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.

Wortrow celebrated the Halo/Halo 2 transition by eating. Good idea!

Long time coming (as usual) – but there are 32 new images in the Miscellaneous Art section. Renders, sketches, paintings – lots of good stuff! Go look. Wallpaper coming in the next day or so.

The July issue of Wired magazine has a nearly 20-page section on remixes – how creative projects involving the work of others have grown in recent times. They look at everything from music and art (the obvious) to movies (Tarantino, anyone?) to cars and candy. The final piece is a two-page, visual spread, showing the last 100 years or so and some of the remixes that have happened in that time. The final image of the spread is… Red vs Blue. Not bad! (Large chunks of this content are online – including the first half of the 2-page spread. Read them soon, though, because that link won’t work once the August issue hits the stands.)

You knew it was coming, right? Wow – when Stuntmutt first submitted some strips for a pun-filled Halo comic strip in 2003, who knew he’d make it all the way to 343? (And with jokes like this one, it’s STILL a mystery.) Congrats, One One Se7en.

For folks looking for strategy tips for the new maps, you might think that the Strategy pages at Xbox.com (Backwash, Elongation, Gemini, and Relic – no Terminal yet) would be a good place to start – but you’d be wrong. Well, the Relic and Elongation pages have some MINOR info that might be helpful – but mostly, they’re just summaries of the maps. Bummer.

Last Friday, XerxdeeJ added an item called ‘Wish List‘ to his Halo blog, ‘Tied the Leader’ – it looks at add-ons he wishes he could buy for his Xbox… that would go with games he wishes he could buy for it. The piece spawned a pretty sizeable response from 3Suns – who suggests that his playing ability in Halo 2 might be tied to the shortcomings of the controller he’s forced to use. It’s more a discussion of ergonomics than a whine – I’m not sure I agree with him (my thumbs seem to fit the controller better than his do, or something), but it’s a thought-provoking post. Give it a look!

DSmooth points out that 2old2play has posted episode 4 of their podcast news summary, 2old2type, on their website. They discuss everything from the new map pack to nudity in video games – the download is 29 mb, available via BitTorrent. Go listen!

Razgriz points out that Frag Nutz, a Halo 2 clan, has the full collection (Episodes 1-57) of Red vs Blue online for registered user download (with permission from Geoff of RvB). If you’re looking for any of these, swing by! (Check out the rest of the site while you’re there.)

MLGPro’s Dyslexia sat down with Team 3D after MLG St. Louis to talk about their win, and about playing in general. A good read – go check it out! Thanks, 3Suns.

SketchFactor has posted a beautiful preview of Gemini, over at Bungie.net – strategy, map overhead, screenshots of the Marathon Infinity level that inspired it, gameplay tips. You can’t go wrong. Go read it!

Eep – almost forgot. Jillybean updated the Halo Story page with some interesting speculation from the fans. There would have been more, but her dog ate it. Or maybe it was her computer. I can’t remember. Go read what’s there, though.

For folks wondering about whether installs from the Map Pack DVD are tied to a key or serial number of some sort: if you own multiple consoles, you’re okay installing the maps on all of them from a single DVD. It’s way cheaper than buying the DLC for each Xbox you have (I had to buy Sanctuary and Turf 3 times, because my son’s birthday party – a Halo 2 party – was right after the release date).

For anyone having trouble downloading the five new maps on Xbox Live, SketchFactor has reprinted Major Nelson’s Downloadable Content FAQ – go read it at Bungie.net. And yes, we know about the Relic teleporter glitch. (For those who don’t – it’s quite simple to pass through the teleporter, in either direction, by simply crouch-jumping on top of the platforms.) No, it won’t kill matchmaking. It just means there’s one more place to watch at the start of the game.