A couple of weeks ago, Phoenix_9286 posted a link to the start of his new ‘comic’ (I’m not sure it can be called that; it’s more of a storyboard tale, or something – he creates it by combining in-game screenshots and comic-style dialogue balloons). I forgot to mention it – but recently, he posted a link to the fifth episode – and the writeup below that contains links to the first 4. He’s cranking them out at a Stuntmutt-style rate, and there’s a plot, even, so it’s time to mention this. Go read ’em over at DeviantArt.

Stephen Loftus continues his in-depth analyses of the structural underpinnnings of the Halo universe – tonight, we have a treatise on how he’s determined sizes of various objects and creatures. A good read, with great graphics. Check out his Halo Scale Comparison!

Mike Miller’s Legendary Walkthrough grows by another chapter – Delta Halo is now posted. Sixteen vids will help you get through this gorgeous level in style. (Be sure to check the main page, as well; there are a few updates, most notably the Sword Flying information added yesterday.) Mike’s not sure whether he’ll make the Tuesday deadline for Regret… but whenever it comes out, it’ll be worth the wait.

A couple of years ago, folks sat down and timed the respawn intervals between various weapons and items on various multiplayer maps in the original Halo. We posted the findings in our Miscellaneous section. Now, MurderDog and some friends have done the same work for all the Halo 2 maps; for folks wondering how long they have to wait for that Rocket Launcher, this should help.

Alan James continues his work on a Master Chief suit – the main body piece begins to be formed. You’ll find the progress shown on his suit page.

Fans ROCK. An anonymous one just sent me one of the coolest Halo gifts I’ve ever received – a Nightmare Armor helmet (shot 1 | shot 2). It’s stuff like this that will finally get me to build a Halo display area in my office, I think. My week just got better.

Saint has updated the Library with all of the I Love Bees wav files. If you’ve never listened to these, and never felt like looking for them, they’re nicely organized in one place. (Hint for folks announcing stuff on our forum – you’ll get more readers if you actually provide a LINK to the new content. Or even just to the site you’re talking about, generally.)

Jump Tactics has announced a Jump Tournament – show off the best jumping skills, win stuff like controllers, T-Shirts, video hosting. You can read all the details at HALOChat, or on our forum. Competition starts in less than three weeks – get practicing!

Wow, cool. OxYgEn, over at the Gearbox forums, has announced a new Halo CE map based on (of all things) a piece of Tina Leyk artwork. Check out the starting phases of Installation 07. Thanks, MasterGrief.

Brian Jarrard, aka SketchFactor, is still in Asia on a promotional tour for Halo 2 – he recently gave an interview to the DigiTimes.com, in Taiwan. It’s a general piece, introducing Taiwanese readers to the phenomenon that is Halo 2. Nice little sketch of Sketch, though!

A very large number of people have pointed us to this article on IGN. This page reports that, allegedly, Microsoft and Bungie are already working on Halo 3, and that it will be timed to coincide with the release of the PS3 (expected in early 2006, but Sony hasn’t fixed a date yet). Remember, this is a rumor– there is absolutely no evidence for this anywhere else on the net. Try to think of it the same way as you would a Halo movie story.

Over at Geezer Gamers, there’s a writeup of a game in which a team tried to glitch their way to victory – but didn’t count on the tenacity of geezers. (Go geezers!) Worth a read because it points out the sort of unsportsmanlike conduct you can run into on XBL – and what can be done to counteract that conduct. First brought to our attention by 3Suns, but I was goaded into posting by Dave Friesen. Go read.

Matt Stum wrote to let us know about playroster.com – a new network that is billing itself as ‘the World’s First Online Celebrity Gaming Network’. Their launch title will be Halo 2 – and their goal is to hook you up with celebrities playing online. They plan to list what celebrities are online at any given time (along with their gamertags), plus scheduled gaming events and live streaming video of celebrity sessions. This looks like an expansion of the existing (Microsoft-run) Game with Fame program – done by a third party. It’s unclear from what’s online at the moment how much of this is actually sanctioned by the celebrities they’ll be tracking. If you sign up now, you get a free 12 month membership; once the offer expires, you’ll have to pay to get in.

Today’s One One Se7en shows that you can, indeed, take a joke too far.

A couple of tourneys came across our inbox recently… Michael M. pointed out one that’s taking place in New Zealand – visit the Halo 2 Battle website for more details. (It’s happening the first two weekends in April.) And Kevin Bunch pointed out a pair of tourneys being run by MVP Gaming in Michigan; end of April/Early May, Halo and Halo 2, $70/$120 per 4-man team to register (for one or both tourneys, respectively), $1000/tourney payout. Details can be found on the tournament web page. New Zealand and Central US – Halo gaming, spanning the globe!

Stephen Loftus has spent an awful lot of time studying the intricacies of the Halo world – to a degree that some might consider fanatical. In the coming weeks, we’ll be bringing you a variety of his speculations and analyses… but to start with, we’ve put up a page devoted to a 1/1000 scale model of the Pillar of Autumn he’s building. This is a work-in-progress; at this point, it’s a skeleton of the ship. The detail, however, is astounding… check it out!

Red vs Blue episode 50 has been posted for sponsors; it’s MASSIVE. 124-129 mb, depending on format… 16 and a half minutes of revisionist history. A whole bunch of mysteries from Season One are finally cleared up – sort of. Awesome episode, overall… for everyone except Shishka. If you’re not a sponsor, this should be available by mid-week. Thanks to all who wrote in to let us know.

Jillybean sifted through some forum posts and emails to put up another few tidbits on the Halo Story page today; a novels-based morsel commented on by Eric Trautmann himself, along with some speculation about the mechanism behind Halo’s offensive capabilities. Go read!

Today’s Prickly City comic looks at one of the pitfalls of pushing the visuals envelope… thanks, pirate stunn.

HALOChat has also posted an interview with a high-ranking Halo 2 player – it’s described as part 1 of 3 of ‘Speaking with a Pro’… but from reading the interview, it looks like cAPPy204 is just someone who plays a lot. (I can’t see anything that suggests that he does this for money anywhere.) Comments can go in the forum thread HALOChat started to announce this.