nof found a superiffic new Halo remix over at OverClocked ReMix this morning – it was posted a couple of weeks ago, but this is the first we’ve heard of it. It’s a reworking of ‘Insurrection’, and while it sounds a lot like the original, there are also some pretty cool additions. Check it out! (And no, we don’t think there’s any such word as ‘superiffic’ – nor would we ever use such a thing, normally… we were goaded into it by the Gnawfster.)

Half of Halo’s levels are now documented in the Halo Cutscene Library – the two scenes from Assault on the Control Room were added today. (Chester The Destroyer also posted a couple of bloopers he recorded at some point, when he was working on recording cutscenes he never submitted to us – the second one is pretty cool!)

A few days ago, we mentioned a high-quality montage vid released on Halo2Forum.com. It was submitted to our Movie Peer Review Rating System, as well – and has passed. If you already grabbed the ginormous WMP9 version at halo2forum.com, you can pass on this – but if you haven’t, you might want to take a look. The thread referenced in that previous post is full of people complaining that Vrbas isn’t a spectacular-enough Halo player to warrant praise for the montage – but I’d disagree. He’s good – but that’s not really the point. The point is that he made a really well-constructed montage; very, VERY high quality visuals, beautiful timing, interesting footage. Whether he’s good enough to win MLG St. Louis is irrelevant – most of the people playing in that tournament can’t come close to making a montage this enjoyable to watch. We’re offering a 66 mb QuickTime version (bungie.org | mythica.org) – if you can’t stand QuickTime, the links are still up for the 110+ MB WMP9, over at Halo2Forum.com. (If they go down, we can BitTorrent it – but I don’t think we can handle a direct download of that size at this time.) Update: HaloChat has secured some hosting for both versions at FileFront – think big, big pipes. Go grab. Update 2: That Weasel Television has mirrors of both versions, as well – thanks, Feenix!

There’s a new Halo Babies posted today – comes with a spoiler warning for Star Wars III, but it’s pretty funny if you’ve seen the movie.

Wanna give us a hand with our content needs? mnemesis has posted a Help Wanted ad on our forum – he’s looking for level transcriptions. Read the post if you’re interested – as he said, it would be better if we didn’t have duplication of effort, so telling us BEFORE you start is a good thing. And… thanks, in advance!

Whee… Jillybean updated the Halo Story Page with a fan-driven theory, which led another fan to write a blog entry disputing the conclusions, which led to a forum thread about the whole idea. So many words – and the speculation continues!

There’s an interesting article over at Gamasutra – a report of a round-table discussion behind the scenes at E3, involving several industry personalities, including Joe Staten of Bungie. The topics under discussion was character and story development, and how they fit into games today – I’m loving where the conversation eventually got to. Each member brought his own perspective to the table – Joe’s experience with Halo and Halo 2 helped shape his views. Thanks, Deanero.

BloodSignature has released the Harvest 2 trailer, a trailer to the sequel to Harvest. 9.5 mb, almost 3 minutes long. You can grab it from their site, or from a mirror at halomachinima.com. Thanks, trigger119!

Thanks very much to the kindness of SanchezTheLlama, we’ve added a third cutscene mirror to our Halo Cutscene Library – you can now download from bungie.org, mythica.org, or enfinityservers.com. w00t!

Gah. Yesterday was so busy here, I forgot to release any new cutscenes in the Halo Cutscene Library – apologies! If you swing by today, you’ll find all 5 scenes from Silent Cartographer have been added. I’ll do my best to stay on schedule.

Infernus has released a Mac version of his Xbox Live Experience Calculator – you can grab a copy over at Rampancy.net. (The PC version was first mentioned in this forum thread – there are download links in this post.)

trigger119 wrote to point out that HaloMachinima.com has mirrored all of the PraetoriaGuard vids (including yesterday’s Episode 3, both versions). Check ’em out!

Eep – this came in yesterday, but I missed it. DSmooth, of 2old2play, pointed out a new podcast they’re doing, called 2old2type. The first episode is about 60 minutes long, and chock-full of info from E3 this year, including Halo 2 map info. Go download and listen!

Duke87 wrote to us about UK Halo Match Maker, a UK-based tournament community that’s looking to launch its league this Sunday. Matches will be 4v4, with up to 10 people per team – the league will operate like a football league, with one match (3 games) per week, with 3 points for a win, 1 for a draw and 0 for a loss. You can also find league information or an application form for participation around the place. If you’re in the UK, check this out!

Mike Riess writes to say that his website, h2press.net, is offering a free video hosting service for Halo vids, with ‘unlimited space and bandwidth’. You can read the details in this forum post.

Captain Spark whipped out another 30 unique dialogue snippets – you can grab the lot in zipped format on his website, or view them individually in our Dialogue Databank.

What happens when plasma grenades fall in love? What’s a tynosaur, and why should you run from it? What ARE popcorn shrimp, anyway? These questions, and many more (as well as a mini-melee montage) can all be found in the latest video release from PraetoriaGuard’s website – hit ‘Downloads’, and grab Video Three, “Where’s The Beef?”, in either WMP9 Advanced or WMP9 Standard formats (thanks, Gideon, for taking care of the Mac crowd!). A bit over 22 mb, in either format – 8 minutes of hilarity and Cheech and Chong imitations.

With the release of Revenge of the Sith recently, there’s been some silly Star Wars/Halo arguments on our forum (okay, maybe not silly, but… no, silly). Stuntmutt joins in with a new One One Se7en. (To be fair to him, he never really intended this to see the light of day – if it makes you groan, blame me.)

I’m breaking a rule because… well, because I want to. Last night, Jamie98s posted a movie on our forum – it’s a remake of 28 Days Later, in the Halo engine. It’s 25 minutes long, and does an amazing job of capturing the feel of the film. (It’s abridged, clearly – but it uses the audio track from the film married to footage from Halo 2, and stays very true to the atmosphere of the original.) The movie is quite large (73-74 mb, depending on flavor), due to its unusual length. You can find a number of mirror links in Jaime98s’s forum post – but most of them are limited in the number of downloads they’ll support, so we’re putting up several mirrors of our own (the rule I’m breaking is the ‘no posting movies without MPRRS approval’ rule).

    WMP9 (72.5 mb): b.org 1 | mythica.org | b.org 2 | HBO Spartans
    QuickTime (73.5 mb): b.org 1 | mythica.org | b.org 2 | HBO Spartans

Go watch this – there’s a lot of work put into it! Update: trigger119 has made copies of both versions available at Halomachinima.com, as well. Thanks, trigger!

sh33p has decided to start a summer league for fun, not rank. Rules are posted at his website, and motivation and basic info can be found in the forum post. If you’re looking for an alternative to matchmaking, this might be for you!