My Halo News.com

The latest news about the Halo series of games from Microsoft

  • Halo Anime

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    by

    Louis Wu
    in
    Neko Ewen posted yesterday on our forum about some Halo comics… check ’em out!

  • Comparably Equipped For Under 10,000

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    Louis Wu
    in
    The next episode of Halo: Resolution is up, as well. Cortana and the MC find… wheels. I knew it couldn’t be quite as simple as just having Foe Hammer drop off what I needed…

  • The Rules.

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    Louis Wu
    in
    That Cortana, she’s a card… just check One One Se7en. (Or is she ON a card? I can never remember…)

  • And mirrors, and mirrors, and mirrors…

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    by

    Louis Wu
    in
    While we slept, the mirrors for the Halo PC dedicated server (pre-release, remember) continued to pour in. The full mirror list is here, a backup (in case HBO is down) is here. Both links can be found on Bungie.net, if you can’t get here. It’s amazing to see how many people are already playing online! (There were several thousand last night – 2 days after the game’s release.)

  • In the midst of chaos, Fan Fiction

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Even the Fan Fiction writers are affected by the release of Halo PC – only 8 submissions in the last 2 days!

    Go read – I’m sure they’ll be back to their old posting rates before long…

  • Stripped Archive – for folks who have Halo PC

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    Louis Wu
    in
    BOLL hit upon the very intelligent (but not previously considered) idea of yanking the map files from the server download. This is NOT a download for someone who wants to simply unpack the server and go… but if you’re going to be serving from the same machine that you’ve already got Halo PC installed on, it’s much easier to download a 1.7 mb file and copy over the mapfiles from a second directory… you’ll find the link at the bottom of our mirror page (and ITS mirror).

  • Halo Dedicated Server (Pre-Release) Available

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Okay, here’s the deal. Bungie and Gearbox didn’t wanna let you folks spend the weekend without a dedicated server for Halo PC – so they’re seeding you with a pre-release version. It runs nicely, it’s just a bit rough on the front end. You’ll want to read the installation instructions very carefully for details on setup – and be aware that there is not yet support for remote management. (You have to have access to the server itself to make changes. RCON is coming.) We’ve put up a mirror page, and listed a pair of our own servers for hosting this – but what we really need is mirrors – and lots of them. This is a 100+ mb file, and a lot of people are gonna want it… Please, once you’ve got a copy, if you’ve got the bandwidth, make it available somewhere and send us a link. (BitTorrent links are appreciated, as well; we haven’t put up a seed, but we’re happy to point to one, if someone else can host it.) Update: A couple more mirrors have come online: FileRush has put up a BitTorrent seed, and WorthPlaying has the file on a number of servers. (Links for both are on the mirror page – and the mirror page mirror, on www.bungie.org.) Keep ’em coming! The more mirrors there are, the smaller the cost for everyone helping out! Update 2: The mirrors keep pouring in – you guys rock. 🙂 From this point on, simply visit either copy of the mirror page; the list now is up to 9 sites (some with multiple mirrors) for http downloads, and two sites for BitTorrent seeds. We’re always happy for more, of course!

  • Mythica is back!

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    Louis Wu
    in
    DOH! I’m an idiot. Mythica.org went live again this morning… and I forgot to mention it! It’s up and running, and serving movies like there’s no tomorrow. Bandwidth isn’t going to be a huge problem, because if/when Mythica hits its limit, we’ve got a backup in files.bungie.org (which mirrors all of Mythica’s data). If there have been movies you’ve been holding off on grabbing… now’s the time! (Direct links don’t work; you’ll need to go through our Movies page. Which is way behind… so you’ll need to go through our news page. Ouch.)

  • Hardfought helps out with game tweaks

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    Louis Wu
    in
    K2 writes to say that on the Hardfought forum, there’s a thread devoted to tweaking your computer (and Halo PC) to maximize performance. Lots of information; you’ll have to register to see it, though. Take a look!

  • Having trouble with Halo PC? Check this.

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    by

    Louis Wu
    in
    Cunbelin has written up a short guide to help optimize your multiplayer experience in Halo PC (thereby obviating the need to write one myself). You can find it over at Subnova.

  • Mac Halo is now Beta

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Woohoo! momo noticed that Westlake’s Project Status page has been updated; Mac Halo status is now Beta. Gettin’ closer…

  • Action Figures, Wave 2

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    Louis Wu
    in
    The second wave of Halo action figures (including the Elite, the Ghost, another MC with new weapons, a red MC, and the Warthog (same as Wave 1, but some folks were having trouble finding it), are now available for preorder from DieCastExpress. Thanks to MinM for the heads-up.

  • Club for Fan Fiction writers

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    Louis Wu
    in
    There’ve been a few Halo-focused fanfic websites in the past, but they’ve all faded. Elfster has created a 7th Column Chapter for fiction writers to congregate on; if the Comments section of our Fan Fiction section don’t give you your needed level of interaction, check out ‘Just one of those days‘, with a built-in forum and everything.

  • Lots and lots of Halo sites

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Another site roundup… looks like the release of Halo has also released some massive creative juices.

    • The Elite Operatives, a Halo PC clan, are currently recruiting.
    • When Hogs Fly is a clan that organized itself from regulars on the Gearbox forums. It’s not clear if they’re recruiting or not, and be careful about using the ‘Home’ link on their site (I got into a nasty auto-refresh loop that way).
    • Team sYn is NOT actively recruiting at the moment, but they are looking for some decent competition. Drop ’em a line if you’re interested.
    • HaloMods, a site that’s been in the news before (it’s the home of SparkEdit, the Halo map viewer), has gotten a facelift/redesign. Take a look!

    And that wraps up another new-halo-site update.

  • The medium for the message

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    by

    Louis Wu
    in
    As Halo PC grows in popularity, alternate ways for players to communicate need to be found. we got a note from adam at irc.PGPN.com, an irc network. Their #halo channel is becoming quite popular, and they’d like it to continue to grow; check ’em out.

  • Team Sexy gets online

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Team Sexy Productions, the group behind movies like ‘The Hall of the Sidewinder King’ and ‘Red vs Who?’, has put up a website with their existing movies and (soon to come) a trailer on their upcoming miniseries. Check it out!

  • MacAddict says Halo’s here

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    by

    Louis Wu
    in
    November’s MacAddict magazine contains an article on Mac Halo. Not a lot of info… but always nice to see in print! Thanks to Latent Node for the heads-up.

  • Free copy of (German) Halo PC

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Halo Universe (in Germany) is giving away a free copy of Halo PC (German version). All you need to do is count the number of Halo screenshots at Amazon.de and then email your results (along with name, address and halouniverse.de username, if you have one) to a special email address. Check their main page for more details!

  • Still Working The Bugs Out.

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    Louis Wu
    in
    Today’s Guest One One Se7en finds MC and Cortana… well, a little bit outside the ring. She really needs to work on that coordinates thing. Thanks, Macegac.

  • Spam Filters Upgraded

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    by

    dmjossel

    The spam filtering program used at Synfibers, SpamAssassin, has been upgraded from version 2.43 to version 2.55 to fix some problems users were having and to introduce new features.

    No system is 100% perfect, however, so some junk mail will still get through. SpamAssassin should help you filter out most of it. The header it uses to identify junk mail is the same as described previously in this article.

    However, there are two new features. SpamAssassin will now put in the headers of messages a detailed report of how it determines whether or not a message is spam or not.

    In addition, it is capable of learning from its mistakes. If you receive junk messages that SpamAssassin does not tag as spam because it doesn’t quite meet the criteria (currently the threshold is 5 “spam points”, a number built by scoring the message in many different areas) you can do the following. Redirect or forward the message to:

    spam at synfibers dot com

    Mail sent to this address will be periodically scanned, and its contents analyzed so that SpamAssassin can better filter typical spam you receive.

    However, it is also possible that SpamAssassin might incorrectly identify as spam a legitimate email message. For this reason, we urge you to configure your mail program to put SpamAssassin-tagged messages in another folder and routinely browse through them quickly to find such errors.

    There are two ways to help alleviate this problem.

    First, collect a fair sample of legitimate messages and forward or redirect them to:

    nonspam at synfibers dot dom

    These messages will not be read. They will be scanned by SpamAssassin so it can better determine what messages are not spam, and then deleted.

    Second, if you have an address book file, or a list of addresses that you receive mail from commonly, send it to:

    webmaster at synfibers dot com

    SpamAssassin can be configured to not filter mail from these addresses, so you will always receive it, regardless of content. (This can be useful when a friend or co-worker forwards you a piece of spam, or a fraudulent virus warning, along with a question about it; SpamAssassin would very likely tag such a message as spam.)

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