Halogamers has put up Episode one of its Sidewinder Saga. 2:39 long, in QuickTime format, it’s available in two resolutions: 640×480 (23.5 mb) and 320×240 (7.2 mb). Nice filming! The story’s off to a rollicking start.

Six desktop images in the queue today, now cleared out and placed in the Wallpaper section. See what captures your fancy.

More content from IGN – the movies posted last night (that went up with an article on Halo PC Sound) now have an Insider article to go with ’em, explaining what they’re showing. 3 pages of explaining, even. (Well, they’re short pages.) The movies, which were only available in a large (640×480) size last night, can now be grabbed in either 640×480 or 320×240. Thanks to ;@PTUR3 for the heads-up.

Pretty interesting collection of Miscellaneous Art for you today, from a kneeling MC (that would work wonderfully as a desktop image, even though it was explicitly submitted to the Misc Art section) to an oil painting of the Chief, to the DOA girls playing Halo… go look at all of ’em.

It’s not that usual for us to release two movies back-to-back… and it’s certainly unusual for a movie to be released ahead of its spot in the queue, but I’m leaving soon, and this one’s not very big. Team Sexy (whom you might remember from their ‘Hall of the Sidewinder King‘ piece) has whipped up ‘Red vs Who‘, a pretty funny (and quite short) look at grudge matches. 1:32, QuickTime 5 format, 6.8 mb. Grab a copy today!

Athol Productions has put together an artistic look at Halo 2; snippets of existing movies, interspersed with stills, all nicely composited. Nice soundtrack, too. ‘Requiem for Halo’ is available in both QuickTime 5 (19.6 mb) and WMP 9 (21.4 mb) formats. It’s 4:55 long, and has a screensize of 320×240. Take a look!

Didn’t get to posting Fan Fiction yesterday, so there are 13 stories for you today:

• Remnants of Reach: Prologue, by Shinai Purugganan
• Unexpected Surprises Part 6, by JediKnight114 (James)
• The Furious Hatred: Through the Eyes of an Elite, by MadJackal
• Project: Shadow Spartan, Chapter 4, by Agent Shade
• Landing on Dracon, by The Scribe
• And so it begins… (Halo 2: Chapter 8), by Shadowrunner
• A World Apart Ch. 1, by Dark Spartan
• A Final Shot – Part 1, by James
• A day in the life of Master Chief…., by That guy over there who smiles just a biiiit to wide….
• Used, Abused, and Blown to Smithereens: The tale of a Covenant Grunt – Chapter One, by Ultimate Grunt
• Honore, by Gunnery Sergeant
• Oblivion Chapter 4: Welcome to Mars, by Reclaimer
• Chapter 3: Behind Enemy Lines, by Nightblade

Read away…

IGN continues to pour out the Halo PC goodness – today they focus on sound. Good questions, and lots of vids. Streaming lo-res vids for everybody, hi-res downloadables for Insiders. (There’s even footage of the flamethrower.) Go get your fill! Thanks to Dan Chosich for the heads-up.

Thirty new dialogue snippets for the Dialogue Databank, including a bunch of Monitor sayings and some pretty rare Sgt. Stacker quotes. (Before anyone gets on my case, there are some that are pretty similar to existing quotes – but they differ in small but substantial ways.) Thanks to Captain Spark and c0ld vengeance for this lot.

Lion pointed out that the FTC movies were mirrored on his Truth and Reconciliation site, so we decided there were enough mirrors to actually create an FTC Mirror list. Any future additions will be added to this list. (There are QuickTime versions available, if anyone needs them – but nobody’s complained about the DivX versions, so I haven’t posted them.) Update: One more – Bungie.de has them, too. These have got to be the most mirrored vids in a long time! (Thanks to andrew for the heads-up.)

Can you tell that today’s One One Se7en was written soon after E3 this year?

Another 25 snippets for the Dialogue Databank from BlackWolverine – and I’ve added some extra code to allow for more accurate display of found results. (Like, for example, just those results submitted by a single person…) Check these out – there are some great ones. Update: It just doesn’t stop – another 11 from Captain Spark (including two great versions of a specifically-requested snippet).

Whoa. I almost missed this… it seems that Gearbox has fixed (or is fixing) many of the glitches folks have discovered in multiplayer Halo… but it’s unclear to me how many of these will affect some of the more enjoyable exploits in the single-player game, as well. (I fully understand the need to close some of these holes for internet multiplay; I just worry that some of the best single-player tricksterism will be inaccessible on Halo PC.) The relevant thread on Gearbox’s forum is here; thanks to CobaltNova (through Battleground: Halo) for the heads-up on this.

Mythica continues to crank out gigabytes for you folks… so what the heck, let’s add to the load. This one’s called Fight Until We Learn To Love, and it was created by LeadHead. It’s gameplay mixed with cutscenes, set to pretty appropriate music, with some nice timing. 3 minutes long, 18.8 mb big, QuickTime format. Sample and enjoy.

Dust and Echoes: Adult Detroit League is hosting a 2 vs 2 tournament in Plymouth, MI on July 26th. If you’re in the area, you might just want to jump in! Cost is $20/team, winnings get split 50/50 between the winning team and the League fund. Check out the page for more details!

Gamespot has posted a massive video interview with Gearbox’s Randy Pitchford and Bungie’s Michel Bastien for Complete members… 6 minutes of discussions about how Halo PC rocks. (I was amused by Bastien’s comment that the new multiplayer maps ‘leverage some of the environments in the single player maps’ – Death Island takes huge chunks of Silent Cartographer lock, stock and barrel, from what I can see. This is definitely NOT a bad thing; that’s a map that should have been multiplayer-capable from day one.) The discussion about mod support was extremely promising, as well. This puppy (along with last night’s 5 multiplayer movies) might just be worth the $6 a one-month subscription to Complete costs!

Doug Radcliffe, the author of the upcoming Official Halo PC Strategy Guide, has returned to our forum, and this time, he’s soliciting game tips from veteran gamers – so if you’ve got some good stuff… send it to him! (He prefers email, since he’ll be checking it more often, but you can reply to this forum thread, as well.) Guidelines on what he’s looking for, and how you’ll be credited, can be found in the post. Help make this guide the best it can be!

Seventeen more dialogue snippets for the Dialogue Databank, including the first batch of Crewmen lines. Check ’em out!

Gamespot has put up a Halo PC preview, with 11 new screens (heavy on the Banshees in multiplayer) – this game is looking mighty impressive! Go read the details. Thanks to KP on our forum, and an anonymous emailer for the heads-up.

The Cananimators, the two Canadian animators on the Halo 2 dev team, have decided that they really don’t have enough to do, so they’ve set up a new feature; Ask the Cananimators. It’s a database where you can ask these guys whatever you want. (There are some rules at the bottom of the news article that will help you stay off the blacklist and improve the chances of your question being answered.) And whatever you do… don’t ask ’em why they’re not animating more.