Yesterday, Ducain pointed out a post on the High Impact Halo forum; it was made by Chubigans, and had links to a pair of movies. The newest one looked at Halo 2 combat from the viewpoint of your Marine buddies, the older one just checked out some of the cool scenery you run into throughout the game. Both show some spectacular filmmaking technique; great camera angles, nice choices of content. This is a guy to keep an eye on. (Warning – some of the content might be considered spoiler material. Not by me… but then, I’ve already received angry email about some of the news posts I’ve put up, so clearly my view is more lax than some.) The HIH forum is down right now, but that’s okay, because the links in the original forum post are dead (from bandwidth overload). We’ve grabbed copies of both movies (they were in WMP9 format), and put them up on bungie.org and mythica.org servers – and made QuickTime versions, as well.

“In the Front Lines” (Halo Action Vid):

• WMP 9 format (27.4 mb) – mythica.org, bungie.org
• QuickTime format (21.5 mb) – mythica.org, bungie.org

Halo Sights Tour:

• WMP 9 format (14.1 mb) – mythica.org, bungie.org
• QuickTime format (11.1 mb) – mythica.org, bungie.org

This is a lot of byteage – if you can help with these, please send us mirror links, and we’ll pass ’em along. Now go watch! Update: Thanks to the7thwar.com – we’ve got another mirror for the QuickTime version of the Sights Tour.

Hehe – Stuntmutt bemoans the audio shortcomings of Halo 2 in this blog entry – thanks, Rampancy.net.

John Kirkpatrick entered a Halloween contest at a local nightclub – his Master Chief costume won him some cash. Nice!

Dinky points out an article at Gamespy that looks at the ‘Top 10 First-Person Melee Weapons‘ – the Plasma Sword from Halo 2 is number 6. Update: 7he One { Ryan R } points out that he noted this article on our forum about a week ago – oops…

omnistegan points out yet another morning news special on the horrible effects of violent videogames on our youth. This one was CTV AM, a national morning show in Canada, and it interviewed the director of Minnesota-based National Institute for Media and the Family, who issued their 9th annual video game report card today. Once again, Halo is lumped in with games like GTA: SA. In the video segment (direct feed for folks who can’t watch it in-page), he actually claims that a recent study (this week, apparently) shows that ‘the anger center of the brain activates and the control center of the brain deactivates’ – but he doesn’t actually give any reference for this, and he doesn’t discuss WHICH games were looked at. (He doesn’t even really talk about what this MEANS.) I gotta say – guys like this activate MY anger center. If anyone actually has a reference to this particular study (if it does, in fact, exist, and is peer-reviewed science), I’d love to post it. Thanks!

Robb Hutzal points out a tournament in Calgary, Canada, to benefit the Calgary Children’s Hospital; registration is $60 per 4-player team, gameplay will take place on January 28/29, 2005, and there’s $5000 in cash and prizes on the line. More details can be found at the Maasai Clan website. While you’re there, Robb suggests you visit the Chronicles section – another member of the clan has been writing Fan Fiction, and the entire collection can be found there.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Sometimes, though, 3 pictures can be worth one word. Take One One Se7en, for example. (I leave the word choice up to you.)

Yesterday, SketchFactor posted a note on the Bungie.net forums detailing changes that are being made to the Xbox Live Matchmaking Playlist – it looks like (if all goes well) these changes will occur shortly after the Thanksgiving break (meaning next week, for folks not familiar with US holidays). Some good info in there! Thanks, SYSTEMS.

Having trouble with that second hangar bay on Cairo Station on Legendary? Mike Miller has summarized some of the existing resources out there to help you through, as well as adding 3 of his own movies. Amazing to watch, they show me how far behind the curve I really am, reflex-wise… but that’s okay, because the entire post, as a whole, gives me enough info to actually get through this area. (One small trick that Mike took advantage of in his first video, but didn’t spell out in the post, is that if you leave grunts alive from a particular wave, the next wave of elites won’t drop down; this can give you a small breather – just make sure you keep at least one grunt alive until you’ve killed all the elites from that wave. You can see him doing this at about 1:30 into the first movie.)

cuc pointed out a series of articles written by David Thomas, a journalist with the Denver post – all are well-written, but 3 are very similar to hundreds of other articles that we’ve mentioned. One is different – it’s the article cuc mentioned first, and it takes a rather more thoughtful approach to Halo 2 and its attributes. I found it most interesting for the observation that ‘Ludology drowns out narrative’ – this concept pins down a problem I’ve been having trouble with since Halo 2’s release; how can a game with a much richer story be LESS engaging than its predecessor? (Thomas’ answer is simple; if you’re too focused on the actual gameplay, you won’t NOTICE the story – which leaves you with less of a feel for it.) Was Halo 2 too action-packed for the story to really penetrate? You decide. (Read the rest of the article, as well; there is some interesting speculation about how Halo 2 will affect the gaming industry as a whole.) Update: Actually more of a tangent… the same author of this article writes a revealing response to another item in today’s news about violence in videogames. I (Ding) can’t stand the hypocrisy!

If you need a cheap copy of Halo 2, and you live in the US, you’ve got a shot on eBay; SYSTEMS pointed out an auction where someone tried it for 10 minutes (it was a gift) and put it on the shelf. Starting bid is $30, Buy it Now price is $40, and the auction ends in 15 hours or so (it was a 1-day thing to begin with).

Thirteen new pieces in the Fan Fiction section today – a bunch of poetry. Go read!

Boatloads of new fan artwork over at Halo Babies today. Hopefully, if all goes well, today will be a windfall for misc-art lovers… we’ll post our own update. Viewers win! For now, though, check out the dozen or so new images at HB.net.

Wow. A a couple of different articles have come out recently about violence in video games, both including Halo 2 in with games like GTA: SA. As far as I can tell, they’re not even about the same organizations… Gamespot reports about a 5-member coalition, including the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, the National Council of Women’s Organizations, Mothers Against Violence in America, Center for Advancement of Public Policy, Justice, and Witness Ministries of the United Church of Christ, that is looking to harden the policies about selling Mature-rated games to minors. (It looks like they got their info from an ICCR Press Release – thanks, UNEXPECTED62.) Australia’s The Age reports statistics from The National Institute on Media and the Family. (Thanks, Brett C.) Is a game that glorifies violence against women and the police really not any more dangerous to our children’s worldview than a game that pits us against alien aggressors in an attempt to save our planet (and our race)?

Okay, we’ve opened a forum specifically for Clan HBO on XBL – this forum is there for organization of clan matches, discussion of tourney rules, that sort of thing. It’s not limited to just clan members; if you’re interested in becoming a clan member, but didn’t make it into the group before the Bungie-imposed 100 person limit, this forum might be a good place to discuss the formation of a second HBO-affiliated clan. It’s a phpBB forum, which should make some people happy… but signatures are turned off, so many of those smiles might turn to frowns. Stop by, find friends, frag each other!

Is the plasma sword hazardous to your health? Maybe. Check this article at Aussie Xbox on ways to escape this deadly addiction. Thanks, Hep.

Dolbex points out that there are two new themes for groups over at the Seventh Column. I’ve switched the HBO Junkies to use the Mullins Halo 2 theme, and Dolbex has set Been Mawed to use the Column WW theme, so you can see them both in action. Nice!

Major Nelson yanked the top 10 games on Xbox Live last week – guess what was in the number one spot? (Yeah, tough guess.) Thanks, Cybrfrk.

Writing music is hard sometimes. Adapting music can be even harder – but often moreso on the listener. Dork Tower points the way NOT to take. Thanks, E1337.

It’s amazing what turns up when you’re not looking. We got email from Jeremy Durkota about a machinima series known as ‘Alone’ – it was created by a Red vs Blue fan and promoted on the Sponsors vs Freeloaders site (they’re a RvB fansite)… but when I visited a couple of days ago, I was surprised to find not one or two episodes, but two SEASONS. There are a dozen films, ranging from promos to commercials to actual episodes, almost all the work of one guy, Matt Spencer. Check out Echo Zulu Films!