One of the few remaining places to explore in Halo is the bottom of Truth and Reconciliation (level 3). Many have tried… but nobody’s gotten down there yet. c0ld vengeance and demonelite are getting close, though… check out this forum post. (Movies are listed later in the thread.)

Forum regular Lion wanted to point out his Halo site, Truth and Reconciliation. There’s not much there yet… but there are a couple of notable items. The first is a movie he made some time ago – it’s called ‘Friends’, and you can download it from the Movies page. (the site is framed, so I can’t point you there directly, without losing the navigation.) The second is a page devoted to an XBC Halo tournament – there are currently 5 people signed up to play, so if you’re an Xbox Connect regular, sign up and join in!

Joshua Griffon, of TheForce.net, has written an interesting editorial for his site. A Halo-engined Star Wars title? Hmm… there’s an intriguing idea…

The NPD Group has released a report on video game sales for 2002 – and among other interesting facts, they’ve compiled a Top 10 Best Selling Game Titles list. On the list are seven PS2 games, one GameBoy Advance game, one GameCube game… and Halo. Booyah! Thanks to kareem ramos for the heads-up.

After a 2-week hiatus, the Bungie Webcam is back in action – and if you look now, you’ll get a glimpse of the Elite Halo t-shirt. (It’s archived here, in case the image changes.) Thanks to SketchFactor for the heads-up!

Took some work… but the Movies database has finally been brought up-to-date. 20 films released in the past 2 months are now listed (and searchable). Hopefully, this’ll help folks looking for that special film. The most recent addition hasn’t even been mentioned here in the news yet – so let me do that now. Athol Productions has created The Blair Halo Project, a nearly-7-minute-long vid which starts, and ends, like the movie it got its name from. (In the middle you’ll find gamplay and antics.) It’s available in QuickTime and WMV formats, and weighs in at 30 or so megs. (Plus or minus 3, depending on your format.) We’ve put it up at both Mythica and The Psyjnir Complex Hotline server… but additional mirrors would be very much appreciated. Next up: The Miscellaneous database. (Tomorrow, maybe.)

Bringing the Interviews section up-to-date, we’ve added 4 recent interviews with Marty O’Donnell – the guy’s been talkative these past couple of months!

Three new desktops for you today – A Matrix-inspired one (well, Reloaded, at least) that’s wicked-cool, one that uses the recently-posted Helljumpers interpretation, and one that… well, I can’t really explain it. I suppose that’s because I don’t understand it. You’ll find all three in our Wallpaper section.

Joshua Pettigrew created a logo for the Helljumpers, Special Forces troops mentioned in the Fall of Reach. You’ll find it in our Miscellaneous Art section.

Lots of new stories in the Fan Fiction offerings today:

• HALO: The Spartans, part 1, by S7N
• D-Day: The Beach, by Shadow Spartan
• 5 Way War, part 4, by Demosthenes
• Eye of the Storm: Sanity’s Reqiuem, by Ashur
• Wrong or Right, by Harley
• Halo Zero, part 1, by nicholas

See what you can find…

10 tips have been added to the Tips Database, including a pretty exhaustive look at all the ways of dealing with Banshees on the Natural Bridge of AotCR. Sometimes internet worms can pay useful dividends for fansites…

Hehe… and the egg-like things continue. Yesterday, Argos noticed that ‘Rock Anthem for Saving the World’, a high-energy piece from the Halo Soundtrack, was exactly 1:17 long. Not only does that match up nicely with the Master Chief’s Spartan II designation… but expressed in seconds, it’s got a length of 77. Marty made it clear that this wasn’t an accident. The Halo Soundtrack’s been out for 8 months now, you’d think someone would have noticed sooner…

In the first all-from-existing-footage movie in a LONG time that seems worth passing along, Senator32 has combined the soundtrack from the StarCraft Ghost trailer with Halo footage spanning almost 3 years to create ‘Halo Warrior‘. It’s 6.4 mb, in MPEG format. (The byte savings from converting to QuickTime format wasn’t worth the effort.) Mythica, as usual, is doing the hosting honors. Take a look!

We got word of three new or revamped Halo sites over the weekend; John pointed out Halo Reamped (‘your source for every thing halo’), sk8er told us to check out Halo HQ (which has ZERO information except a couple of links to buy Halo and Halo 2 at EB Games, passing along a commission to the site), and Chris Ryan let us know that the Halo hub at Forerunners.org has been resdesigned. I’d expect more of these updates, as Halo for PC and Halo 2 draw nearer…

Three new desktop images for you; a nice composite of the very old (one of the earliest wallpaper submissions we ever got) and the very new (a Halo 2 shot), a nice cleanup of some magazine art, and more playing cards. Check ’em out in our Wallpaper section!

MiNiTeK14 dropped off a drawing of a Covenant Elite – we’ve added it to our Miscellaneous Art section.

A little earlier than usual, maybe, but the Bucs kicked some serious butt tonight, so what the heck. The new Screenshots posted at Bungie.net yesterday have been added to our Screenshots database – unreferenced shots and all.

Ferrex dropped in for a minute to pass along some tantalizing tidbits about the newest screenshot… and to update the community, in a roundabout way, on where the Halo engine is in lighting progress. Very, very nice to get new info…

Fan Fiction turned in in the last couple of days:

• Omega Red Chapter 4, by Kane172
• This Battle, by Nike
• Wings of Death Part 19, by el_halo_diablo
• Sarge’s Story: Daux, by Jamirus99/Traumatized Marine
• HALO: The Spartans, by S7N

This is the Series Finale of Wings of Death – and it’s a long one! Update: Oops, forgot one. Check out Locke’s Ring of the Forerunners, Chapter IV. Sorry about that!

He lives! *Ar-Isildur took time out of his busy schedule of bedrest and nasty treatments to pop into our forum with a quick update. He’s not out of the woods yet… but your emails and cards are definitely helping. Way to go, folks!