While we’re doing site updates… I’d like to thank weephun, who donated the I Love Bees Commemorative DVD for the ‘Blow Me Away’ Charity Auction, for contacting the 4orty 2wo team that put the campaign together – he’s gotten them to agree to sign this DVD! If you win this item, you’ll not only be getting one of a very small number of DVDs… you’ll be getting the ONLY one signed by the crew that made it happen. Go bid! (In other auction news, with just under 7 days to go, total bids are up to $7700. A sign?)

At the moment, we have a total of 24 entries for our 343 Guilt O’ Lantern Pumpkin Carving Contest. (A few are simply spectacular – but there’s room for competition.) The deadline is still a day and a half away, so there’s plenty of time to get your entry in… but you don’t want to pass up the awesome stuff we’re giving away, do you? (A finalized prize list will be up later today – I really want to apologize for the delay.) Update: Prize list is up!

In early October, Elnea released ‘Blow Boys Away’, a girl-gamer anthem – er, parody. A couple of weeks later, QuackJAG created a HaloCE-based video that brought that song to life, visually. Now, ANOTHER video version has been released; Amanda and Sevenar, of Silver Stars/Purple Hearts, have whipped up a pretty slick Sims2/Halo2 meld that uses the character that Elnea voices as a lead singer, coupled with great footage (both band and gameplay) – this one should be seen. I found this in Elnea’s RvB journal, which has links to the hi-res WMP9 and low-res QuickTime that are being served by Amanda and Sevenar – if you’re not an RvB member, you won’t be able to see that anyway. To reduce strain on their server, I’m offering the hi-res WMP9 (17 mb), the low-res QT (8 mb), and a new hi-res QuickTime (16.6 mb) – grab the one that makes the most sense to you.

The Tied the Leader blog has recently been less about general Halo musings, and more about clan-related activities (or coverage of the Doom movie, which might be interesting to the Halo fan from an instructive “here’s what not to do” perspective), but there are still some entries of interest to the general Halo public. I enjoyed the analysis of similar player icons for clan members, and what this can mean for team coordination… and there are some great comments in the post asking for strategies for objective games on Coagulation. All in all, the writing in this blog continues to be top-notch – go give ’em a read!

Last night saw the release of the Weekly Update over at Bungie.net – Frankie dropped heavy-handed (and almost certainly misleading) clues about the pimpin’ nature of their next project, discussed the rediculous overload on Noguchi’s desk, and provided some encouraging words about the Halo 2 Soundtrack, Volume 2. There’s also info on a pair of new, upcoming playlists on Xbox Live (the Insane Team playlist seems like it would do okay pulling some of the wilder gametypes from the old HBO HaloPC servers…), and some subtle pimping of the Blow Me Away charity auction (that Frankie and his pimping…). And more. Go read. (And oh, yeah… Frankie was first.)

Bunch of new content over at MLGPro.com – you can find the second half of Dyslexia’s MLG LA writeup (great read), an interview with Team3D (great podium shot), and some more video on demand from MLG LA. Thanks, 3Suns.

We got word that DropShock, a new Halo podcast, just released episode 3. In their words, it has an M rating. (This means it’s loaded with sexual humor and ethnic jokes.) You might need to follow the Feedburner RSS feed to actually download the shows.

FI3ND and OGRE1 teamed up to bring you a ‘noob guide’ to up-close strategies – worth reading, no matter what your level! Check it out.

Hehe – there are three new commercial spots, running Sunday and Monday on the Sci-Fi Channel, for Stubbs the Zombie… but if you don’t want to wait, they’ve been put up in the Stubbs the Zombie website Gallery. Funny stuff!

Wow. The deadline for entries to our 343 Guilt O’ Lantern contest is coming up fast (just 3 and a half days left)… and we’ve got two brand-new prizes to toss on the pile! Both Steve Downes, voice of the Master Chief, and Tim Dadabo, voice of 343 Guilty Spark, have agreed to contribute the recording of a message on your answering machine (or your cell phone’s voicemail, or whatever you choose); the first place pumpkin will get their choice of actors, the second place pumpkin will get the other one. Wouldn’t you like the Master Chief telling your callers “I need a message.”? (The message itself is completely up to you. They’ll just bring it to life.) Tacked on top of an Xbox, and EB Games gift cards, and an I Love Bees DVD… if you’re not carving a pumpkin, you’re tossing away your chance at some awesome prizes.

Over at Wideloadgames.org, the second half of the Glenda Adams interview has been posted. (We mentioned part 1 last week.) Lots of good technical info on why some of the choices that got made went the way they did; I find it amusing that PC retailers are STILL unwilling to go with a DVD-only SKU, even when the game itself requires a top-end, brand-new video card and other hefty hardware requirements. (How many of you have bought a high-end PC in the last year or so that DIDN’T have a DVD drive in it?) A good read – if you’ve got the hardware, this game looks to be pretty slick on a PC or Mac! And for those unhappy with what ISN’T shipping in the PC versions, take heart in this comment:

We have a lot of things (including co-op) we’d like to put into updates after we ship, so Stubbs PC/Mac will definitely not be a game that is released and forgotten.

Thanks to the Battle Cat for the heads-up.

Stuntmutt continues to obsess about Spartan 458 in today’s One One Se7en. I wanted to high-five Cortana at the end of this one.

Wow. I looked on Wednesday, and there were only 3 stories in the Fan Fiction queue. This morning… there were 17. Busy Thursday, I guess! Go read.

The official film selections for the 2005 Machinima Film Festival were posted yesterday – and nominations for the awards themselves went up on Wednesday. There are a LOT of familiar names in there… on both lists. Go check ’em out! The Awards Ceremony will be held in Astoria, NY on November 12 – good luck to all! Thanks to Z for the heads-up.

Halo Babies has put up a Halloween-themed strip today… I’m LOVING it. Go read!

A couple of bits of site news… the forum thread started yesterday, discussing the merits of keeping the original voice actors for many of the Halo roles, has garnered quite a bit of attention (including some from a couple of the voice actors themselves); the thread is almost 200 posts long, and a large percentage are on-topic. Most respondents (though not all) seem to want Master Chief’s helmet to stay on… and most respondents (though, again, not all) want the original voice actors to reenact their roles in the movie. Have you made YOUR opinion known? And the Blow Me Away auction, now just 19 hours old, has already collected more than 60,000 pageviews and more than $5500 in bids. You guys ROCK!

Halo Podcast Morning, I guess – Halo Nation has posted their newest ‘cast, called ‘HALO-ween Special’. Go listen!

Podtacular Ep 19 went live yesterday – it covers Waterworks. Apologies to Foo Mo Jive, who sent mail early, but got buried in the auction work. Go listen!

Mat Noguchi gave a studio tour to Scobelizer, of Channel 9 – it’s pretty heavy on the geek side of Mat’s job (and Halo development in general), but for those who like that stuff, it’s pretty interesting. Vid is tiny, but quite watchable. Thanks to Mat, who was FIRST!!, and to Odyon, who noticed it on Scobelizer’s blog. Format is streaming WMP9 (ugh).

It’s been in the planning stages for a long time – but it’s finally here! “Blow Me Away“, the charity auction to benefit hurricane victims, supplied by Bungie (and a couple of generous fans) and administered by us, is finally on! The first item is already available at eBay. Subsequent items will be added every few minutes (this will give people time to move from one to the next at the OTHER end, as auctions are closing), so be sure to keep checking back on our auction page. There’s some truly droolworthy stuff in there for hardcore Bungie fans… dig deep!