Dan Mitteer found a new Halo 2 ad in October’s Gamepro mag; it follows the trend of the first Halo 2 print ad, except the picture is better and they moved away from the Halo font. You’ll find small versions that Dan posted in this post, and larger ones in this post.

There’s a Halo tournament in Eastpoint, Michigan, on August 15; 2-man teams, entrance fee is $40/team, top prize is $120. Information can be found on this website.

Once again, though a few days ago, Roger Wilco took some fun motion capture footage, and applied the Master Chief skin to it. As he says, this one definitely needs sound. (1.1 mb, QuickTime format.)

The next big MLG tournament (after Seattle, at the end of this month) will be in San Francisco, on September 11/12… and the San Francisco subsite just went live at MLGPro.com. Go check it out! (I couldn’t find any info on registration fees or prize values… but I’m sure they’re coming.) Thanks, Dolbex.

Recently, a whole passel of press hung out at Bungie and played some Halo 2 multiplayer. The first magazine with this information is already on newsstands… in Germany. According to Tempus Fugit, Xbox Zone has a solid hands-on Halo 2 article in the latest issue (out to subscribers now, on newsstand shelves later this week), as well as an interview with Pete Parsons. A summary of what’s in the article can be found in his forum post; looks to be definitely worth a read. If you have access to a newsstand selling this magazine, go grab a copy!

Last week, Bill Daiber, one of the Mountain Dew contest winners, wrote up some of his experience at Bungie’s offices, with respect to Halo 2 gameplay. He’d left some of the writeup out, however – it was vacation time. We’ve posted it now. Vehicles, Sound, Glitches – go read about it! (Notice the ‘already fixed’ comments in the glitches section, however, and remember he got to play an older build.)

The Junkyard has posted an article on the realism of Halo, and how this affects gameplay, in which an 8-year veteran of the US Marine Corps gives his opinions about some of the choices made in the game. Interesting concept…

Boxer has started a new comic, called Aventures in Disaster. The first episode, ‘Location, Location, Location‘ is hosted by akba. Boxer says there’ll be new strips every Monday and Wednesday.

G4techTV posted a 5-part article last week on The Top Ten Games of G-Phoria, and Part 4 covered halo 2 (the number 2 game in the list, following only Doom 3). Thanks, WhiteRaBbit.

Today’s One One Se7en looks at one of the new Halo 2 multiplayer features… with a rather cynical eye.

Light, light news day – how about some comics? There’s a new sprite-based strip up over at the newly-opened 7th Revolution, called Halo: On Vacation (be sure to look around a bit when you’re there), and Sector 7 has put up its next episode of The Marines – or should I say, has been taken over by ANOTHER internet phenomenon? Enjoy this Sunday!

The Fan Fiction queue had 6 stories in it – it now has none, because they’ve been posted. Go read.

Tempus Fugit notes that Microsoft will be showing off Halo 2 at the G|C Games Convention. All the information is in German and only available in printed form, but Halo 2 can be spotted in the press release transcribed here. The convention will be held in Leipzig, Germany in about two weeks.

Doug Fabrizio, aka StrangePurple (a frequent winner on the Halo competitive circuit) hung out with Bungie bigwigs in New York recently, and played some Halo 2 (and other games)… he’s written up his experience for the masses over on the MLGPro.com website. Thanks to Dolbex for the heads-up.

Bungie.net has posted a story explaining everything you need to do to be ready for Halo 2 this fall, from helping with excuses for getting off work to buying the right hardware to get online. (They’re not advocating breaking rules, just offering options.) Check it out! Thanks to Marcus for the first heads-up.

Frankie’s weekly update has popped up at VideoGames.co.nz. It’s a pretty long one this time, and with tons of nice tidbits and numbers- Gameplay animations are 95% complete, there’s 4.1 gigabytes of audio dialog assets, and… pocky? Sure, why not. Check it out!

Just a quick note – I’m going to be mostly out of touch for the next few days. I’ll do my best to catch up on off hours, and Count Zero MIGHT be able to fill in a bit… but if you submit content, and it doesn’t go up right away, don’t freak out, it just means we haven’t gotten there yet. Thanks!

cykage posted a vid made by Rippon, showing some… odd dancing styles. Brian Towne mirrored it at Mythica, so bandwidth shouldn’t be a problem. 22 mb, WMP9 format. There’s a QuickTime version, as well… because, well, we like Macs.

‘Ridley Rarzamee did some custom painting of his Blue Joyride Elite figure, and ended up with a pretty slick-looking Spec Ops Elite. Check it out!