The traditionally insane ‘biggest shopping day of the year’, the day after Thanksgiving, helped push Halo 2 over the 5 million mark in sales in less than 2 and a half weeks. You can read the press release for more details. Thanks, Dolbex.

I know it seems like pigpiling on Bungie… but it’s not. Yet another hardcore community member has taken the time to write out, coherently, what he thinks is wrong with Halo 2. Mothergoat wrote up a ‘Reflections on Halo 2‘ post on our forum, looking at the little things that (for him anyway) diminished Halo 2 from a GREAT game to a great game. (Tip o’ the hat to Dazza for the distinction.) Before anyone goes ballistic: mothergoat says, clearly, “I love Halo 2 as a video game. Just… not as a Halo game.” Personally, I find it heartening that so many longtime fans are making the effort to try and nail down what it is about Halo 2 that disappointed them; not a single one of the criticism posts we’ve mentioned recently has said ‘Bungie sucks!’ or ‘Halo 2 sucks!’ or ‘I’m never buying another Bungie product again!’ These are people who LOVED Halo, and (for the most part) LOVED Bungie, and want to see them get it right(er) next time. They want to turn the great game that is Halo 2 into the GREAT game that could be Halo 3. (Or whatever it ends up being.)

Recently, Bungie posted two new desktop images – both contained ‘Covenant text’ at the bottom. The code, it seems, has changed a bit since the Halo2.com site went live – but Ain Soph Aur, with the help of Hybrid-X-Ultima, managed to decode them anyway. (‘Jiralhanae’ is the Covenant name for ‘Brute’, according to the Limited Edition manual.)

There’s yet ANOTHER Stats aggregation option now (thanks, Craven); vviperrx, at the Bungie.net forums, has written a perl script to do the basic work for you. I just tested it out (the linux version, which I ran under FreeBSD – it’s pretty generic Unix, actually), and it works nicely. There’s also a Windows version – I haven’t tested it. He’s still working on it, and more details can be found in that forum thread. I’m going to hold off on any NEW aggregation techniques; it sounds like an entire section needs to be set up, and I don’t want the front page overrun with this sort of technical stuff (I realize it’s only interesting to a subset of our readers). You’re welcome to continue sending in stuff you find – but realize I won’t be posting it until I find time to compile a full ‘Stats Tools’ section.

Hehe – you thought the Covenant came to Earth to kill us. Calvin has learned otherwise, in today’s Calvin and Halo.

A few days ago, kornman00, ViperNEO, and Fayt released a movie runthrough of a new level they were working on for HaloCE – called ‘The Engine Room’, it recreates the space from the Maw pretty nicely. (Thanks to MasterGrief for pointing this out.) The following day, kornman00 released a beta version of the map. (There’s another version coming tomorrow, probably.) Check this out!

There’s an interesting news post over at Bungie.net – it addresses some of the fears and desires fans have expressed about long-term stats. Currently, there’s no easy way to archive your old stats when Bungie does a purge… and even between purges, there’s no way to look at your CUMULATIVE stats (total kills in all games, etc). Bungie.net user Clustered Index has put together an Excel worksheet that helps solve these problems – you can read about it (and download it) from his website. Nice! Update: Apparently, the XML tools needed for this don’t exist on all versions of Excel. focused7 sent mail saying you needed “Excel 2003 with a Microsoft Office Professional install” -I hadn’t realized things were quite so spread out on the PC side. (On the mac side, you can buy Office. Period. The version of Excel that comes in it uses this worksheet without problems.) Update 2: Eep, I’m wrong; I can VIEW content, but not import it. In order to use this worksheet, your copy of Excel will need XML Import tools. Sorry! (Thanks again to focused7 for setting me straight.)

Thanks to the 8 million people who pointed out that Bungie has updated the XBL Matchmaking playlists; visit the news post for an overview of what has changed, as well as links to the full list of gametypes.

A few website reviews for you today:

• SignOnSanDiego.com – 4 stars, ‘less repetitive than Halo 1’, but ‘ending is surprisingly awful’. (Thanks, kinggun)
• Wired News – ‘excellent game’ with ‘considerable flaws’ (thanks again, kinggun)
• Gaming Nexus – 7.6/10, a scornful-enough review to be mentioned on Bungie.net (interestingly, the same site did a SECOND review, by a different reviewer, Halo 2 rated an 8.9/10.)

Wow. Buxton has recreated the first episode of Red vs Blue… with Legos. It’s nearly flawless – attention to detail is amazing. So here’s a game (Halo) that was so good it inspired a group of guys to make a movie based on (and using) it… which was so good it inspired someone to reproduce that movie in an entirely different medium. It’s an onion, I tell you. Thanks, Legolaso111.

A few days ago, Randy Glass put forth his thoughts about Halo 2 – and they inspired one community member to… well, go postal. The thread got locked soon after (before I had a chance to weigh in), and after calming down, the same fan started a new, calmer thread. It’s so far generated quite a bit of insightful commentary about Halo 2, and how it differs from Halo, and is worth a read if you’ve already finished the game. (There are a number of posts in the thread containing spoilers.) The incident also, however, inspired Stuntmutt to look at the entire issue through the lens of One One Se7en – can humor defang the rabid fans? Let’s see.

Last week, David Galindo made a name for himself with three separate videos – one which took you on a tour of some of the prettiest places in Halo 2, a second which looked at your compatriots, the Marines, and a third which showcased the Covenant. He’s back with a fourth film – this one looks at the Flood. As usual, fantastic camera angles, nice blending of video and music. It’s available in WMP9 format (19.3 mb) from both mythica.org and bungie.org, and QuickTime format (16.3 mb) from mythica.org and bungie.org. Nice work! Update: David’s own website is back online, and contains some pretty cool information, including a tutorial on how to make movies like this. Check it out!

Michelle Rodriguez, an actress who supplied some of the marine dialogue to Halo 2, talked pretty frankly to 1UP.com about videogames in general, and her contribution to some of them (including Halo 2). Nice read. Thanks, Voodoo Extreme.

Wonga. New Letters to the Webmaster over at Bungie.net; along with the usual ridicule and scorn is word of the possibility of customized shirts (emblazoned with your gamertag). Hmm… the ridicule and scorn is pretty fun, too.

Ducain has whipped up a gorgeous little section with information about the 15 bonus Skulls strewn throughout the single-player game. If you don’t know what this means, go read the page. If you DO know what this means, but have been looking for an easy-to-use guide (including levels, effects, and methods for finding – including video), this page is for you. (The info isn’t new; it’s been built up at HIH over the past few weeks. The PRESENTATION is new.)

While you’re at Bungie, picking up new desktop images, be sure to check out the latest job openings – they need an Art Production Manager, a Graphics Programmer, a test tool builder, and a Tools programmer, as well as some temporary positions. If you think you’ve got what it takes, send ’em a resume!

Two new wallpapers to be found over at Bungie.net – put together by Shishka, they do a great job of showcasing both the ODSTs and Tartarus. Available in 4 sizes each. Go get ’em!

A million people have been sending us mail about the last page of the upcoming XboxWorld magazine in Europe. It says ‘Halo 2. Didn’t think there was more? Think again!’ And then, below that, ‘Plus! If all goes to plan, a massive world exclusive first look… NEXT MONTH!’ Folks have been theorizing that this refers to everything from downloadable content to Halo 3, coming out next month. Looks like Spong got the lowdown… the Halo 2 ‘more’ is a Multiplayer guide booklet, and the ‘world exclusive’ is the new Medal of Honor title. Sorry for any burst bubbles.

Last week, a few people turned in speed runs of Outskirts – and I mentioned that I’d really love to see a speed run of Cairo Station, on Legendary. Today, Cody Miller obliged. I was amazed. It’s not perfect – he dies twice (in the same place both times), but man… it’s beautiful. 10:19, from start to finish. The film is QuickTime format, 64.8 mb, 480×360 (just like the GNF speedruns). Grab a copy, and check out the shortcuts you missed!

The ongoing saga of Calvin’s meeting with the Covenant continues in today’s Calvin and Halo. I’m thinkin’… Calvin might have just gotten himself into something big…