Crispy Spartan has posted the second Weekly Update for the First Strike mod; this one contains info from the various section leads, some concept artwork, and a request for help. Read the post for details!

Wraith, too, wanted to model. No, not Bikinis. MCs. (Trust me – you don’t wanna see him in a bikini.)

Interesting perspective on last weekend’s tournament in Philly from ‘Nosolee, one of our forum denizens. Makes you stop and think…

Whoops, I forgot – there was more modeling action on the forum recently (this time by dolbex), and I forgot to post it. Check this stuff out!

Rampancy.net has gone screenshot-crazy. There is now a full gallery devoted to the shots that XLNC has posted on our forum – as well as a SEPARATE gallery with 8 as-yet-unseen shots (Grunt Justice ROCKS). He’s also added a dolbex mini-gallery that includes the shots dolbex posted yesterday (but not yet including these shots, posted 2 days ago). While we’re ON the subject of screenshots, there are a bunch MORE that folks are taking, using the HUDless methods pioneered by XLNC: MerecCatfish took a bunch a few weeks ago, JM posted some on our forum this morning, and even BOLL’s getting into the act. Screens everywhere!

Today’s Guest One One Se7en comes from Konrad – we’re ALMOST back to the lag thing. He WISHES we were back to the lag thing. Oh, yeah.

Calvin and Halo gets back to snow – something it does really, really well.

Halo Babies has posted 4 new animated avatars an a piece of Fanart – go check it out!

This came in yesterday, but I never got to it. Major League Gaming has released results from the 2-day Halo tournament that took place over the weekend in Philadelphia. More than 400 competitors and 350 spectators were on hand to watch the festivities; more than $17,000 in cash was handed out to the winners. Here are the results:

Halo Free For All:

• 1st Place: Ogre 1 (Danny Ryan, NJ)
• 2nd Place: Ogre 2 (Tommy Ryan, NJ)
• 3rd Place:
  • Saivan (Ryan Danford, NC)
  • C2 (Chris Collins, WV) – tie

Halo 4 vs. 4 Team Competition:

• 1st Place: Team StK:
  • Ogre 1 (Danny Ryan, NJ)
  • Ogre 2 (Tommy Ryan, NJ)
  • Strangepurple (Doug Fabrizio, NJ)
  • Clockwork (Kushik Dutta, WA)
• 2nd Place: Team AP:
  • Acer (Chris Hoover, TX)
  • Anti (Josh Crahan, TX)
  • KillerN (Nick Urso, TX)
  • Shizz (Paul Baffi, TX)
• 3rd Place: Team Shoot Back:
  • Csquared (Chris Collins, WV)
  • Damien (Justin Thomas, WV)
  • Nistic (Kevin Colvin, OH)
  • Zyos (Matt Leto, TX)
• 4th Place: Team DM:
  • Deeter (Pat Danford, NC)
  • Gestapo (Scott Moore, NC)
  • Ryu (Ryan Moore, NC)
  • Saiyan (Ryan Danford, NC)

Halo 4 vs. 4 Tournament MVP award: Zyos (Matt Leto, TX)

Sounds like a party that shouldn’t have been missed!

To the (literally) dozens of people mailing us about the Gamespy Titlefight – here’s the news post, can you stop mailing? (The only category of mail we’re getting that exceeds this right now is the MyDoom virus mail.) In a week or so, Halo will go up against Goldeneye (from the Nintento64) in a popularity contest. (Check ‘The Abandoned Base’ bracket, about 2/3 down towards the bottom.) See what you can do about helping it win, okay? We’ll try to remind you next week.

So that BOLL guy, I think he works for Macromedia, or something. All he does all day is turn out cool Flash toys. And yeah, he’s got a new one. It’s called Warthog Launch… and that’s exactly what you do. Grab a Warthog, pile grenades under it, and try to pop the Engineers. Stats keep track of how many levels you got through, how many grenades you used, the number of launches, how many times your Warthog bounced, how many Engineers you popped, and most importantly, how much time you wasted blowing stuff up. What are you waiting for? Go Play.

One One Se7en looks at the relationship between Covenant and Forerunner today. If that grunt gets his own strip, I’m leaving.

Halo: Resolution doesn’t have a lot of respect for Captain Keyes…

Dang. Dolbex has decided to get into the Screenshot act – 21 shots, containing tons of spoilers (for those keeping track). Some seem a little washed out… but all are pretty dang impressive. Mod city, baby!

Another 18 stories for you today in the Fan Fiction section:

• Battle For Reach pt.1, by Chris
• Hidden Threat: Chapter 3 – The Plunge, by NBD24
• The Soldiers of Angelon: The Lady of Shadows, by Jinkaiden-XI
• The Siege of Zion Base; Part Two: Siege – Chapter 9, by Scimitarex
• The Siege of Zion Base; Part Two: Siege – Chapter Ten, by Scimitarex
• Part two— The Covenant Weapon, by Halo_2204
• Visions of Purity Part 2: The Colonel, by xitWOUND117
• The Enemy Within-Chapter Four: Ask, Seek, Knock, by Mind_Affecting_Parasite
• Halo 1.5–From Halo to REACH–chapter one, by Halo_2204
• Trapped Part : Gunned Down, by Daniel Renner
• Neverland: Eradication, by SOS.Odin
• Earths Fall? Prt: 2- The Assault, by Jim
• The Darkness and the Light – Chapter 2:, by IAmDelta
• Long Shot, by Kosh_123
• Chapter 0 of Halo: Fellowship in Blood, by gamer02
• Halo: The Scythe of Death Part Eight, by LordofDestruction
• Dubbo’s Demise, by CoLd BlooDed
• Probably No Choice, by Jon M… a.k.a The Flu

Read, dangit – it’s only Wednesday!

Scimitarex tried his hand at Screenshot composition – and I must say, the results are pleasing. These are more sweeping visions of Halo’s snow levels than other shots we’ve seen recently – I think they give a nice sense for the grandeur of Forerunner architecture. Take a look!

About a year ago, we mentioned a polyphonic ringtone for your cellular phone – the midi file it used was pretty impressive. It seems to have vanished from the web… so Deimos Fawkes has kindly made it available at Subnova. It’s a 16K download.