This was probably a bit more relevant last week, when our forum was full of complaints about the changes to the pistol in Halo 2… but hey, there are STILL threads today about it, so go read One One Se7en and realize that it’s only a game.

Brodingo found a pair of brand-new screenshots on the Dutch site Xboxworld.nl. There’s now a big long forum thread debating whether they’re real or not… for what it’s worth, they look real to me. It’s a map I’ve never seen before… but there’s some interesting stuff, if you look around. Maybe we’ll get word from Bungie about the story behind these – who knows?

New content over at Halo Babies; a new strip (things are getting… weirder) and some new Halo 2 Baby Chief concept art (very cool). Go look!

14 new pieces for you in the Fan Fiction section today – songs, stories, you name it. Folks keep writing.

ILTB dropped us a note about an event he attended in Melbourne, Australia, involving the band Regurgitator. (We mentioned them, and their Band in a Bubble project, about a month ago; they were released on Tuesday, which is probably the event ILTB was attending.) He snapped some pics of a roving Master Chief interacting with the band… take a look!

There’s a new mailbag up, courtesy of Count Zero; I think he must have been sober when he wrote it, because he’s less offensive than usual. He DID point out a hole in my near-complete collection of Halo-related souvenirs, though… if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some eBaying to do.

The 7th Column is back up and running – and man, there are a lot of changes. mrsmiley has done a decent job of summarizing them in a Bungie.net forum post; if you want a rundown of what he thinks is good and bad about the new system, go read. Otherwise, just explore the options available to you – there are many.

SketchFactor points out that the latest Wired Magazine (October) has a feature on some of the people behind Halo 2. They had to airbrush Marty to make him presentable, apparently. (My copy hasn’t arrived yet. I think it’s time to get on Wired’s case.) We will, of course, have a press scanned version of this when the November issue hits the shelves – but if you want to read it now, get thee to a newsstand!

Saint posts to say that the Library, his encyclopedia of all things Halo, has been updated again. (There’s still no search function, so you have to know what you’re looking for… but there’s a lot of stuff there.

Paul and KINGHALO! from halosecrets.com have put together a live-action promotional vid for Halo 2 – though I doubt it’s the sort of thing that Microsoft would ever actually sanction. It IS pretty funny, though. The 360×240 DivX-encoded .mp4 is up on our server; there’s a larger version on their own server, but there’s no guarantee the bandwidth will hold out. The small version is 4.5 mb, the large one is 11 mb. Go watch!

guS and Burnie, of Red vs Blue, have written up their visit to Bungie last month, wherein they came, got drunk, and played Halo 2 until 3 in the morning. Dang, that sounds like fun. (Oh, wait… I was there. Forgive me – I look like I haven’t slept in WEEKS in the one pic of theirs I’m in. Maybe I’m just dead, or something.) Anyway, go read. It’s a great writeup. Looks like PsycoJoe was the first on our forum to notice it.

A couple of trickster vids showed up on our forum last night… Madrox and Foxygrandpa posted A Tribute to Tricking Part 1 (stunts on Silent Cartographer and AotCR, mostly). And in another thread, Devin Olsen posted a bunch of stunts from 343GS. Both vids are about 18.5 mb, in WMP9 format. No QuickTimes this time around – sorry.

serpx posted a couple of links to nice Wallpapers he’s put up at DeviantArt. Silvery…

Today’s Calvin and Halo, from Blackstar, shows a disturbing side of 6-year-olds that unfortunately doesn’t go away with age.

BOLL has (once again) updated the HBO PAL; now you can export your settings, and reimport them on another machine (or even just another browser on the same machine). I’m pretty sure that tomorrow we’ll receive the update that gets HBO PAL to do your laundry for you.

A note on Bungie.net points out that the website will be offline at 1 pm pdt today (8 pm UTC) in order to add some code for the return of the 7th Column. By this afternoon, pacific time, you should be able to set up new Groups (previously Chapters) on that site!

Ross Mills notes that ‘Game’ stores in the UK have a deal running right now; if you pre-order Halo 2, and pay a minimum of £3 towards the purchase, you’ll receive a Halo 2 poster when you actually purchase the game. It’s not clear WHAT poster you get; it’s possible it’s one that was showing at E3, but then again, it’s possible that it’s not. If and when we find out more, we’ll pass along the info.

A couple of days ago, Andrew, from XboxOttawa, pointed out in our forum that today’s Ottawa Citizen newspaper would be running an article in its Tech section that covers machinima and several groups that use Halo to make it (including XboxOttawa). If you’re somewhere that that newspaper is available, grab a copy! (If you’re not, we’ll bring you a press scan after it’s off the shelves.)

GamesRadar has put up the full text of the October 2004 Halo 2 article in Edge Magazine. We’ll have a press scan for you in a couple of weeks, with all the pretty pictures as well, but the real meat is in the text – and that’s online now. Go read. (Thanks again, Rams.)

Gamespy has posted a Xbox Fall Preview Guide – and Halo 2 rates an ‘awesome’ (as usual). I can’t figure out how they ordered them – Halo 2 is referred to in the opening paragraph (“not all of the titles are as anticipated as a certain first-person juggernaut”) but shows up on page 4. Guess it doesn’t matter. Go read. Thanks to Rams, of HaloPlanet, for the heads-up. Update: TruneX points out that the order is dictated by release date. DOH!