Wow – this is a new one for me. 2old2play is hosting a LAN party in Chicago… and they’re charging $60 to get in. They’re shooting for 32 gamers (on 16 TVs) – but if they get more, they have a second venue that can handle up to about 70. And oh, yeah – you have to bring your own Xbox and controllers. (TVs will be provided, though.) If you’re over 25, and are either in Chicago or willing to fly there on Saturday, August 13… swing by and check out the page!

The Halo CE Chronicles have kicked off Season 2 with Episode 10, now available from the HCEC video page. Many new characters, but the focus remains on the Spartan and the station AI – very nice use of repurposed footage. Go check it out!

SanchezTheLlama put together a guest strip for CTF, a Halo-influenced comic (not all strips are safe for work, so careful if you go backwards). Do women on XBL have a harder time than men? You decide.

IGN has a Sniping Locations on Coagulation FAQ online – this is fan-written, and starts with the dubious information “Xbox Live = no fun”… but you might find some useful info inside. Update: looks like I mentioned this in January. Seems I wasn’t that impressed with it then, either – guess I gotta be careful with Google News Alerts from now on. Thanks, nof.

How do you follow up your 343rd strip? With true cheese, of course. Go read One One Se7en – but don’t get carried away.

Jamie98s whipped up a nice little video (WMP9, 10.6 mb | QuickTime, 9 mb) showing some of the pretty stuff in Halo 2’s multiplayer maps. No plot – just pretty. The Jack Johnson soundtrack is a perfect fit, too. There haven’t been a lot of films passing the MPRRS recently – this is one. Go watch.

Twelve new pieces up in today’s Fan Fiction batch – go read!

The CPL Summer 2005 event kicked off yesterday; [HC] D-Man has put up a writeup on HALOChat, including links to pics, and a writeup on GotFrag. These guys are playing for a $10,000 purse – go check out the first day of action!

We mentioned Doug Godfrey a couple of weeks ago – he’s been working on some MC models based off action figures, instead of in-game stuff. He dropped by our forum last night to point out a short rendered animation (4 mb, DivX format) – he’s not sure where he’s going with it, but so far, it’s looking pretty cool!

Gamespot has posted seven new movies, showing gameplay on the new maps. ‘HD Quality’ downloads (yeah, right – they’re 480×360 MPEG1s) for Gamespot Complete members, streaming WMP9s for the masses. Check for the ’07/07′ posted date.

MLGPro.com has put up a huge new batch of Video on Demand content for subscribers – Finals and semi-finals from MGL St. Louis. There’s more on the way today – keep your eyes peeled! Thanks, 3Suns.

New Halo Babies strip available today… looks like Baby Cortana’s growing up. Ouch, Chief!

There are four new articles up in the Articles and Extras section of Overswarm’s Not So Common Sense guide. You’ll find pieces on Team Organization and Communication, as well as reviews of the Maptacular Map Pack and the training website Console Pro. Check it all out!

The MLG interviews just keep coming – this time, it’s the IGameSpot team (second place in MLG St. Louis, formerly Legendz. They talk about their performance in STL, and what’s next for the members. Thanks again, 3Suns.

Both IGN and TeamXbox have released reviews of the Maptacular Map Pack – if you’re still not sure if you should pick ’em up, read these.

MLGPro.com has posted info about MLG Las Vegas, coming August 12-14. There’s a slight twist to this one – each room needs to be booked (and checked into) by someone over 21 – this is Nevada state law. Beyond that, though – looks to be a fun event! Thanks to Ecko, from HaloPlanet, for pointing it out.

Captain Spark finally got the IWHBYD skull to work successfully – and man, does it help produce some funny dialogue. The first couple of dozen snippets were released today – you can snag ’em at his website, or browse through them in our Dialogue Databank. Awesome stuff!

Nirvana has re-encoded low-res versions of the Hollywood Halo Update 4 vid released a few days ago – if 87 mb was too much for you, grab the ~30 mb versions he’s made.

Last night was the kickoff event for Video Games Live, and it seems to have been quite a success. The LA Philharmonic performed music from many video games – and the finale was Halo 2. Marty O’Donnell and Mike Salvatori were on hand and available for questions and autographs – once again, Marty suggested taht the Halo 2 Soundtrack is being held up by MS lawyers at this point. Thanks to NSA, Reinsoft, and mnemesis, who sent in email or posted to our forum with tidbits. If you get the chance to see this show elsewhere in the US this summer… go.

We’ve mentioned a Freelancer Halo mod a couple of times – seems they’ve stalled for lack of help. (This will be the last of this type of ‘please visit’ posts we put up for this project.) They’ve got a screenshot of their ‘slipspace effect’ graphics – except without Halo models so far. If you’re interested in seeing this mod succeed, go visit.