The tireless grunts at the Halo Story Page have given you even MORE content to chew on. There’s now a HSP FAQ… and ‘Halothon‘, an addendum to the Marathon Connections page. (It’s not really story-related, but it’s not really eggs, either; it was homeless, so Finn gave it a home.) Read and be wiser.

A new Halo-related comic at Subnova today – posted last night, but I couldn’t get to it right away. For what it’s worth, Deimos is a nicer guy than that. (Pallor, now… Pallor might have done that.)

Xerxes writes to let us know that Halo Orbit just got a new layout – it loads three times as fast as the old one, and includes a news search function, among other new tidbits. (Anyone paying attention knows how much I love news search functions, and realizes Halo Orbit just got 14 brownie points for this.) Check ’em out!

The boys at Battleground: Halo got a note from David Mertz, the lead level designer for Halo PC. Go read it on their front page (or at this more permanent location) for details on their preparations for E3.

gd points out that there’s a new poll over at Gamespot: ‘Which of these highly-anticipated first-person shooters are you most looking forward to?’ Halo 2 currently has 42% of nearly 8000 votes… but you can help make sure it doesn’t lose that edge.

Hehe… for another take on the OXM Halo 2 scan issue, check out Penny Arcade’s comic yesterday. (More info is available in the news, as well.) Thanks to Ross Mills for the heads-up.

A sad, sad story… go read the tale of the AAARDP. And let this be a lesson to you! (A lesson about what, I’m not sure.)

Whoa. Ceri Thomas has created a Halo card game – and at first blush, it’s pretty dang high quality. Rules (and cards) come in the form of a 2.2 mb PDF; download it, print it on cardstock, and cut it up. I haven’t actually played it… but the rules are pretty clear, and seem to be well thought-out. A forum post has been pretty positive so far, and has a mirror for the pdf – at Halo-Game, in France. Check it out.

Slothboy let us know about ‘Ash vs. The Covenant‘, his tribute to the Halo WAST-M. Check it out – timing is QUITE good. (Format is mpeg-4; QuickTime 6 will open it, but I’m not sure about other programs.) 9.2 mb, 1:26 long. Two thumbs up. Minor spoilers, for anyone keeping track.

For those who don’t remember, we announced a major bungie.org contest, the Pillar of Art, a few months ago. We wanted to take this opportunity to remind you that the deadline for submissions is now less than three weeks away; we need to RECEIVE your submission by May 16, 2003. (If you mail it on the 15th, the likelihood of our receiving it before the deadline is… well, not very good.) There’s an added bonus to mailing your entry now, though: any work that we get our hands on by May 9th, 2003, we’ll consider hauling with us to Los Angeles, where it will be on display during the Bungie Fanfest. (This will not in any way affect your chances in the contest itself; if it goes, you don’t get special consideration, and if it doesn’t, you don’t get penalized… it’s just a chance to show your work off to more Halo fanatics, and to Bungie themselves. Also, we’re not promising to carry everything we get early; remember, we’re headed out to LA on airplanes.) To date, we’ve received just a few entries, but an enormous amount of interest – make sure that your entry doesn’t miss the deadline! (Cash and glory, people… cash and glory.)

E3 is just 2 weeks away and as it gets closer so does the Bungie Fanfest. As is the tradition from previous fanfests, there are going to be exclusives that only folks that attend the event will get to experience. Hey, Bungie has to reward those of you that are traveling far (some from Italy!) just to sniff Chucky’s sleeve.

SketchFactor has already announced that a surprise mystery guest will attend. Who do you think it is? Speculation is running rampant. heh 🙂

But on to today’s new announcement: It is Bungie’s great honor to welcome the guys behind the RedvsBlue videos. Not only will they be around to sign your girlfriend’s breast, but DVD-quality versions of their videos will be playing on the big screen! And here’s the kicker: They are working on a special video just for the fanfest. The premise for this “Special E3 Video” is so funny that even the folks at Bungie can’t wait to see it!

This is truly shaping up to be the Fanfest to beat all Fanfests. How will Bungie top it next year? One can only wonder, but I’m bringing my galoshes.

Stuntmutt has begun work on a new comic strip – one that we’re hosting here. It’s called One One Se7en, and it stars your very own Master Chief, in all his MS Paint glory. We’ll be releasing new comics every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, unless something comes up. To start with, go check out ‘Mission Um… Possible‘.

Well, they might be a little hard to see… but Dolbex has put up a couple of hundred pictures from the Halo50K event. Unfortunately, the server is somewhat overloaded, so you might run into trouble seeing some of the thumbnails, or loading some pages. Be patient, though – there’s some fun stuff in there!

Good lord – as if you didn’t have ENOUGH to read… mnemesis, afraid that his job was being usurped by the young upstart Finn, went on an all-night rummaging binge and pulled out ANOTHER dozen-and-a-half morsels from the enormous Story Page email archive to mull over. Mosey on over to the Halo Story Page news section and nibble ’til you’re full!

Another Battlefield 1942 mod team throws its hat in the Halo ring. Inner Circle Halo is working on a conversion for BF1942 to bring Halo weapons and vehicles into a multiplayer environment that supports up to 64 players. Check out their website for some early renders… and if you’re interested in helping out, they’re looking for you; stop by and let ’em know!

In late March, an unofficial probe into some comments made by Pallor became what is now known as ‘The Megg Hunt’ – a community feeding frenzy that eventually involved hundreds (thousands?) of Halo fans, an attempt to discover an easter egg placed in Halo specifically for Meg by her boyfriend, a designer on the Halo team. It got ugly before it got solved… but solved it got. A few days ago, some folks with access to modded xboxes and hacked copies of Halo found some clues that pointed to the location of the Megg… and the rest, as they say, was history. Today, Meg has written up a full history of the search, including the steps required to see it for yourself (and a movie to help you along). Zip on over to Subnova for all the details. (Be gentle; this information is being posted in a lot of places. If you have trouble seeing the page, try again later.)

Hart points out a quiz he’s created at Quizilla; What Weapon Are You? Take the test, and find out!

And again… there’s ANOTHER of the Dogtags sets up for sale on eBay; this one currently sits at just under $15 (much better than the $71 the last one closed at), auction closes in 2 days, but the seller has no history at all. Caveat emptor… and thanks to The_Unseen for the heads-up.

Wow. Halo: The Flood has shown up on Publisher’s Weekly’s Mass Market Bestseller’s List (number 11)! Wow. More details over at Bungie Sightings. Thanks to poenadare for the heads-up.

The last time the Movies database here at HBO was updated was mid-March – about 5 weeks ago. As of today, the 22 movies released since then have been added to the database. Total number of movies is up to 231; it’s getting to be an unweildy list. Time to rethink the organization, maybe…