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One million dollars. Sounds just great doesn't it? And $250,000 of the million dollar pool can be yours if your Halo 3 pwning skills are unnaturally super.
You can win said cash if you make the trip down to Dallas, TX on December 18th for the $1 million Halo 3 Competition held by the Cyberathlete Professional League. The competition is open to anyone, noob or l33t gamers alike, and registration is on a first come, first serve basis. Like we said, first prize gets $250,000 cash with prizes extending all the way down to 64th place who'll still walk away with a cool $2,500. If you're interested and are willing to head to Longhorn country, make the jump, get learned and register. Who ever said your Halo 3 skills wouldn't earn you a living?
It's a good day for Halo fans, folks. Not only did Bungie reveal our Halo 3Halloween surprise, but the latest novel in the franchise was released today. Titled Contact Harvest, the novel chronicles the life of Avery Johnson, better known as the invincible Sergeant Johnson in the Halo games. In honor of the release, the novel's author (and Grunt voice actor extraordinaire) Joseph Staten has placed the prologue on Bungie.net. Yes, the entire prologue. Head on over to Bungie.net to give it a read. Once you've done that, do your civic duty and buy the full novel at your local bookseller. It's the right thing to do.
Bungie revealed last Friday that they had a special treat in line for Halo 3 players this Halloween and now Frankie has made the treat known to the slavering masses. Fitting in with the season, the Halloween treat is a special 27 hour playlist in matchmaking that involves (what else?) zombies. The playlist features nothing but the Infection gametype and will be available starting October 31st at 12:01am PST and ending November 1st at 3:00am PST. The playlist will use Forge edited maps created by Bungie. These maps feature special changes that benefit the Infection gametype, things like fortifications for the human team. Perhaps best of all, the playlist will be ranked and players will be able to unlock multiplayer achievements inside it. Let's think about that: four players all rushing you, staring down the business end of your rocket launcher. Hello Overkill Achievement. Hit the "read" link for all the dirty details.
Good old Toddy McFarlane and his entrepreneurial spirit, always taking ideas to the next level and always willing to saturate a retail channel. It's something we value in a person more than good will or kindness. And his ambitious nature is spreading into the previously announcedHalo 3 figures he's creating, because we're getting lots of 'em.
According to official product launch dates over at Spawn.com, the McFarlane Halo 3 figures we've all known about will launch sometime in March 2008, but there will be other series' coming later in the year. Series two is scheduled to land at retail a few months later in June 2008 including such highlights as ODST, Drone, Mongoose and Wraith figures. Series three is planned for an August 2008 release and includes figures like a Human Flood, Brute Captain, Banshee and Scorpion. That's not all, August will also bring a special 12" Master Chief figure and October 2008 will see the release of three highly stylized figures. Wowzaz! And for easier digestion, we posted a list of figures, release dates and a series breakdown after you click towards the break.
Good old McFarlane, we knew you wouldn't let us down.
Here we are again with another winner of yet another fabulous prize. In case you missed it, last week we put up a copy of the Halo 3Legendary Edition and a Game Fuel prize pack for your winning pleasure. And now, it's time to announce the winner, so let's get to it. The winner of the Halo 3 Legendary Edition and Game Fuel prize pack is ... FDread! Congratulations, your prize will be winging its way to you any moment.
As usual, we ask that you try not to mope too much if you didn't win. After all, we'll be giving away a new prize this Wednesday. Keep your eyes peeled, enter the next giveaway, and you just might win.
In last night's newly released Bungie Weekly Update, the Bungie clan talks about VGA, banhammers, melees, maps and Halloween surprises. We're going to talk about the last two subjects, so if vga, banhammers or melees tickle your fancy then make the jump, because you're not getting anything from us.
Progress on the upcoming Halo 3 multiplayer map DLC is moving along swimmingly and are being developed in logical order focusing on filling current multiplayer map voids. All the new maps are in the testing phase and Frankie also mentions that "two of them in particular will cause a Three Mile Island scale pant-fill-disaster in the Halo community". We're not sure what that means, but we think we like it. Bungie also confirmed that they have a super secretly exciting Halo 3 Halloween surprise planned for next Wednesday. Details are scant right now, but we do know that their spooktacular surprise will last 27 hours around Halloween and relates to matchmaking. Our guess, expect a social or ranked matchmaking playlist featuring nothing but Infection. Oh, and maybe a special Halloween medal too.
The Weekly Update is chalk full of tidbits, news and Halo 3 details this week. Run (don't walk) over to Bungie.net and get your read on, you'll be happy you did.
If you missed out on purchasing the Halo 3 Legendary Edition in favor of one of the other editions and wish you could experience all the fun the Legendary Edition brings, then we've got something for you. Over at Paper Art Gadgets they've posted complete template downloads for you to create your own Halo 3 Legendary Edition (stand and helmet included) or a Halo 3 Xbox 360 in foldable paper form. The paper downloads can be downloaded right here, but we are not responsible for crippled, carpal tunneled or injured fingers as a result of the tiny paper folding you'll have to go through to create your own Legendary helmet. And, if possible, wear the proper finger protection. We've seen far too many lives ruined as a result of horrendous paper cuts.
Just a quick reminder to all our readers out there that this week's Fanswag Weekly giveaway is for none other than the Halo 3Legendary Edition. Not only that, but our winner will also receive a nifty Game Fuel prize package. Remember, they're only selling this stuff for a limited time, so winning our limited edition aluminum bottle may be one of the only chances you've got left. For your shot at this super duper prize package, head over to the official giveaway post and follow the ridiculously easy instructions. Nothing could be simpler. Now get to it.
Last night, two blogging worlds collided when X3F took on Gamertag Radio in a Halo 3 8v8 duel-de-force. The matches were frantic, the smack talk was thick and the testosterone exuded from all sixteen gamertags. You could tell that a bitter war was about to be unleashed.
X3F and GTR teams both met up in a David Dreger hosted room, each choosing a team color. GTR went with old school blue (which we now call "boring blue") and we went with something a little more lively and exciting ... pink. With color decisions behind us we were infromed that GTR was missing one of their players, so they quickly decided to pick someone up from Godfree's friends list. We weren't sure what all the hubbub was all about, but Godfree mentioned something about needing their "secret weapon" and not knowing where he was. We simply shrugged, accepted GTR's replacement and with our colors chosen, both teams agreed on a set of rules. We agreed to decide on a Fanfight winner by doing a best out of three, starting off with Valhalla, Team Slayer, first to 100. Then, the losing team would choose the second match's gametype / map and the same would go for the third. Everyone buckled in, took a deep breath and we began our Fanfight.
Ladies and gentlemen, tonight we prepare for a momentous occasion. Later on tonight, we will be facing of with Gamertag Radio in a battle of strength, wits, and Spartan Lasers. Tonight at 10pm Eastern, we'll be throwing down for great justice in Halo 3. Naturally, we'll write up the event and put up videos afterwards for your Halo 3 downloading pleasure. Who knows, maybe we can even toss these up on our website proper. If you can't wait for the after match report, you can head over to Gamertag Radio, where they will be streaming their side of whole event. If you'd like to see firsthand what it's like to lose to us, check it out. We've recruited a crack team of X3F readers (not to be confused with a team of X3F readers on crack) to help us on our way to ultimate domination, so we're ready to take on anything.
Wish us luck fanboys. Sure, it's only a symbolic gesture -- it's not like we need luck -- but we still appreciate the support.
Usually video games are chalk full of secret images, objects or jokes that we call Easter eggs and are things developers hide in their game for the sole reason of having fun hiding stuff. But rarely do we get to use the coined term "Easter egg" so literally as is the case with the latest Halo 3 Easter egg named the Da Vinci Code Egg. Per the video above, you can see that Project Mod Gaming found numerous colorful eggs high atop multiplayer map Sandtrap, each with what looks to be a secret Da Vinci code printed on them. We aren't sure what the special code means, if the symbols are merely decoration for the eggs or why "Dani California" was chosen for the YouTube video, but we are going to fuel the rumor fire and say that this "code" will reveal something. What something? We aren't sure, but we want this Halo 3 Easter egg cracked and cooked sunny side up (we couldn't resist).
While on Xbox Live playing games we all have our certain "ticks". Things that people do within or outside of gameplay that either annoy us or make us want to break the closest object. This experience happens in nearly every game, but is ever so more apparent while playing Halo 3.
JW over at 1P Start posted his list of the top nine things that ruin his online Halo 3 gaming experience and we must say, we agree with most. Scattered throughout his list are the typical weapons based annoyances including the people he calls "rocket whores" or "swordsmen". We aren't annoyed by the weapon whore'ers of the world, but when we get repeatedly pwned by the same person using the same weapon ... well, we tend to get a bit angry. JW posted other Halo 3 gaming annoyances, but two that stand out and we wholeheartedly agree with are the "heavy breathers" and "deserters". Seriously, if you're raping your microphone in such a way that we can hear every inhale and exhale you make then we're going to have a problem. Same goes for deserters. Don't quit, don't leave our team and force us to fend off the impending onslaught one man short. It's evil and makes us sit up at night, crying and eating a half gallon of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Grrr.
JW's list of Halo 3 game ruining experiences are all pretty spot on, but we're wondering what you think. Do you have Halo 3 annoyances (or any general gaming annoyances) that bother you so much that you nearly tweak? Please share them with us and we'll have an impromptu therapy session right here in this post's comments. Gamers venting their anger about other gamers ... what's more natural than that?
Late last month the USB thumb drive creators over at mimobots announced plans to release officially licensed Halo 3 Master Chief themed thumb drives to the masses. And good news, yesterday these cute little Master Chief storage devices became available for purchase online.
We're sure you want specifics, so let's get to business. The Halo 3 mimobots are available in green, red or blue (Spartan approved) colors in 1GB ($49), 2GB ($69) and 4GB ($109) flavors. They are standard thumb drives that use USB 2.0 technology and will work on your PC or Mac. The drives also come pre-loaded with exclusive Halo 3 content including things like wallpapers, screensavers, sound clips, videos and other Halo related goodies. Give in to your urges already and make a thumb drive purchase today. The image of seeing Master Chief's head plugged into our laptop sold us.
The September NPD numbers just rolled in and we must say, everything is ice cream and roses in Xbox 360 land. As expected, Halo 3 cleaned up in the sales department coming in at the number one spot managing to sell a whopping 3.3 million copies (insert astonished face here) during the six days it was on store shelves. In comparison, the second best selling game for the month, Wii Play, sold a respectable 282,000 copies. Taking the facts even further, you could say that Halo 3 sold twice as many copies as the other nine games featured in the top ten sales combined. Simply amazing.
As for hardware, the Xbox 360 had an equally great month due to a little thing we call the Halo effect. Xbox 360 hardware sales skyrocketed to 527,000 consoles topping all other gaming platforms even the Nintendo Wii which sold 501,000 units. As far as the PS3's performance goes one could use the words "lackluster" or "sad", but we'll say its sales of 119,000 units was ... "sub-par". You can check out all the September NPD sales chart numbers after the break and after giving them a quick analysis we think you'll agree that everything is in fact, ice cream and roses.
Nothing like a good Halo 3 video to brighten your day. Today we bring you not just one, but two Halo 3 videos. The first, embedded above, features a Spartan being killed. That in itself isn't exactly out of the ordinary. What is out of the ordinary, however, is just how he gets killed. Through a bizarre bout of physics and chance, the Spartan in question is killed by ... a traffic cone. Yeah, the same orange traffic cone your likely to see on any given day in the city. It's something that's not likely to happen to you, but you might want to check fusion coils for nearby cones before you detonate them.
The second video, embedded after the break, shows off an interesting property of Halo 3 teleporters. it seems that they maintain your velocity as you travel through them. Through some clever arrangement with Forge, the people in the video perform some crazy (and physically impossible) jumps. Check it out. If you've got some Halo 3 action to show off, feel free to tell us.
