand Theft Childhood looks at the relationship between violent video games and behavior. Halo is mentioned a few times, which helps justify its presence here on HBO’s front page – but really, this is a subject that comes up a lot, and this book seems to do a reasonable job of addressing it. Check it out!(Louis Wu 15:04:35 UTC)

Back on May 22, we mentioned a weekly film clip feature from G4TV’s X-Play, whereby TSquared, from Str8 Rippin, provided tips on Bungie’s maps. Since then, there’ve been two new ones – Standoff aired May 27, and Rat’s Nest went live June 3. Step up your game!(Louis Wu 15:00:59 UTC)

Keith Steury, formerly of MGS, spoke at an event in Melbourne and touched on how Bungie changed the rules when it comes to testing. Though back in the day it almost turned into a meme (“Bungie cares more about mothers that play Halo!”) this article highlights that clever selection of datapoints gives you richer results. The result being a smoothly polished game experience we’ve come to love in the Halo series. Will it continue to bleed into other games? Looks like our friends down under are listening! Hat tip to Google Alerts.(Ding 14:59:32 UTC)

Remember this rumor about a Halo prequel? It’s popped up again, in a different form – CVG is reporting that the latest issue of EGM has some info about something that sounds the same – but there’s no mention of Gearbox. Hmm… same game, different developer? Different game altogether? Totally false rumor? Your guess is as good as ours. (Louis Wu 20:54:10 UTC)

The latest Inside Halo (Episode 16) is now up for downloading on YouTube – they’re still in Mexico, it’s still surreal, but they’re coming home. News, video picks, top plays. What more could you want?(Louis Wu 20:42:28 UTC)

ZZoMBiE13 takes a break from his break to bring you rules about how to submit Guest Strips for Another Halo Comic Strip. Go read ’em… then get to composing!(Louis Wu 20:40:55 UTC)

Grunts R Us has put together a Halo 3 Meta Game guide – point values for everything are laid out for you to study. Plan out your high score today! Thanks to Bungie’s new blog for the heads-up.(Louis Wu 20:36:26 UTC)