Self Righteous has picked up a couple more mirrors (and a thumbs-up from moviemaker Dan Chosich), so we’ve put together a full mirror list. If you haven’t grabbed it… it’s only 13.7 mb! Thanks to Dinky, of HaloJuggaloProductions, and That Weasel, of That Weasel Television, for the bandwidth.

We get an awful lot of mail from folks who seem to be confused about what constitutes an ‘easter egg’. So much, in fact, that it was finally worth my time to write an Easter Egg FAQ, of sorts. Check it out for what we consider eggs – and what we don’t. (Suggestions welcome, but there’s no guarantee we’ll agree with you.)

The February issue of the Official Xbox Magazine (off the stands as of the 7th of this month) had a one-page quick look at Halo 2. nukedude was kind enough to scan this for us and send it in. (Normally, this wouldn’t be necessary – I subscribe to this mag, and usually scan it myself. I never got to it this time, though, so his efforts are appreciated!) You’ll find it in our Press Scans database.

On January 13, kapowaz bundled up an archive of images taken from the Bungie webcam over the span of a month – every 5 minutes, 8,000+ images in all. The zipped archive weighs in at 83 mb – and has been made available by Eclarap, of Halo-Game, for anyone who wants to use it.

Thanks to bandwidth provider That Weasel Television – three recent movies (HaloHackinFun, HaloHackinFun2, and Heffalumps and Woozles) now have mirrored versions served up by That Weasel. Get yer red-hot movies now!

Whatever problems mythica had recently seem to be cleared up. Therefore, we’re going to post the latest movie in the queue for you – it’s called ‘Self-Righteous‘, and it was made by Mobius. (We’d planned to release it more than a week ago – and then the hacking craze hit, and suddenly we didn’t have the bandwidth for it.) It’s 13.7 mb, 3:30 long, in QuickTime format. Timing is quite good… and there’s a short clip starting at about two minutes in that I just LOVE. We’ve mirrored it at the Psyjnir Complex hotline server, if you have trouble reaching mythica – and there should be other mirrors on the way. Enjoy! Update: Whoknew writes to say he’s added a mirror. Thanks!

Break Point writes to say that he’s started a profile for Team HBO at the Halo50K competition. There are still two positions open – if you’re interested in representing our site at this massive Halo competition at the end of April, stop by and sign up! (Break Point asked if there was another official ‘Team HBO’ before setting this up. There is a team made of HBO Junkies that played recently at the iGames Regionals… but they won’t be headed down to Atlanta, so the name was available.) Show what you’re made of… and bring the honor of winning (if not the $50k) back to HBO!

We have another movie for you – this one’s not a hacking film, but a gameplay one – but our main bandwidth provider, mythica.org, seems to to be having some nameserver troubles. As soon as we can get there, we’ll serve this puppy up!

Another Bryce-looking piece from gizella Varga – check our Miscellaneous Art section.

Been a few days since Fan Fiction was updated – here are 10 more:

• Sarges Platoon, FINAL CHAPTER, by Bobby Lucas
• Project Shadow Spartan: Chapter 2, by Shadow Spartan
• The Battle For Sigma Octanus Chapter 2, by moniter101
• Forest of Black Epsilon, by janglurevil7
• Freelance-Chapter 3, by Bloodcider
• Attack Plan, by Dispraiser
• A Fresh Start, part 4, by Simon James
• Chronicle of Neapolitan Ice Cream Banshee, by Sesshoumaru, Lord of the Western Lands
• And Raise Your Head With Pride! Part 1, by Arthur Wellesly
• Ring Of The Forerunners Part V, by Locke

Hopefully, I’ll have time to check the forum tomorrow. (Busy weekend…)

Thanks To Ciarán Walsh, our Forum search features just became more useful. Before today, if you were looking for a specific snippet of text, you could search for that text, or you could search for the author of that text – but you couldn’t do both. If you knew you were looking for a post about banshees, from, say, Red Loser… you could search for ‘Red Loser’, and manually check almost 800 posts… or you could search for ‘banshee’, and sort through almost 1300 posts. Now, however, you can search for both, and pare your results down to a manageable 54 posts. Nice! It’s a simple checkbox in the Search window, and it’s been added to the forum archives, as well. (If all goes well, there will be more enhancements in the not-too-distant future.)

Rampancy.net posted links to two new Bungie jobs listed at Gamasutra (but not yet on the Bungie Jobs page). These new job openings (posted a week ago) are for a 3D Environment Artist and a Developer. (The developer job is for Halo 2 – the last bullet in the ‘Responsibilities’ list is “Work with the graphics team, artists and designers to insure that Halo 2 is the best looking game on this planet or any other.” Seems like a worthwhile goal to me!) To see these at Gamasutra, you’ll need an account there. It’s free – and if you’re too lazy to sign up for one, you probably don’t want these jobs.

HUNTR-KILLR created a small (900K) movie showing the jumping ability of a floodified marine with the recent Halo hack. The library is 4 stories high… the marine has no trouble getting above the final platform in one huge leap. (For good measure, a second jump proves, once and for all, that there are no branches in the roof. If you don’t know what that means… consider yourself lucky.)

A pair of great sketches from Tina – originally done with coloring pencils (sorry, Tina, I’m American, can’t use the British spelling without twinging 🙂 ) and pen, with a little photoshop help. (Spoilers, for those still keeping track.) You’ll find ’em in our Miscellaneous Art section.

Wanna get a copy of the next Halo book (Halo: The Flood) for free? The MOSHPIT, a 7th Column chapter at Bungie.net, is giving one away – just drop by their website and add your name to the giveaway database. They’ll pick a winner at random on April 1, and ship a copy to that lucky person the day the book becomes available! (MOSHPIT Membership is welcome, but not required, for this contest.)

A bunch of mirrors have come online for both Halo Hackin’ Fun 2 (released a couple of days ago) and Heffalumps and Woozles (released last night). I’ve set up mirror pages for both – follow the links above to grab your copy. Thanks to all the bandwidth providers – you guys make all this possible!

More information about Halo Novel #2 at Ballantine:

The Human-Covenant War, a desperate struggle for humankind’s very survival, has reached its boiling point on the mysterious, ring world called Halo. But the fierce Covenant warriors, the mightiest alien military force known, are not the only peril lying in wait.

As the fortress world of Reach and its brave defenders were bombarded to rubble, a single cruiser fled the carnage with the battle’s only human survivors-Captain Keyes, his crew of a few hundred Marines, and the last remaining SPARTAN super-soldier, the Master Chief.

With the cruiser’s artificial intelligence, Cortana, concealed in his battle armor, the Master Chief crash lands on Halo in the midst of a massive Covenant occupation. Curiously, the alien soldiers appear to be searching for something hidden on the ring. Built by a long-dead race, Halo harbors many deadly secrets, but one overshadows them all. Now the Master Chief must lead the scattered troops in a brutal race to unravel Halo’s darkest mystery-and unleash its greatest source of power. . . .

Heh – one of the topics that’s come up a lot recently on our forum is whether the Forerunners are actually gone or not – this text suggests they are, but is it just random copy written by someone who doesn’t look as closely at the story as some of our visitors? (Thanks to Aaron Charles for noticing the new copy.)

Okay… we’ve got another Hacking vid for you. This one is called ‘Heffalumps and Woozles’, and was created by HUNTR-KILLR. (Okay, he shouldn’t be blamed for the name. That’s my fault – it’s full of such fancy that the name just seemed to fit.) This one’s a monster; 11 and a half minutes long, 33 megs, in QT format. There’s no sound at all, and segments are broken up by a second or two of black space, so keep your eyes open. There are more cool things than you can shake a honey pot at! Think of this one as a library of what might be. Right now, it’s ONLY at Mythica.org – we’d love mirrors. (I’m currently uploading it to the psyjnir.com hotline server, but I’m only getting about 6k/sec… gonna be an hour or more.) The next movie after this one won’t be a hacking vid – we’ve had a Blood Gulch action flick in the queue for FAR too long. (Sorry, Mobius.) Oh – and Dinky, of HaloJuggaloProductions, sent along a link for Dozi’s SECOND hacking fun film – you can grab it here, if mythica is too overloaded with this current film. Thanks, Dinky! Update: Frogblast, in his infinite kindness (and despite the pain), has provided mirrors for both ‘Heffalumps‘, and the recent Halo Hackin’ Fun 2. We <3 you, Froggie…

Mmm… pie. (Thanks, Razorback.)

Couple of updates on yesterday’s news… The guys running Sector.7 have bought a domain name, www.sector7-halo.com, and will be moving there shortly. (Currently, it’s just a placeholder page.) And the editorial by poena.dare on hacking and what it means to the Bungie community has generated a host of interesting comments, including several from Bungie employees. Go read.