PraetoriaGuard has opened a new website – Halo2Cheaters.com. They want to provide a player-accessible database of cheaters; you can submit gamertags and game links, upload vids of cheaters, or just vent. (All reports will be reviewed by site admins before being made public; you won’t be able to accuse the guy who just pissed you off unless he really DID cheat.) They’re aware of the h2cheats@microsoft.com feedback address – but none of what goes there is made public; this gives the community a chance to see who’s who. The full press release is here, on the PraetoriaGuard forum – or just visit the new site. Update: Just found this post on our forum; looks like CarnageStats.com is helping, too. W00t!

MLGPro.com has started up a new weekly feature, to be posted on Fridays – it’s called ‘Editor’s Corner’, and it gives Dyslexia a place to hold forth on topics of interest. This week’s rant (posted on Sunday, accidentally) looks at the recent AutoUpdate – or, more accurately, at the reaction it’s received on forums around the net. It’s a surprising read – here’s a guy who is fully immersed in the MLG culture – he provides the majority of the content on the MLG website these days – writing that people in general, and MLGers in specific, should take a step back and stop hating Bungie for dumb reasons. Whoa. (I’m POSITIVE he’s gonna get a lot of flak for this one – but I agree with almost everything he says, and applaud him for saying it.) Thanks to 3Suns for the heads-up.

duderlock wanted us to point out that the GameRiot tour will be hitting the House of Blues in LA this week – visiting will give you the chance to play against Zyos; score 3 point, win 6 months of Gamefly rentals… beat him, get $100, an MTV jacket, and an MLG management contract. This is true – but it’s also true everywhere GameRiot goes; there are still plenty of cities left to challenge him in. Check out the tour schedule! (So far, 3 people have garnered management contracts in this competition, the latest in St. Joseph, MI, last week. You can read about it in the blog of BJ, the site host.)

RmicF is working on a Halo vid, and looking for help. You can see some renders of the work done so far in his forum post – looks promising!

*Butcher interviewed Foxygrandpa117 (I refuse to write it the way he did), and posted the result on our forum. Just turned 15… and has been part of the tricking scene for a while, is going to tournaments, it’s interesting. Go read.

rockslider continues to add battle plans to his Rockslide Megabattle site – check this forum post for details. Great to see this stuff is still being refined!

Patriarch917 continues his Halo Parody spree – the latest entry is ‘My SMGs’, a takeoff of Green Day’s ‘Minority’. It weighs in at 2.4 mb, and you can find a download link – and lyrics – on his music page. (His email address is at the top of the page, if you want to let him know what you think of these songs.)

Yet another one of those Top X lists – Gamespy put up a ‘Top 5 Xbox Live Games‘ recently, and Halo 2 took the number one spot. Nice! Thanks, Promotheus.

Yesterday, a fun Flash piece passed our Movie Peer Review Rating System – it’s the first episode of ‘Life in General’, submitted by Tim Murray, and it tells the tale of four friends playing Halo. It weighs in at about 9 mb, and we’ve put it up on a page for viewing. Enjoy!

The Halo Humpday Challenge happened a bit late again this week – the Bungie guys played Xbox Taiwan this time around. Mintz found 4 matches, with Bungie winning the first and last, but losing 2 and 3. (He missed this game, which came between his first and second game, and was won by Bungie… and this one, which came between his 2 and 3, and was won by Xbox Taiwan.) Shishka said that the writeup won’t be up until Monday, but that Bungie didn’t lose… as I see it, they won the first two out of three, and overall they won 3 out of 6. I guess we’ll have to wait to see what’s what.

Okay, I’ve got no confirmation on this (my copy of OXM usually comes weeks after everyone else’s), but Mars Man 0013 just wrote in to say that his copy just arrived… and the demo disc contains all 9 multiplayer maps! The cover price of a newstand issue with a CD is probably around $7 (I can’t find it online, but the no-CD cover price is $5), so this is probably the cheapest way to buy these maps – even cheaper if you’ve got a subscription! The September issue will be on store shelves during the first week of August. Update: DeadGeneration passes along the info that the newsstand price of an issue of OXM is $10 – still less than buying these puppies online, especially if you’ve got more than one Xbox!

Hikaru, of Halo Arena, took some time out to ask KP a few questions. (KP can occasionally be seen forgetting to delete the ‘KP’ from the bottom of his ‘Badmin’ admin posts on our forum.) I can’t believe there’s no mention of that life-altering whiffle-ball game anywhere! Good read, otherwise, though. Except for the goats.

A couple of weeks ago, GameTrailers posted video coverage of the Video Games Live kickoff concert in LA – Geary just noticed that there’s an interview with Marty O’Donnell from there up now at Gametrailers, as well. (There are a few other interviews, as well, for folks interested in the tour.) Marty mentions a super-secret guitarist who performed on the Soundtrack, with no credit (by choice) – hmm…

Today’s Weekly What’s Update got an awful lot of its questions from a thread started by Frankie in our forum a few hours ago. Some of them are good, some of them aren’t. The liquid Mister Chief is particularly disturbing. Overall, though, it’s worth a read – and don’t forget to take Frankie up on his challenge! (It’s about a third of the way through.) Thanks to the billions and billions of people who pointed this out while I was at dinner.

Wow… that took a LOT longer than I’d expected – but the Wallpaper queue has been cleared out. 23 entries – 38, if you count all variants. Some are amazingly good. These have built up over the past two months in our uploads folder, our email, the forum… go see what you can find! (Be sure to check the ones you like – some have color and style variants hidden on the display page.)

The Codex, Episode 17, has been posted over at their website… and man, this one’s pretty cool. The Praeceptor has been awakened! Really nice video and audio effects… though I gotta say, I’m not particularly happy about how the battle went. 46-60 mb, depending on the flavor you choose.

MLG has posted another Dyslexia interview – this time it’s Havok and Acidian, a pair of rising stars. These are two of the guys from the much larger pool just outside the limelight… read the interview for a sense of what it takes to break into the ‘big leagues’! Thanks, 3Suns.

Halo 2 CE is DONE! Swing by the EPGServers.com site to grab your copy… this puppy has been a LONG time in the pipe. Beautiful! Thanks, DevilsKnight666.

Chris Bryan continues his rendering efforts on the Master Chief – you’ll find a test render in this post, and another in this one. All I can say is… wow.

Dennis Powers writes to point out that Episode 12 of the Halo CE Chronicles, ‘Bonding’, is now available for downloadin on the Halo CE Chronicles download page. The Spartan finds himself in… strange circumstances, while a rescue party sent to save him runs into pretty big trouble. Roughly 30 mb, in both WMP9 and QuickTime format – go grab a copy!