Kotaku notes that the Japanese release of Halo 3 works in US/NTSC Xboxes. Usually the reverse (US releases working in overseas consoles) is true, but not the other way ’round. The only catch is Japanese language audio with apparently some grammatical problems, according to comments.

The Sydney Morning Herald wants to know what you think of Halo 3. If you’re Australian, that is.

PlanetXbox, among others, is tracking forum posts from Halo 3 players who say they’re having some disc error messages as well as some freezes; there’s also a known issue where transferring a hard drive to another console will prevent you from using the “resume” feature to play from where you left off (although unlocked levels/checkpoints are accessible).

…next week.

It will come as no surprise to regular readers of this site that I’ve lived overseas for eight years, and as such, I can’t walk down to the corner store to pick up Halo 3, it has to be couriered to me.

I ordered a Legendary Edition from EBGames.com, and Blackstar has now shipped it to me via FedEx. If you’re really, really bored, you can track the package’s progress! I’m told next Wednesday it should arrive.

However, the only reason I’m bothering to post this is that the charge for sending the game turned out to be (if you ignore the cents) $117, which I thought Halo fans might get a kick out of.

Pro-G has delivered the promised longer interview with Bungie’s Joe Tung and Lee Wilson.

GameGuru interviews Mohit Anand of Xbox India, who makes some pretty ludicrous sounding sales claims for Xbox 360:

GG: How is the Xbox 360 currently doing in India?

MA: Good question! As per your survey, all of us would be out of our jobs. Your survey says 1500-1600 units. If that were the units that we sold, I guess we’d all be out of our jobs. We don’t disclose figures on a nationwide or a region wide basis. All we can say is that worldwide were are now close to 16 million units sold, which is more than all of the other next-gen consoles that have been launched today.

That’s funny, since the last claim from Microsoft I saw was around 12 million consoles worldwide, 4 million short of the 16 Anand claims. Plus, you have only check the night map on the Halo 3 page at Bungie.net to notice that however many Xbox 360 consoles there are in India, there are precious few of them online in Halo 3. Not even 1500-1600; at the moment of this writing, there are none showing.

Looking to unlock some of those cool armor permutations in Halo 3? Thumb at The Hushed Casket has got you covered with an armor guide.

7th Columnist is livid over a change in Halo 3’s controls. Not one that affect the game; one that affects machinima.

Instead of just pressing down on the D-pad to create the weapon-lowering, head-bobbing effect used to create the illusion of talking Spartans in movies like Red vs Blue, in Halo 3 you apparently have to:

Hold down left bumper, right bumper, left analogue stick, down on the d-pad and the A button… AT THE SAME TIME… for three seconds!

It’s a ridiculous feat in itself that feels as clumsy as pulling off a ‘fatality’ in Mortal Kombat. Worse yet, the feature can only be used in system link and local play, NOT over Xbox Live where many machinima pieces (This Spartan Life, for example) are filmed due to the ease of using ‘actors’ from anywhere in the world.

That sounds pretty terrible. Might this be part of the reason Red vs Blue isn’t transitioning to Halo 3? Why would Bungie make such a change– is down on the D-Pad performing some other function this time around?

That’s what BeyondUnreal forum poster Quaz51 asserts that these screenshots he’s taken illustrate.

If true, might this be the source of all the cantankerousness over Halo 3’s “not quite next-gen” graphics?

Kotaku says that Halo 3 sold out in at least one store in Japan. Who’d have thunk it?

Chicagoist notes Bungie’s hometown roots at the University of Chicago, Jason Jones‘ continued leadership of Bungie, and Alex Seropian‘s founding of Wideload.