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RT: These things happen…
As you’ve no doubt already read about 30 times, Bungie announced yesterday that they are now independent of Microsoft, a move that is being assured as mutually benefitial to both paries. But what does this mean for young Master Chief? Today’s comic wants…
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Bungie and Microsoft – tighter than ever
And ANOTHER Bungie/MS interview – this time it’s Harold Ryan and Shane Kim, talking to 4players.de, a German site. The interview is in German, but longtime Bungie fan Harry Al-Shakarchi was there to provide us with a beautiful translation. (Louis Wu 21:46:52 UTC)
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Bungie LLC retains ownership of Pimps at Sea
There’s another interview with SketchFactor over at 1Up about the split; pretty much the same info as you’ll find in the other Bungie interviews. Sketch DOES suggest that Halo 3 might be better because of Bungie’s disappointments with Halo 2 – something I’ve believed since I first saw the game. Thanks, Zeouterlimits.(Louis Wu 21:26:03 UTC)
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Take cool screens, win cool cash
The360Forum.com is hosting a Halo 3 Screenshot contest – there are 5 categories, with a $50 prize on the line for each one. Go read the rules! Thanks, Z.(Louis Wu 19:16:11 UTC)
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The Split, Reexamined
The New York Times looked at the Microsoft/Bungie split; it doesn’t have a ton of new info over other articles about the subject, but is notable for being in the Times, I suppose. It’s also interesting because of the image at the top of the article; it shows Bungie environment artist Eric Elton working on “a Halo video game in Kirkland, WA” – but it’s not any architecture I recognize. So it’s showing either something that got cut from Halo 3, or something that’s going into a future Bungie release (DLC, maybe?). Thanks, Usul. Narcogen, over at Rampancy.net, did a great job of summarizing the press reaction to the announcement; articles I found worth reading included an interview GameDaily did with Frankie, a short interview with Brian Jarrard at MacWorld, in which he agrees that future Macintosh development could definitely happen, and an interview at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer with Microsoft’s Shane Kim and Bungie’s Harold Ryan. We’re entering exciting times for Bungie fans…(Louis Wu 19:11:20 UTC)
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Halo 3 meets V8 Supercars
PROPH37 sent us some interesting info about Australian racecar driver Rick Kelly, who will be wearing (or wore, I guess; the race happened this weekend) a Master Chief helmet in the Bathurst 1000, a V8 Supercar race. You can actually WIN this helmet, by answering some trivia questions (if you’re an Australian/NZ resident). Go check it out!(Louis Wu 18:51:47 UTC)
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I think they missed Stuntmutt’s category.
Blogcritics has posted a guide to Halo 3 multiplayer – see if you can figure out which category of player you fit into! I think I’m either the Team Player or the Noob. Or maybe the Noob Team Player.(Louis Wu 18:26:11 UTC)
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Super Halo Brothers
Heh – this is fun. Xbox 360 Fanboy found a video of Sandtrap, modified for platforming, with sound effects from Super Mario Brothers. If you want to see a larger version of it, they grabbed it from GameVideos – and you can actually download the modified level from the FileShare of finjitzu, the guy who built it. (Louis Wu 15:22:09 UTC)
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Awesome Guitar – For You?
Back in July, we mentioned the first 3 for 3 sweepstakes on Xbox.com – and we noted that you could win a cool Ibanez guitar. Seems Ibanez is giving away 3 more, over the next three months – along with the game and a couple of shirts, each month. Go enter! Thanks, Electric Guitar Review.(Louis Wu 15:14:35 UTC)
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What folks won’t do for schwag
Weird. Some guy is trying to play Halo 3 for three days without sleep. He’s already a little over 2 days in – you can follow that link to see his progress. If he does it, he wins a 360 and a copy of Halo 3. Thanks, Mintz. (Louis Wu 15:13:47 UTC)
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Workin’ through the levels, step 5
Jake Seaton’s Mission-A-Day, Episode 5, is now up – this is the last one until Monday. He gave this one a 4/5 – the action was too easy. (Louis Wu 15:09:57 UTC)
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Saturday Handful of Reviews
Just three reviews for you today:- Bentley College’s The Vanguard gave Halo 3 8/10, and said that the multiplayer rocked, but that the Campaign didn’t have enough to keep people interested.
- The University of Hartford Informer says “don’t say, ‘it’s just a game’.”
- Inland Valley’s Daily Bulletin says it’s no religious epiphany, but it’s solid. Score is 1/2 (huh? A 2-point rating system?).
Looks like the hype is dying down – or is this that backlash Tom’s Games was talking about?(Louis Wu 15:08:55 UTC)
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Marty to talk to Major Nelson?
Shinesevens caught a glitch in Major Nelson‘s RSS feed – it’s cleared up now, but from what he could see, Sunday’s podcast is going to be an interview with Marty O’Donnell. Look forward to it! (Louis Wu 15:07:07 UTC)
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Jealousy is an ugly emotion
zugy pointed out a video at Tom’s Games that looks at the backlash against Halo 3 in the PC gamer community. Heh – I guess if you’re not IN that community, you might not even have KNOWN about the backlash.(Louis Wu 15:05:11 UTC)
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Sword GIMPing
thePheonix9 played with a bunch of sword shots in multiplayer, adding comic-like filters to them. The end result was pretty nice!(Louis Wu 15:03:08 UTC)
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Sketch looks forward
Great interview with SketchFactor, over at Kotaku – it clarifies a few things about the new Bungie/Microsoft relationship, talks about what might be coming, and confirms that the Halo DS stuff that resurfaced last week was, indeed, real; it was a proof-of-concept project that never got off the ground. (Lots of folks noticed that it was clearly built on the Goldeneye: Rogue Agent engine… but that doesn’t make it fake.) Thanks, Red_Breast.(Louis Wu 14:55:45 UTC)
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Drink Up.
ViralSyris noticed some new party cups in the Bungie Store – perfect for lanfests.(Louis Wu 14:50:08 UTC)
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Microsoft Owns Halo, No Outside Investors In Bungie
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has an updated story on the to-all-visible-appearances amicable Microsoft-Bungie split, including comments from Bungie studio head Harold Ryan and Microsoft’s Shane Kim.
It’s well worth poring over. Both Kim and Ryan are extremely evasive regarding any of the financial details, but they do say that the Halo intellectual property belongs to Microsoft, and that Bungie is “not bringing in any outside investors”. Not sure if that means that going forward they aren’t bringing in any, or whether there are no investors other than Microsoft and Bungie itself.
That probably indicates either some kind of management buyout, where members of Bungie, perhaps including Ryan, sought bank financing rather than an angel investor in order to buy a controlling stake back from Microsoft, or perhaps a special deal involving future publishing revenue that allowed Microsoft to spin off Bungie as a separate unit with majority control going to some or all Bungie employees without any payment; on that point Kim is silent, saying (several times) that details will not be disclosed.
So, to summarize:
- MS owns Halo
- Bungie will still make Halo games
- Bungie will still make Xbox games
- MS will publish Bungie games, Halo or not
The funniest bit? When Kim tries to dodge a question about a vague statement about Bungie becoming, at some undetermined point in the future, “fully independent” and replies:
Kim: It doesn’t matter about equity stakes. Fully independent, completely in control of their future and doing what they want to do, regardless of who owns what.
Right. It doesn’t matter who owns what. That’s why Microsoft bothered buying them in the first place, and is now spinning them off. Because ownership and control are unimportant. If it didn’t matter, why bother doing it?
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Community Reacts To Bungie’s Regained Independence
Here are more links to articles on Bungie’s bombshell announcement:
Nobody asked Bungie about the rumored separation in the thread for this week’s update, but Frankie dished on it anyway. Effective October 1, Bungie is an independent company with a long-term publishing agreement with Microsoft Game Studios for Halo games.
GameDailyBiz interviewed Frankie about Bungie’s new status.
Kotaku conducted a short email interview with Brian “SketchFactor” Jarrard to find out what’s next for Bungie.
7th Columnist reposts the press release and invites community comments.
The Hushed Casket also reposts the press release, with reader comments.
For other stories, see:
- XboxSolution
- PlanetXbox360
- Xbox360Fanboy
- Major Nelson
- Slashdot
- Kikizo
- MTV Multiplayer Blog
- The Escapist
Mainstream media have also picked up the story:
The Macintosh press is having a field day with the news, given Bungie’s track record as an independent game developer with its roots on the Mac platform:
There’s not much commentary yet, but John Dvorak weighed in, apparently just before the announcement went public.
Louis Wu at HBO responds with wonga as he is wont to do. There are also threads (one, two) in the HBO Forum.
On behalf of Rampancy’s founder, Ferrex, I’ll say zang as I’m sure he would have, or perhaps even has at some time in the recent past, deep within Bungie’s headquarters for world domination. Perhaps even kudos are in order.
The latest news about the Halo series of games from Microsoft