A week ago, we mentioned an upcoming mod from Icetiger with low-gravity play and bots – it’s now available for beta download from Halomods. (If bandwidth runs out, there’s a mirror at Halo World and another at Fileplanet, as well.) If you’ve got Halo CE – give this map a shot, and send your feedback to Icetiger! Thanks to Battleground: Halo for the heads-up on this one.

This is just a reminder – midnight, EST, on July 1 is just under 64 hours from now. That’s the final deadline for all entries to the Going Nowhere Fast contest – if you plan on mailing a tape, now would be a VERY good time to do so. (And you should send it Second Day Air at the very slowest – anything slower, and you’re not guaranteed a delivery by the due date.) The more glitchable levels (Silent Cartographer, AotCR) and the foolable levels (PoA, 343GS) are honed down to a razor’s edge… but there is plenty of room for improvement on some of the less-attempted levels. For example, in the past 12 hours, we’ve received not one, but TWO entries for Keyes – both of which beat the existing fast time by many, many minutes. (Times will be posted once we’ve gotten the films into the hands of the judges.) Show us what you got! Remember, there’s lots of little schwag (books, action figures) and some pretty good BIG schwag (a special-edition Xbox) on the line…

ps2.ign.com has posted an article entitled ‘PS2 vs the World: Flagship Crushers’, in which they analyze other consoles’ top games, and how PS2 equivalents stack up. Page 6 is a look at Halo 2 – and all three reviewers acknowledge that there really is nothing on the PS2 that will compete with it. (All three check out the best contender – Killzone – and come to the conclusion that yeah, it’ll be good… but it won’t touch Halo 2.) Remember – these are hardcore PS2 fans. Thanks, Mr. Mongoose.

Want some cool wheels? You might just have to wait a few years. Check out the December 2551 issue of Car & Pilot, nicely posted by Frankie over at B.net. I want one of those.

What happens when you take spectacular game art, and let a spectacular wallpaper creator mess with it? You get something SketchFactor calls ‘Desktop Coolification‘. Check out the Bungie.net Wallpapers section for a fantastic new piece by Zoe, using Lorraine McLees artwork. Thanks to akba for the heads-up.

Konrad reminded me I forgot to post links to pictures taken at last weekend’s lanfest. (They weren’t very exciting… but hey, there were a bunch of HBO regulars there, so…) You can find a set from GT(Juggler) here, and another set from Konrad here. Funny comments from MIguel (who didn’t make it) on the GT shots.

The July issue of Xbox Gamer has hit the newsstands in the UK, so we’ve put the June Halo 2 article (scanned nicely by broony) into our Press Scans database. Some good stuff in there, though there’s obviously a lot of overlap with the other magazine articles published last month…

Fourteen new Fan Fiction pieces since the last update. Are you caught up?

A nice collection of desktop images have built up in the past couple of weeks – you can find 17 new choices in our Wallpaper section. Two that really stand out for me (mostly because of the custom artwork) are Mr Guy’s Boarding Action pic, and Eric Rodrigues’ Elite. Go look at everything, though!

In keeping with the mod updates, Homefront has posted one, too. Buildings, vehicles, landscapes… go check it out. Thanks, Pballwizard.

Poor Grunty in today’s One One Se7en.

Halo: Resolution shows why you shouldn’t make EVERYTHING obsolete.

Stefander pointed out the third weekly update for the Zanzibar modding team, over at Halomods. Base work, looks like.

Friday’s Weekly Bungie Update has been added to our database – and a quick search on ‘Marty‘ will show that the last line of his current update might actually be false. Search is good…

Skeletor points out a resource for guitarists:

Powertab Editor is a program that makes arranging songs for the guitar easier. Someone made a tab of the RvB theme recently and uploaded it to the Powertab Archive.

If you use Powertab Editor, go grab this! (And then upload your OWN tabbed version of other Halo songs…

A few days ago, we mentioned Halogen, the upcoming mod for C&C Generals – yesterday Dispraiser posted Weekly Update One on our forum. The UI looks pretty good, and there’s a bit of info about upcoming vehicles and weapons. Take a look!

NiTrOuSoXiDe posted an update for the New Mombasa mod for Halo CE over on Halo Revolution – DHalo reposted it on Halomods, and scottisonfire found it there and posted it on OUR forum. (Viral marketing at its best.) Very sexy screenshot, and some drool-inducing text. Check it out!

GAH! This came in last week, but got lost. (Sorry, Peter.) The Tulsa Jaycees are hosting a video game contest to benefit a local Tulsa hospital on July 10. Halo is one of 9 games in the lineup (rules can be downloaded here, in pdf format). If you live in or near Tulsa, OK, this might be of interest to you!

Red vs Blue will be showing at the Alamo Drafthouse in Austin, TX on July 8, 9, and 10. (How they picked 11:49 pm for showtimes, I don’t think I want to know.) Ross Mills also points out some extra Sponsor content related to this event in the RvB Sponsors forum. If you’re in the area – it should be a good time!

rockslider mentions another episode of Frontline with Suzie – this time, the interview is with the Master Chief. Go read!