As I’ve written before, holidays are pretty fantastic at 343. Sometimes we have unlimited amounts of Lucky Charms, other times we get custom Halo valentines. Most times, there is a lot of delicious homemade food. This past Tuesday was Earth Day, and as you may have guessed, it was a pretty big deal here at 343. Sitting on each desk on Tuesday morning was a little surprise in the form of a custom-made trading card. It is worth noting here that the cards were made from 100% recycled paper.

The franchise team put together a collection of eight trading cards, each featuring a planet from the Halo universe, and gave each employee a random card. This made everyone excited, and also made some people want all of the cards. I may or may not be one of those people. The planet I received was Earth – good place to start, I thought. I quickly looked around at neighboring desks to see which cards my co-workers had received, and immediately stared going through my inventory of Halo figures, dogtags, and other trinkets for items to barter with. Others were a bit more direct, and started negotiating trades on an email chain with the entire studio. This is when I knew things were gonna get serious.

By the end of the day, I had traded a set of Halo 4 Infinity dog tags for Sanghelios (URS IV), and was lucky enough to nab a Te (SVIR V) in exchange for a future favor. I realize this may have been a questionable decision, but I really wanted the card. At the time of this writing, I am still actively searching for the remaining five Earth Day 2014 Halo trading cards. I will find them.

This week, we’ve got a new issue of Halo: Escalation, a (heavy) Halo 4 Matchmaking update, and more. Let’s chat!

The fifth issue of Dark Horse’s ongoing comic series – Halo: Escalation – is now for sale! Missing for thirty years, a legendary UNSC warship is discovered deep behind enemy lines. As Infinity plans a rescue mission, however, Admiral Hood’s past with the ship’s captain threatens to jeopardize the mission. The investigation into the UNSC saboteur continues as the journalist infiltrates an Elite holy land in search of answers.

Published by Dark Horse Comics, Halo: Escalation spins directly out of the events of Halo 4. Below, check out pages 6-11 of Halo: Escalation #5.

Visit the official Dark Horse website to purchase Halo: Escalation #5.

Gaming conventions have already kicked off for the year and Penny Arcade Expo, or PAX is no exception. While there wasn’t a Halo presence at PAX East this year, as a gamer on the east coast, it’s a hard event to pass up. For us, the big games of interest were Titanfall and the announcement of the Borderlands Pre-sequel. Our PAX experience this time, however was filled with what most people would get out of a PAX experience: waiting in lines, walking the show floor over and over, and attending various panels instead of our normal shenanigans of handing around what Halo presence or booth there has been in the past since we’ve been going. My good friend Vanirfreyja was there along the journey for the PAX East weekend and joins us as we take a look back at the highlights of the expo.