You can tell that Wirehead hasn’t posted news in awhile can’t you? He got the links mixed up. Nathan expounds on “water, textures, guns” HEREand on Halo’s tools HERE. Sorry people.

Whoah… Bitner Blitz! Nathan “Island Four” Bitner, former Producer and Creative Developer for Halo, hits our forums with a barrage of posts. Incoming! Nathan expounds on “water, textures, guns” in this postand on the availability of Halo’s tools in this post. Check out his other posts too! 🙂

Holy bratwurst, Batman! Poland joins the ranks of countries that host a Halo fansite… http://www.centrumhalo.prv.pl/. As far as content goes… I have no idea at all what it says, but they did a great job with how it looks! Weapons and Vehicle pages have very nicely cleaned-up thumbnails, for example.) Check ’em out… and even if you don’t speak Polish!

Ding and Crux wheeled me in here to say… hmmm hang on… oh yeah… vote Hamish… that’s it. And you can KEEP your stock options Louis!

I’m with Ding on this one. Hamish gets my vote.

Not all of us at HBO think that votingfor Louis in the bungie.netpoll is a good idea. I mean Louis hasn’t paid us any wages yetand we’re up to here with his stock options BS. So my vote goes to Hamish.

The Bitner update, December 7: There’s been quite a bit of information flying around about Nathan Bitner, and his new company, Island Four Software. Rather than add these items as we found them (which would turn HBO into I4.org – unnecessary, since it already exists), we’ve decided to give you a roundup.

• Island4.org has been registered by Nathan… not to be confused with Islandfour.org, the aforementioned fansite, registered to 3of9. (Island4.com is registered to an unrelated company, and island4.net is as yet unregistered.)
• Nathan has been waxing poetic (and not so poetic) on various fora recently… there are lots of interesting tidbits to be found. In this one, he discusses some of the literature that has influenced him… and one of the books (Infinite Jest) has elicited discussion and feedback from the community.
• Nathan has posted his first job opening on I4.org’s forum… he’s looking for a sparkplug. (Read the post to see what he means.)

Bottom line: the Bungie community (or at least the Halo community) seems excited by this new company… we have high hopes for Nathan’s success!

Has nobody got faith in your trusty webmaster? Bungie.net is running a new quick poll:

All this talk of rioting in the streets has led us to wonder which of the following fans would win in a fight. Who’d you put your money on?

• Miguel ‘Freewill’ Chavez
• Tyson ‘Ferrex’ Green
• Claude ‘Louis Wu’ Errera
• Hamish ‘Godot’ Sinclair

Good Lord… even Hamish has more votes than I do! I’m a monster in the cage… they wouldn’t stand a chance! Go cast your vote for me, and show that silly Yeroen guy who’s boss.

Hey, cool, lead times are dropping. Haloplayers reports that the latest copy of PCGamer UK contains a snippet about Halo… they’re quoting the November 11Halo update, in fact. Not too shabby… less than a month after it hit the web – lead times used to be 2-3 months. There’s also a tidbit about Planetside:

It’s already clear that Verant have been inspired by Bungie’s forthcoming Halo.

We’d agree with that. 🙂

Odd stuff going on over at… um… what used to be the Psyjnir Complex.

Eldar-Colonel has posted on the R.net forum that he’s reopened Halo HQ. Other than the fact that we HATE being referred to as ‘Halo.org’… they’re on their way to a fleshed-out site.

For a long time now the HBO crew have been systematically searching the Bungie trash cans forclues to the identity of the Bungie Webmaster. Since the move to Redmond howeverwe’ve had to wait in line to get at them. But today we edge that bit closer to the tru7h! Hamish *insert Souless death cry here* Sinclair over at the Marathon’s Story pagenoted a post by Nathan Bitner on R.net where he lets slip a name. And that name is Matt. Hamish asks “Is the Bungie Webmaster Matt Soell?”.

HBO spin… we get dizzy and fall down!

More Bitner news… The Story page (busy today!) received another note from Nathan about his new company, now (almost) officially known as Island Four Software. There’s some info on the platform choices, and the tidbit that in anticipation of the multiplayer aspect, IslandFour.net has been registered as well. This seems to be a company dedicated to bringing good stories to life:

Island Four Software Corp. is dedicated to bringing you an exciting EXPERIENCE that captures the imagination not only of our unique employees, but also of the unique gamers. That imagination will create and enhance our gameplay. Island Four will create experiences that “you can’t put down,” just like your favorite book.

We certainly wish him the best of luck – his success is our gain! Read the full letter at the Marathon’s Story page.

Hamish Sinclair has added a new screenshot to his ‘Ring Motif in Halo‘ section of the Marathon’s Story page… it backs up the theory that the glyphs strewn around the Halo’s structures were put there by the builders, not the Covenant. Amazing what turns up in movies…

Massa, of Halo Network, points out that Giga Games, a German television show dedicated to videogames, did an interview with Boris Schneider-Johne, a Microsoft Xbox PR rep, who stated that the PC version of Halo will follow the Xbox version by 3 or 4 months, with the bulk of the time being spent on multiplayer. This info was reported by Gamestar.de (and gibes well with what is known here).

Thanks to J Moyer, who noticed that EBWorld.com actually has a mockup of the Halo Strategy Guide cover mentioned last week. It’s old artwork, so it’s most likely not the final product… but interesting nonetheless. (Does it mean that Sybex isn’t doing the Xbox version, or that EBWorld is just focusing on the PC side?)

Wow. Talk about quick… yesterday, Josh Inglima, aka 3of9, a regular to the R.net community forum, registered islandfour.org:

IslandFour.org is here to provide news, rumors, gossip and anything that seems somewhat related to the new gaming company Island Four.

OK, so it may seem a little premature to launch a news site for a company that isn’t even officially named…but I have a good feeling about this one.

Now THAT, my friends, is confidence in a new company. Today, NetSol’s database was updated to reflect that Nathan Bitner registered islandfour.com. Islandfour.net is still available. Thanks to Pallor for the heads-up.

Last week, HaloWar posted a story saying someone had sent in the cover to the Halo Game Guide. Today, Halo Center has an interesting bit on the origins of that image. If at first you don’t succeed…

Dink!… The Halo SETI Marines fall yet ANOTHER notch in the Battle of the Teams… down to 47th position (and 80th on the full Teams list). Ouch! We lost And0, but gained Lacrymosa, a net gain of 500 units. Those Covenant soldiers are coming, marines… see who’s trying to do something about it on the 7 day stats page.

Chris Cox has submitted part 2 of his Warrior saga, a tale told from the point of view of a Covenant officer. Nicely written… definitely worth a read! You’ll find it in our Fan Fiction section.