Curious about the development process involved in putting together a gameplay demo like the one Bungie showed at E3 this year? SketchFactor has interviewed the design team, picking their brains for details about how the level was decided, what needed to be thought about, and what got missed. And if reading it leaves you thirsting for more, don’t worry… this is only part 1. Take a look!

For those who missed the 8 pm showing of ‘The X Factor: Inside Microsoft’s Xbox‘ on the Discovery Channel this evening, it’s on again at 11 pm (ET/PT) tonight. Set your VCR!

The day has come – and man, have we been waiting for it! The Pillar of Art contest results have finally been posted. Details, and images of all the entries, can be found on the Pillar of Art site… but we’ll recap the basic stuff here.

• First Prize: Adam Vehige ($250, and a signed piece from Bungie)
• Second Prize: Richard Menchaca ($150)
• Third Prize: Russ Leach ($100)
• Special Award: Geoff Chang (Red MC action figure, as seen on the webcam)

There are also (as-yet unannounced) prizes for some of the younger submitters; we haven’t pinned down exactly what’s available yet, so we haven’t decided how to divvy up the loot – but that’s coming. Also coming are artist bios, and their explanations of their work. (We simply didn’t have time to get all of this into web-friendly format in time for this post.) The gallery showing for all of this work will take place on July 5, and details will be posted as the day gets closer. Congratulations to everyone who entered – we had a tough time! And to Richard Menchaca – we hope this prize makes a decent birthday present for you today. 🙂

A few links for you: Tekkomix was one of the sites kind enough to contribute bandwidth to the mad trailer rush last week – they also host a Halo clan, The Shadows. Brandon points out Installation 07, a Halo forum that needs some new members. And Alberto wants us to know about LANWARRIORS, an Italian Halo clan. Check ’em all out!

HemoGloben noticed that IGN has a hi-res trailer for tonight’s X-Factor special on the Discovery Channel; if you’re not an insider, you’re stuck with a WMP9 version, but Insiders have access to a 32 mb QuickTime version. It’ll definitely whet your whistle for this program! (Along those lines, SketchFactor forwarded a fun little promo graphic (67k) from FilmOasis yesterday – check it out!)

Red vs Blue episode 10 is out now for sponsors… this has got to be the funniest episode yet. It’s also HUGE; it’s almost like they slapped together two episodes to make up for last week’s missed episode. (They weren’t slacking, they were serving you folks more than a terabyte a day of Halo 2 demo trailer goodness, so don’t be givin’ ’em any lip.) If you’re not a sponsor, registered forum members will have access late Saturday/early Sunday, and the rabble can grab it Sunday afternoon. This one’s really big… but really worth it. (c0ld vengeance was the first to notice on our forum, I think.) Update: whoa, didn’t catch this first time around… but the voice of Blue Command (and his mouth) were supplied by a special guest – Randall Glass. Way to go, Randy!

Quick heads-up: We’re very, very close to announcing the results of the Pillar of Art contest. There are a few finishing touches needed to be put on the presentation of the work… but it won’t be long now! Once again, I’d like to apologize to all the contestants for the delays we’ve encountered… and tell the rest of you that it’ll be worth the wait!

Apologies to the rather large list of folks who were waiting for their Gamertag/screenname entries to be approved – I guess Tarrsk is on vacation. I just noticed them; dunno how long they’ve been there for. 🙁 Anyway, now’s as good a time as any to make sure your games list is up-to-date… forum regular (and moviemaker extraordinaire) Dan Chosich had some good times with SketchFactor last night, except that nobody knew who anybody was.

In an attempt to curb the email, we’d like to state that Mythica.org, our primary bandwidth donator for Halo movies, is down right now. We don’t have word yet on what’s wrong, or when it will be back up… but rest assured, as soon as we know, you’ll know. If you click on a download link that points to Mythica, and it doesn’t work… it doesn’t mean we took the movie offline. It just means the server’s down. Update: looks like Mythica’s going to be down for a week, at least. The box has hardware problems that need to be fixed, and shipping time to and from the datacenter means that there’s no way it’ll be back online before next week at the earliest. Sorry, folks!

13 Fan Fiction stories for you today:

• True Purpose(11), by Frensa Geran
• Halo: The Scythe of Death Part Three, by LordofDestruction
• Covenant Invasion! Part Three, by Hunter_Killer
• Rescue, by MJOLNIR
• A Marine Named Peters: Forward to Bravo Base!, by GLADIATRRR3000
• Battle for the Norah: Part Two, by Sterfrye36
• Halo 2: Capter 1: Defenders of Earth, by Shadowrunner
• Halo Zero 2 /p1/ Attack on Nuuth, by nicholas
• The Mars Annihilations Part 2, by Janglurevil7
• The Ganymede Seige Part II, by Spartan81388
• Death’s Angels: Chapter 1, by Space_Moose
• Foresaken Forefathers Part VI: Island Infiltration, by Havok and AlphaBravo343
• Critters the reckoning part 2, by Caleb Generoso

Lots to read…

Nice find by CSJ – Bungie has posted ANOTHER sign from the E3 trailer for those who like to read such things. Nice tip o’ the hat to Hill Street Blues… (The discovery method for this one is pretty funny.)

For the folks that have trouble with our forum, we’ve added a small FAQ – you can find the link at the very top of the forum. It covers things that turn up on the forum itself. (Very little of it is Halo-related, specifically.) Thanks to Cybrfrk for its inception, and mnemesis for editing help.

Wednesday’s One One Se7en is now up. Harsh truth… but tru7h nonetheless.

Yesterday, Gholsbane posted a rough sketch of the E3 demo map. Today, he’s got a polished, colored version, with pretty icons and everything. Check it out!

SketchFactor graced our forum with a pretty clear shot of the Hog billboard from the E3 demo trailer. He was afraid nobody would notice it, though… go appease his fear, would you? Thanks.

Wow. Every week, we get email from folks who want their site to be added to our Links list. We announce ’em all… but it’s rare that I’m as impressed with one as I am with Halogamers.com. Clean design, good (unique) content, lots to explore… It’s not finished yet, but it’s well on its way. Check ’em out… and if you’re near Eau Claire, WI, go play with ’em!

Another Halo 2 Preview posted – this time over at GamePlasma. Some um… interesting suggestions (the machete’s back? And release has been pushed up to December 2003?), but mostly a pretty upbeat piece. Thanks to TankRamp, at Battleground: Halo, for the heads-up. (We’ve added this to our Previews section.)

A pair of Canadian tournaments for you: Got Game has a FFA tourney running June 27-29 in Victoria, British Columbia – $20 to get in, $500 first prize, more details at the website… and Fragapalooza, in Edmonton, Alberta, will happen on July 17-20 – it includes a 4v4 CTF tourney. There’s $30,000 in prizes on the line for the entire event (Halo is a small part of the package). Thanks to Dark-Bane and Sabre for the heads-ups.

Last alternative version, at least from us: this one is in WMP7 format, 360×243 big, weighing in at 46.2mb. If anyone has a problem with it, PLEASE let us know. We’ve also put up a secondary mirror list, for those times (like this afternoon) when HBO goes offline for a bit. They should be identical; go to the one that’s easiest to reach. (For those interested in these sorts of numbers, o1.com (the Red vs Blue guys) transferred over 4.5 terabytes of Demo trailer movies in the past 4 days, not including the BitTorrent versions, and Mythica’s closing in on 3 terabytes. Don’t even ASK what that would have cost from a standard service provider…)

The Halo 2 Caption contest has drawn to a close… and Evil Otto has had some fun writing up the results. He included some REALLY bad entries, some almost-good-enough entries, and, of course, the winners. (Several HBO regulars made the ‘almost-good-enough’ list, and a number of others used lines we’ve got in our Title rotation here.) Congrats, however, to shiner1x, epitaph01, and Shishka (yes, our very own Shishka) for gettin’ in! (Dave: for next time, Quote 1 belongs to Steven Wright, and Quote 2 belongs to Dilbert.)