Jan 6, 2000 (Thursday)

Thanks to Seth Graham (aka Xzzy) <sether@xzzy.org> for pointing out that he has made two posts to The Core forums giving further details on last night's "Gathering of Fans". You can see them at:

http://www.daboyz.org/core/cgi-bin/forums/halo/archive/index.pl?read=11747

http://www.daboyz.org/core/cgi-bin/forums/halo/archive/index.pl?read=11759

Lots of interesting stuff in there. You'll note in Seth's first post that #2 is allegedly "8 megs uncompressed" which is different from SiliconDream's "8 MB compressed" description below.

Alan Greene <alan@fontshop.com> kindly sent in this report of last night's "Gathering of Fans" hosted by at Miguel Chavez and Bungie at Club I:

Hi there, I thought I would try to be the first to give you the lowdown on the post-MacWorld Bungie fan gathering, hosted by Miguel Chavez. Beware, I have been up for 21 hours, so this is long-winded.

Miguel opened the evening by briefly introducing Alex Seropian, who thanked us for coming and thought it was cool that we were there.

Marty O'Donnell popped in, and Miguel called for an orchestra of 25 PCs playing the Myth II intro simultaneously, as a welcome for him. He answered a few questions about the music in Oni and Halo, noting that the theme heard in the Halo trailer was intended to provide a solid impact at MacWorld NY. He mentioned that although much of the sound for Halo is still in its early stages, some themes from the trailer piece may work their way into the final score, provided that it fits properly. Apparently, context-sensitive music will be a feature in the game. Halo on DVD, anyone?

Matt Soell took the stage next. The pronunciation of his last name is still a mystery, as Miguel refused to say it out loud. Matt answered exactly seven questions from the crowd, covering #2, Myth II 1.3.1, Halo and Oni editors (or lack thereof), and whether or not there will be an Internet-compatible version of Marathon. He deftly avoided most of the questions with Soon™ and the crowd understood. However, he did say that #2 is at his house, and that he would disregard things like sleep and personal hygiene until he had it out the door.

Miguel ushered Alex back up to the stage. Alex was also eager to avoid questions about various topics, such as consoles and the future of Bungie in general. He was very soft-spoken, so I didn't catch much. Rather odd for a man leading a subversive campaign for world domination. But I did make out his comment that Bungie would like to continue using bTV for conferences in the future. He also said that due to technical difficulties, Wednesday's edition of the bTV broadcast may not be archived in full, or perhaps at all.

Sales guru Jim made a few comments about wanting to produce more Bungie merchandise, and informed us of the new bTV mugs that are for sale. He also reminded the crowd to save the Bungie Points that appear on The Total Codex and upcoming Bungie products, as they will be redeemable for something or other.

Next, Joe spoke. He had a story to tell, and it went a little something like this:

"Sometime in the future (no date determined yet), humans explored the galaxy and colonized in various places. They travelled from Sol, towards the center of the Milky Way, laying down colonies here and there. Even once in a while, these posts got a cryptic, religiously-toned message from a group of aliens, just before being completely destroyed. After several of these attacks, the humans determined from the messages that the aliens were called the Covenant.

It turns out that the aliens originated from somewhere on the other side of the galaxy, and were themselves exploring and conquering different regions. At one point in time, the humans and the Covenant engaged in an enormous war, and the humans were annihilated. One of the surviving ships in the human fleet was the Pillar of Autumn. The commander of this ship, in a desperate attempt to flee, set course for some remote location in the galaxy. She punched in the coordinates, and off went the Pillar of Autumn.

Upon arriving at their arbitrary destination, the humans found themselves among three celestial bodies. One was a gas giant, named Threshold; the second was a moon, named Basis; the third was a relatively small ring, approximately 10,000 miles in diameter. The ring had an atmosphere, continents, varying climates, its own gravity, and was very much supportive of life.

It soon became clear that the Covenant were near. Another battle was fought, the humans once again slaughtered. As a final measure before the Pillar of Autumn fell apart, the AI on board the ship deployed an army of military personnel and some artillery. This army battled an enormous fleet of aliens, all the while trying to discover the technology behind the ring on which they fought. The race that found out the secrets of the ring would be those that would win the battle, and ultimately the universe."

It is worth noting that Joe had that look of "whoops" when he mentioned Threshold, and looked over to see if Alex had heard him. He then continued quickly, and mentioned what sounded like "Basis" as the name for the moon. He was trying to cover himself, so I may have heard wrong. There was no mention of a Space Cheerio.

It is also worth noting that Joe used a much stronger, more heartfelt word than "enormous" to emphasize the number of aliens that the humans would battle on the ring. His story, I think, was the highlight of the evening.

After that, we got cozy for a charming group photo. The attendees then engaged in 16 gruelling rounds of 90-minute Myth II deathmatches, and I was one of two players that pulled ahead and walked away with a Soulblighter pencil holder. That's a lie, actually there was just a drawing, and I got lucky.

When I looked up, most of the crowd had disappeared, and the pizza along with it. I was forced to purchase a bagel at 10:15, as I recovered from several hours of Myth II.

Naturally, the event was marvelously successful. I would imagine that I'm not alone in wanting to thank Miguel and Bungie for pulling this off. They rock.

That's all for now. Time for a midnight bike ride home ...

Nice Halo story tidbits in there. Thanks Alan. :-)

Both The Core and halo.bungie.org have Forum posts with further details of the "Gathering of Fans". Most are by SiliconDream=PN=. I'm taking the liberty of reprinting the most comprehensive one below:

Halo stuff from the Expo

Posted By: SiliconDream=PN= <querl@uclink4.berkeley.edu>
Date: 6 January 2000, 3:35 a.m.

First, a few miscellaneous tidbits:

We met Marty O'Donnell at the Bungie booth, and he said that one of the things he's looking into for Halo is dynamic music, where tracks don't just turn on and off according to where you are and what you do, but vary their "emotional intensity" by altering individual instrument tracks and so forth while keeping the same basic tune.

Joe Staten (or Staaten, I forget how many a's) gave the diameter of the Halo as 10,000 *miles* and stuck to this figure when I asked him whether he meant kilometers.

We were told at the gathering--I think by Matt--that Halo is intended to be extensively modifiable and that, probably, the editors will be made available immediately upon release.

Matt sez #2 is 8 MB compressed, that it's on his hard drive, and that once the Expo is over he won't sleep or bathe until it's released. So Sunday or Monday, I'd guess.

That guy who ate the shirt on BTV? He just had his wisdom teeth out. There was blood on the shirt afterwards. Dedicated fan. :)

Now, here's my synopsis of Joe's talk about Halo's story. It has a couple of things Xzzy left out. I'd give it word for word, but I gave my camcorder tape to Deus Ex Machina for converting to Quicktime. Anyway, I'm sure someone will post a movie of his talk soon.

At an as-yet-unspecified point in the far future, humanity is steadily expanding into space, colonizing more and more systems. Colonies are probably fairly small at the moment--Joe called them "outposts." Our primary direction of colonization is toward the galactic core.

The Covenant's attack comes from this side (which, Marathon story buffs will note, implies that they may have explored L'howon), although they attack from many different directions (in other words, the coreward area they control is BIG). Little is known about them, as their only communications are brief transmissions of a seemingly religious nature before opening fire on whichever outpost they're currently attacking.

Humanity can offer little resistance to their superior numbers and tech, and in an enormous Star Wars-style space battle (described by Joe as "with star cruisers and all that stuff") the human fleet is annihilated. A single ship, the Pillar of Autumn, flees-- I didn't catch if Joe gave a specific motive for this but Xzzy says he said they're trying to decoy or confuse the Covenant--and its female captain puts the crew in stasis and hands over control of the ship to its AI. Joe said we were "going to hear a lot more about this AI later;" can anyone guess who it is? ;)

The ship, following an evasive course, eventually arrives at the Halo system, which contains (perhaps among other bodies) the gas giant Threshold, its moon Basis, and the Halo. Unfortunately it also contains an enormous Covenant fleet, which got there a little bit earlier. The human ship's AI puts up quite a fight and destroys most of the fleet, but the ship is disabled and crashes on the Halo. It ejects its crew before the crash and their escape pods land all over the ringworld. As the game opens, you, an elite, high-ranking military officer, have just woken from stasis and climbed out of your escape pod. And so begins the guerilla war, in which you will encounter, in Joe's words, a "f*ckload of aliens."

Then he sprinted from the mike before we could badger him with questions.

I'm DEFINITELY going back Saturday.

--SiliconDream

Interesting to note that #2 is 8 MB compressed. :-)

Jan 7, 2000 (Friday)

Bungie TV showed a two minute clip of new Halo footage a few minutes ago. It was explained that the footage was culled from a larger demo to be shown to the Asian market by Peter Tamte. The footage was very similar in parts to the German PC Action Halo movie which was in fact a film taken of Bungie's Halo/Oni demo for the European market.

Apart from Halo the world now knows how to pronounce Matt Soell's last name (Sell not Soul). :-)

Thanks to Zach Stroum <durandal@u.washington.edu> for sending in the current EtherLife comic which has a tongue-in-cheek look at Halo and rampant AIs. Check out the EtherLife site and put a smile on your face. Nice one Zach. :-)

Two new Halo screenshots have been sighted at Gamespot and IGN PC. Other sites have one or other of the shots. Worth a look.

Jan 8, 2000 (Saturday)

According to a Mac Observer news article Bungie are to spotlight Halo at ths year's Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) on May 11-13th in Los Angeles, California. Part of the text reads:

Bungie Software will be showing their next generation multiplayer game, Halo, at E3 this spring. Doug Zartman, PR Spokesperson for Bungie, told The Mac Observer that the company will be demonstrating the team-oriented game at the show. "Yeah, we're going to dominate E3," says Mr. Zartman. A release date for he game has not been announced, but Mr. Zartman is saying that sometime during the second half of 2000 is a goal. The team currently is currently working on multiplayer functionality.

The article also makes reference to an unannounced project by the team formerly known as the Myth 2 development team.

Jan 9, 2000 (Sunday)

Merkinja7a <merkinjata@paxnimbus.com> has posted (at the Core forums) a transcript of Joseph Staten's description of Halo's back story from Thursday's edition of Bungie TV. I've taken the liberty of copying it out in full below:

Halo Backstory Transcript

Posted By: Merkinja7a =PN= on Saturday, 01.8.00, at 3:05 p.m.

I pulled this from the Thursday edition of bTV for those of you that didn't get a chance to see it or want a hard copy to discuss ;)

-- Begin Transmission --

So I thought I'd take some time and give you guys the basic story of Halo so you know what to expect.

You all should gather round, get some popcorn, get a warm blanket, curl up in bed and get ready for a bTV story.

Do we have some kind of fancy little graphic video fade we can do Jason? Alright, let this suffice *waves arms while saying "woo woo"*

So, here's the story of Halo:

It's a couple hundred years in the future. Earth has, the people of Earth have, gone out and colonized the galaxy. They made a number of different outposts in one particular region of the galaxy and are doing fairly well until they run into a massive group of aliens called the Covenant.

Now, keep in mind this isn't just one alien. It's actually a conglomeration of different alien races, none of which are particularly nice; on the whole they're especially nasty. They're pretty zealous; they have a lot of really zealous religious fervor. Whenever they come in contact with one of the human outposts they wipe it out utterly without any word, without any warning, a couple cryptic messages, but then they raise the planet in a tremendous firestorm. They're destroying all the human systems and the unfortunate thing is they're getting closer and closer to Earth.

Now we have a final setpiece battle with the aliens at one of the last remaining Human colonies that is not Earth. We get totally obliterated except for one human ship. The commander of this human ship decides that rather than lead the aliens closer and closer to earth that they're going to plot a course to some random destination in the galaxy and lead the aliens away with them.

So, they set this random course, they log it into the computer's AI, the AI blasts them out of the system and oddly enough the entirety of the alien force follows them. Not one ship, not a couple, but every single Covenant battleship follows this one human ship.

Now when this one human ship arrives at this uncharted destination they find a couple cool things in the system. They find a big gas giant planet that has a moon orbiting around it. In between the two things is this ring structure, something they've never seen before. It's 10,000 miles in diameter, it has an atmosphere, it has continents, and it can support life. It's a habitat, you can live on it.

The human ship comes into the system, makes these very quick discoveries, but before it can do anything else it's attacked by the Covenant battle fleet and broken into bits. Before the ship is destroyed however the commander of the ship is able to jettison certain essential supplies, troops that remain alive, and vehicles. All these different things land in various places on the Halo ring.

You, the main character of the game, an elite military officer, are able to bail out of the breaking apart human ship at the very last minute and burn through the atmosphere of the ring, which is Halo, land on the surface of the ring, and what begins is a guerrilla war between you and this massive, overwhelming, alien fleet. Aliens land on the ring and they engage you and your former crewmembers in a variety of battles around the ring.

So that's the basic back-story of Halo. All that happens before the game begins. And again the game of Halo is a 3rd person action game; it's all about action from minute to minute. It tells the story of you, one person alone, with your friends, with weapons, with vehicles, fighting a guerrilla war against a fairly overwhelming alien force.

-- End Transmission --

Jan 10, 2000 (Monday)

Another interesting tidbit popped up on the Core forums. It relates to Joseph Staten's rendition of Halo's back story at the Bungie Fan Fest last Wednesday evening. This was before he gave the Bungie TV (Day 2) version. I've taken the liberty of reprinting the full post below:

Thresold and Basis

Posted By: Kel on Monday, 01.10.00, at 10:34 a.m.

Sorry if this is duplicitous, but one thing I made note of at the Bungie Gathering at Club-I was the names of the Gas giant and the moon(planet?) between which the Halo spins. Joe named the gas giant Threshold, and the other celestial body Basis. Other neat info was that he classified the person in charge of the Pillar of Autumn as a "she." Finally, if the Milky Way is the face of a wrist watch, and Sol is at about 7 o'clock on the outer edge of the clockface, Joe described the Covenant as coming from 10 o'clock, half way between the center of edge of the clockface. In this description he characterized we humans as having colonized inwards towards the Covenant, and the Covenant as having traveled outwards towards us, our meeting having been the beginning of the Covenant's attacks.

More fodder for the rumormill.

Woo,
Kel

Apparently the Fan Fest was recorded so it'll be interesting to hear exactly what Joseph said that night and compare it with the Bungie TV version.

Thanks to all those who have written in about Joseph Staten's rendition of Halo's back story on Bungie TV (Day 2). Lots of speculation but first off note Joseph's opening remark (starts at 04:29 in the movie):

It's... a couple hundred years in the future...

This does not sound like Halo is set at the end of 28th century during the 17 years between Marathon (2794 AD) and Marathon 2 (2811 AD). It's also not easy to see how Joseph's description fits into the Marathon timeline. The UESC Marathon was launched in 2472 AD. This would appear to be mankind's first colony endeavor outside the Sol system. The Marathon manual recounts the launch of the UESC Marathon as follows:

With apprehension, the same apprehension you felt three hundred and twenty-two years earlier, you envision Marcus Tiberius Buendia, one of Sol's greatest leaders. "Mankind will venture out past its earthly bounds, and move into a future grander and more real than the total of its own written history." Buendia, the president of the Unified Earth Space Council, had spoken those words to the people of the Sol System on the eve of the launching of the Marathon.

2472 AD is more than a couple hundred years in the future. It's more like half a millennium. So how can Halo be based in the Marathon timeline if as Joseph Staten states:

It's a couple hundred years in the future. Earth has, the people of Earth have, gone out and colonized the galaxy.

In the Marathon timeline mankind had only just begun to colonize the galaxy some 500 years in the future.

Raul Bonilla <lassonde@hotmail.com> highlights some similarities between Marathon's story and what we know of Halo's back story from Joseph:

Let's see:

This (The Covenant) isn't just one alien (race). It's actually a conglomeration of different alien races, none of which are particularly nice; on the whole they're especially nasty.

"Durandal told me there are many "clans" of Pfhor,
each one physically distinct from each other"
(Defend THIS! - terminal 0).

Whenever they (the Covenant) come in contact with one of the human outposts they wipe it out utterly without any word, without any warning, a couple cryptic messages, but then they raise the planet in a tremendous firestorm.

"Today at 0820, the Marathon came under surprise attack
from unkown hostile forces. The Marathon has sustained
serious damage"
(Arrival - terminal 0).

(In both cases, the aliens wipe out the humans by surpise and suffer great losses)

The commander of this human ship decides that rather than lead the aliens closer and closer to earth that they're going to plot a course to some random destination in the galaxy and lead the aliens away with them.

"Tau Ceti's sacrifice bought time for Earth,
which the Pfhor are even now planning to invade.
What would have happened if the Pfhor had found Sol first?"
(The Slings & Arrows of Outrageous Fortune - terminal 0).

The human ship comes into the system, makes these very quick discoveries, but before it can do anything else it's attacked by the Covenant battle fleet and broken into bits.

This sounds like the Marathon 2 intro, with one ship controlled by the good guys aganist an entire fleet lead by the bad guys, except that in this case the good guys ship is destroyed (instead of Durandal tearing appart Battle Group Three).

Aliens land on the ring and they engage you and your former crewmembers in a variety of battles around the ring.

After Durandal is forced to land on Lh'owon's second moon and is captured by Tycho, the Pfhor and the human forces led by Robert Blake (formers crew members of the Marathon) engage into combat while you, the player, run around different locations waking up Thoth, the dorman S'pht AI.

(Remember that in Halo you're going to search for alien technology that will help you in the war aganist the Covenant while in Marathon 2 Durandal come to Lh'owon "searching for something, a weapon or piece of knowledge to use to stop the Phfor's conquest of the galaxy" (Waterloo Waterpark - terminal 0).

You, the main character of the game, an elite military officer, are able to bail out of the breaking apart human ship at the very last minute and burn through the atmosphere of the ring, which is Halo, land on the surface of the ring, and what begins is a guerrilla war between you and this massive, overwhelming, alien fleet.

You, the player in Marathon, a security officer who's the best of it's kind, escapes from the Mirata in a maneuvering pod seconds before it's blow 'till kingdom come and land in the Marathon, then begin "a guerrilla war between you and this massive, overwhelming, alien" force.

Yes lots of similarities here. :-)

Jan 11, 2000 (Tuesday)

Alan Greene <alan@fontshop.com> writes about Halo and the Marathon timeline:

One thing to note about your observations on Halo not being far enough in the future to coincide with the Marathon timeline: At the fan gathering, he [Joseph Staten] said he wouldn't mention any dates, because no one really pays attention to dates. That got a laugh. :)

All the more strange that Joseph should then say next day on Bungie TV:

"It's a couple hundred years in the future."

Jan 12, 2000 (Wednesday)

Alan Greene <alan@rifted.com> writes:

A while back, the Story page reported that Halo had a new networking programmer. He would remain anonymous for the time being, but a Bungie official mentioned that his name was very appropriate.

According to Claude Errera's interview with Matt Soell, this name would either be Shirinian or Sinclair.

Alan is referring to the current Halo development team as listed by Matt Soell. Namely:

Jason Jones - Project Lead
Konrad Shirinian - Network code
Chucky Gough - Physics
Matt Segur - Programmer
Paul Russell - Art
Rob McLees - Art
Shikai Wang - Art
Marcus Lehto - Art
Jamie Griesemer - Design
Stefan Sinclair - Networking (Bungie.net III)

All I'll say is that Bungie.net III is in safe hands! :-)

Jan 13, 2000 (Thursday)

Rob Schultz <silvertail@howling.com> writes about the Halo back story as told at the Bungie Fan Fest at Macworld Expo:

At the Bungie fan Gathering, which I attended, we were given a synopsis of Halo's story. Joe described the Halo system, which included the gas giant "Threshold". I belive this was mentioned, but when he gave the name of Threshold he stopped for a moment with a legitimate look of "oops!". Heh.. I don't think we were supposed to hear that. Anyhow, here's my theory.

It struck me odd that the little Halo ring, albeit full of alien technology, could turn the tides of the Covenant war. It also seemed odd that the creators of the ring would build it out in the middle of nowhere between two, rather plain, celestial bodies (Threshold and Basis).

I thought about it for a while and came up with this: What is a "Threshold" commonly associated with? A doorway. Stew on that one for a while...

Doorway... paths... convergence... Convergent Series. A new addition to Facts and puzzling things about... . It's been on the back burner for some time. Contains some interesting connections between Bungie's early games, Halo, Larry Niven, and Charles Sheffield. Enjoy... oh and you can add more books to the Marathon/Halo reading list. :-)

Leland Tankersley <leland@tridsys.com> writes concerning yesterday's submission about Halo's networking programmer:

Concerning the "appropriate" name for the new Halo network programmer, I'm fairly certain that the name in question isn't the person's real-life name (first or last) but rather their online handle. I'll just leave it at that.

Similarly Dennis Taylor <dennis@funkplanet.com> writes:

Konrad is by no means a "new" network programmer at Bungie. He did the metaserver code for Myths I and II, as I recall.

And finally Chris Butcher <cbutcher@hermes.otago.ac.nz> reveals all:

The reason that Mr. Sinclair's name is rather apposite to his job description is, of course, because he is the rather infamous "My Modem Is On Fire" of bungie.net fame.

Jan 14, 2000 (Friday)

William Cromie <wjcromie@midway.uchicago.edu> writes concerning Rob Schultz's comments yesterday about Threshold - the name of Halo's gas giant:

Just thought that the etymology might be interesting. The Romans believe that thresholds had great power. Every time they crossed a threshold they said a prayer to Janus the God of thresholds. They were considered very dangerous places because when you are on a threshold you are neither here nor there. This use of the word threshold is critical in Vergi's Aeniad.

Interesting stuff. Since Bungie have a penchant for using mythological terms in their games the naming of Halo's gas giant may be of significance. More details on the Roman god Janus can be found here.

Check out http://www.thresholds.com/ for some Halo'ish swirls. ;-)

Mauro Braunstein <EllBrau@aol.com> writes:

Regarding the Convergent Series company, it makes me think that it is called that because Jason Jones converged his efforts to work with Alexander Seropian. He chose that book title as its name because of this. If it were because of the convergence of Marathon and PiD (they don't truly converge. They just connect), they'd keep it around for the rest of Marathon. At least the first Marathon. Jason probably decided that Bungie didn't need another one-person affiliate company when Bungie started hiring more employees. Strange thing is, I don't recall Convergent Series being ever mentioned in the Scrapbook...

Some things are best left unwritten. ;-)

On the subject of Larry Niven and his sci-fi influences in Marathon and Halo Andy Evanson <BaronMind@netscape.net> writes:

I'd like to mention that Larry Niven will be the Guest of Honor at the Chicago-based Capricon XX, January 27-30. Info is at www.capricon.org if anyone's interested.

Wonder if Bungie will be there?

Jan 15, 2000 (Saturday)

Rob Swenson (aka Noctavis) <noctavis@paxnimbus.com>, co-maintainer of the Core, posted a transcript of Joseph Staten's rendition of the Halo back story from Bungie's Gathering of Fans at Macworld Expo San Francisco. This version was given the night before the version on bTV (see Jan 9). It's interesting to compare both versions. I've taken the liberty of reprinting it here for the record:

Transcript of the Halo story described at Club-I

Posted By: Noctavis =PN= on Saturday, 01.15.00, at 3:35 a.m.

Well... I downloaded and viewed the video material supplied by SiliconDream and DeusExMachina... a lot of it is difficult to hear. I'll have to see if we can extract more from the audio.

In the mean time, I've transcribed the basic Halo plot from the video. Probably not anything you haven't heard described by Silly or Xzzy, but you might like to read it, just the same. I've tried to be as accurate as possible, but it was a difficult transcription... pipe up if you were there and heard differently. And if you happen to be handy with any good audio programs that can help to bring out the material by Matt Soell and certain other Bungie employees, please let me know.

Have at it.

-Noctavis

The transcript:

Because it's a Bungie game and Jason's making it, it's much more complex.... [garbled]... If you will bear with me, I can tell you about... something that's happening in the far future. We're not quite sure about the date as of yet for obvious reasons.

The Humans have colonized far out into the Milky Way, and they'v created a number of outposts. Unfortunately for us, as we've created these outposts we've run into a big group of aliens know as the Covenant... or at least that's what we think we understand from the transmissions they send immediately before destroying us without saying a word.

It's pretty brutal. They blast into our systems and just raze our planets without warning, sending us very cryptic, slightly religious, very zealous messages. If you can imagine the Milky Way galaxy, and down here on some outer spiral arm is Earth (Sol), we've sort-of colonized inward and the Covenant fleet is coming directly down from a variety of different directions... gradually getting closer and closer to Earth.

We have this final battle, a really big [garbled] battle [garbled] in one of the Human systems and we get our asses totally whupped. The final ship that survives, which is called the Pillar of Autumn... the commander of the ship, she decides that she's going to set a course far out into the galaxy somewhere... to some random destination as far away from Earth as she can possibly find. And she sets these coordinates for the ship's A.I., and the ship's A.I. takes over and they blast off into space.

Now when they get to this location they find a couple of cool things... [garbled] Well, you guys have all seen the trailer, right? So, they find a couple of cool things. They find this big gas-giant planet and they find this little moon. Now the name of the gas giant is "Threshold" [Someone speaks off camera, and he turns the mic to point that direction... but it's garbled] The name of the moon is Basis, and right in the middle between this big-ass gas giant and this little, tiny moon is this foreign object. And upon close inspection they find that this object is, in fact, a ring structure [garbled] close to a thousand miles in diameter, it has some gravity, it has continents, different climate zones, all of that sort of thing. Most importantly, it can support life on the inside of the ring.

Unfortunately for the crew of the Pillar of Autumn, as soon as they arrive in the system they meet a big-ass Covenant battle fleet, which has arrived there before them. They get blown to bits but do a pretty good job of destroying the other ships - the Covenant ships.

So the Ship's A.I. on the Pillar of Autumn is pretty good... Um.. You'll find out more about the A.I. later [laughing by people off-screen]. It's pretty smart, and what happens just before the ship breaks up is a variety of different military officers bail out of the ship, they dump equipment, they dump supplies... it all lands, scattered around the Halo ring. And you, this very elite military officer, get jettisoned out of the craft, and you burn through the atmosphere and you land on the ring, and what happens from them on is a guerrilla war between you and... [he looks off to his right for a second]... and a fukk-ton of aliens [more laughing]... You go around the ring, you try to gather your friends, you try to gather your equipment, gather your vehicles and beat the hell out of the Covenant.

Meanwhile, you're discovering the secrets of the Halo ring, itself, and as the game progresses, you realize that whomever understands and harnesses the technology of the ring is not just going to understand this cool ring-structure but is actually going to win the war, save the universe, go home happy [garbled]... [clapping starts]... Oh yeah... all of that happens before the game starts.

Mike Schapiro <mikeschappy@ameritech.net> writes concerning the map hologram room as seen in the current Halo movies:

As I was watching the new (day4) Halo footage, I noticed something about the big room we first see the marine standing in. A) The room is quite circular with a hall way leading out the bottom/back/whichever direction you feel like. B) Except for a narrow walkway, there is no floor. I drew a very rough floorplan in Photoshop, and it's pretty interesting, to say the least.

P.S. It's color coded: Blue is a wall that may or may not exist in that shape. White is the walkway + the hallway. Yellow is a wall seperating the Holograph room from the rest of the base.

Very nice. The Halo marine does stand on a circular platform in the middle of a spherical room. And the floorplan is oddly familar... as if it were from an old dream, but you can't exactly remember...

Charles George <dystopia@jps.net> writes:

Just wanted to tell you about a few things, first of all there is a really informative post over at the core. It put's a completely new perspective on those little cryptic messages in the first Halo page. It actually explains the Pillar of Autumns and Covenant meetings.

http://www.daboyz.org/core/cgi-bin/forums/halo/index.pl?read=12545

Jan 21, 2000 (Friday)

Miguel Chavez (aka Freewill) <JMChavez@aol.com> writes to say that his Macworld Expo San Francisco films are now online. Five Quicktime movies in all:

MartyODonnell_MWSF00.mov (33013 Kb)
ClaudeErrera_MWSF00.mov (39721 Kb)
TourOfBungieBooth_MWSF00.mov (18706 Kb)
AlexIntrosJoe_MWSF00.mov (2581 Kb)
LiveHaloPreview_MWSF00.mov (8334 Kb)

Nice interviews with Marty O'Donnell of Total Audio and Claude Errera of bungie.org. Claude reveals just how big bungie.org really is and how much it serves each day... without advertising revenue.

You can find Freewill's movies on Cunbelin's Macworld Coverage page at the Myth Townhall. Click on the Day 3 button. The movies are also available on the Clan Plaid Hotline server (cphl.dhs.org) at the following location:

Files -> Other_Files -> misc_movies -> Freewill_Halo_Bungie_Video folder

Bungie.org also have a ftp site for the movies at ftp://paradox.bungie.org/pub/freewill/ and their second hotline server site at hl2.bungie.org (24.4.104.213) also offers them.

Miguel also scanned in the Bungie TV Guide from Macworld. Check the Marathon/Halo reference on the bTV Guide cover (312K).

Somewhere in the heavens Halo is waiting...

Nice one. The inside of the bTV Guide can be found here (294K).

Jan 23, 2000 (Sunday)

Another Blam reference in Halo. Mike Schapiro <mikeschappy@ameritech.net> writes:

Hmmm.... In the shot of the marine with the minigun, the top right corner of the HUD changes slightly. If you look at it double sized, it looks faintly like it could be saying "Blam!" Perhaps the "You Killed Sumpin'!" message in the version bungie has right now?

You can see the screenshot Mike is referring to here. Note the letters at the top left.

Jan 24, 2000 (Monday)

mage enhancement seems to be flavor of the month. Halo.bungie.org report that they have identified a player name tag in one of the recent Halo screenshots. It appears on the left arm of a marine. Realistic place to put it if it is a player's name tag.

Concerning yesterday's Halo screenshot with the words "Blam" Miguel Chavez <JMChavez@aol.com> writes:

Thought I'd drop a line and offer what little insight I can. I was fortunate enough to be looking over Joe's shoulder (with his permission of course!) when he was playing with the latest Halo build. The word BLAM seems to be 'fill-in' for the name of the weapon you are using. At one point Joe pressed a key that filled the left side of his screen with several translucent weapon 'slots', all saying BLAM and each highlighting as he switched between several weapons.

Marc Paveglio <mariogp@mail.microserve.net> writes:

I don't know if anyone noticed this already, and if they did, my apologies for sending in old information. When the marine is firing the Assault Rifle in the Halo clip from bTV 4, there is a small white bar at the top left sandwiched between some other gibberish in the HUD. As he sprays metal through the air the bar shrinks down until he takes out the clip. Obviously this is the ammo gauge. You can also spot this when the marine uses the rocket launcher. The bar is full, and after firing a rocket, it is reset to nothing, meaning that the rocket launcher has an ammo capacity of 1, possibly?

The ammo bar also appears in the jeep scene, but not the tank. Perhaps Bungie hasn't implemented that feature yet? I've enclosed a picture from the movie so that you can see where the ammo gauge is.

Jan 27, 2000 (Thursday)

Mark Bassett <markb@iisc.co.uk> makes an interesting find:

I saw this on today's "Daily Illuminator", the house newsletter of Steve Jackson Games http://www.sjgames.com/ill/ill.html.

January 27, 2000: Chicago, Chicago

I'm in the Windy City from today until Monday, meeting with Alain and Micah to scheme about new games in general and In Nomine in particular, visiting FASA and Bungie, discussing plans for a new [NOT AVAILABLE AT YOUR CLEARANCE], and generally hanging out with our Chicagoid MIBs. I'll report further when I get back.

SJ Games & Bungie have already worked together to produce GURPS Myth, a role-playing book set in the world of Myth. So what next - GURPS Halo?

If GURPS Myth is a success I would imagine that GURPS Halo would be a distinct possibility.

Jan 28, 2000 (Friday)

Added a further observation to the Ring Motif in Halo page.

Feb 3, 2000 (Thursday)

Terrence Nowicki <kablam@edmail.com> writes:

I dropped by soffish.bungie.com around 12:54 PST and was surprised by a bizarre picture (attached to this email an in temp uploads at hl.bungie.org, in case the pic has changed by the time you read this). Up close to the camera, it showed a plastic goblin-like thing wearing what looked like a hamburgeler outfit, but farther away and more interesting was a "poster" that shows a photo of some guy, with the words "Wanted, DOA: Charles (Gogh?)"

Who is Charles Gogh, and why is he wanted dead or alive??

Perhaps he leaked the Halo beta? ;-)

Feb 4, 2000 (Friday)

Lots of updates at the Pathways Into Darkness page today. Good to see people showing new or renewed interest in this Bungie cult classic.

Thanks to all the people who wrote in pointing out that the Charles Gough in the Wanted DOA pic is in fact Halo's Physics Programmer Extraordinare Charles Gough, better know as Chucky. The picture was taken shortly before he absconded to Mexico with the Halo beta.

Feb 5, 2000 (Saturday)

Halo/Oni/something GURPS? Jon Chang <chang@signalpost.com> points out that Steve Jackson (of GURPS fame) has posted more info about his trip to Bungie Software on his Daily Illuminator page. The text reads as follows:

February 1, 2000: Home Again . . .

Actually, I won't get home until nearly dark today, but I'm already looking forward to it. The Chicago trip was very worthwhile . . . lots of good ideas brewing . . . and now it's time to DO something with them. Here's a shot from our visit with Bungie Software; Doug Zartman is demonstrating a new game, and Alain and I are admiring it. My, they have some nice things cooking there . . .
-- Steve Jackson

There is also a photograph of Doug Zartman demonstrating an unnamed game. Check the computers in the background. Looks like we need some state of the art image enhancing technology here.

Time to keep a regular eye on Steve Jackson's Daily Illuminator page.

Feb 6, 2000 (Sunday)

Mark Levin <haveblue@mac.com> writes concerning the Bungie pic on Steve Jackson's Daily Illuminator page:

This is a blown-up version of the monitor behind Doug, along with an inset of our mutual friend, darkened and blurred to match the image under scrutiny. That looks very suspicious doesn't it? ;)

Feb 7, 2000 (Monday)

Back in December there was some discussion about the vehicles and weapons in Halo having a somewhat low-tech look for a story based 100s years in the future. John Prichard <jpp@usc.edu> now writes:

In a late December or early January issue of "Newsweek", there is an article on the future of warfare. This article, which appeared in the Newsweek issue with the Charles Schultz "Peanuts" cover (the issue which covered his retirement), has an illustration which could easily be Halo concept art. Really interesting. It says that the future of warfare is battlearmor, small buggies, lots of other observations which put the "futuristic world but buggies and guns!?" argument to rest at least partially.

But what about battle tanks?

Feb 8, 2000 (Tuesday)

David Johnston <de.johnston@sympatico.ca> points that part of the Jjaro logo from Marathon Infinity bears a striking resemblance to the '0' in the Halo logo. Here's a comparision pic. Note the spur that extends from the 'O' and then a similar spur extending from the Jjaro space station in the background of the Jjaro logo.

Bryce Wheeler <silverwolf@biosys.net> writes concerning the "Newsweek" article mentioned yesterday:

The article in question also referred to how the military is supposedly fighting the "last war." The tanks envisioned by the military are the Crusaders, tanks that basically are overgrown Howitzers. The tank is sectioned: the gun cannon and the support vehicle, which is just as massive as the cannon section.

In fact, the tank is so big that both halves must be transported separately, as only one half can fit in the military's largest transport plane.

Feb 9, 2000 (Wednesday)

Jonathon Green <jdgreen@lindenwood.edu> writes:

Following on the Newsweek article of yesterday, and linking the recent Steve Jackson news is this tidbit (quoted from http://www.sjgames.com/ogre/index.html):

Ogre and its sequel, G.E.V., are tactical ground combat games set in the next century. In 2085 A.D., armored warfare is faster and deadlier than ever. Hovercraft, tanks and infantry slug it out with tactical nukes. But the most feared weapon of all needs no human guidance. It's the giant cybernetic tank called the Ogre.

Concerning yesterday's submission about the similarity between the Halo and Jjaro logo Chris Hebner <chebner@erinet.com> sent in a pic showing the Jjaro logo overlaid over the full Jjaro space station. Note how the end of the spur is cut off in logo thus excluding the round part at the end. This would seem to counter any suggestion that the 'O' of the Halo logo was designed to look like part of a Jjaro space station. Unless of course the inspiration came from the Jjaro logo itself rather than the space station. Chris goes onto to say:

There could still be an interesting correlation between the 2 symbols. The Jjaro uses a map as a backround, the Halo uses a (?wall) texture.

Yes a wall/door texture of a ring motif. The Jjaro space station is also a ring!

On the subject of ring motif's, Halo and the Jjaro... Sarwat Khan <sarwat@interlog.com> writes:

You know that Halo door pattern that everybody loves to talk about? It's also in the Jjaro logo from Infinity, as you can see in the attached pic.

See the Ring Motif in Halo section for details.

Dennis Taylor <dennis@funkplanet.com> writes:

From a recent interview with John Carmack:

Question: Are you interested in Halo at all?

John: I've watched the movies of it; it looks pretty good. The one problem right now is that there's no way to really judge anything from screenshots because any halfway competent rendering engine can render any given scene. And it's only in how things tie together that there's any differentiation. Certainly the Bungie people, they've got a lot of talent. And they've been doing this basically as long as we have. They were kind of id's Mac shadow for many years. But now that they've gone ahead and had some mainstream PC success, they're doing pretty well.

http://www.firingsquad.com/features/carmack/page11.asp

Just thought it might be interesting to see what the competition thinks, for once. :-)

Feb 10, 2000 (Thursday)

John Prichard <jpp@usc.edu> writes concerning the futuristic battle field:

Here's the pertinent part of the article I wrote in earlier about. It says some exciting things about what kind of action we might be getting in Halo, as well as some plot points which we've already heard about so far. The url is

http://www.newsweek.com/nw-srv/printed/us/sr/a1825-1999dec20.htm

no luck with the picture yet, though it was in the US edition January 1st.

"Location" tidbit below suggests tanks as primarily fire-support. This gels with what we've seen of the B.F.T. - really more of an assault gun than a tank. The machine gun is fixed to the turret, which doesn't move all that fast. This tank would get plown up pretty bad in close quarters fighting with antitank capable infantry.

Battle Plan

Fighting: Waging the next war-instead of the last one

By John Barry
Newsweek, January 1, 2000

...[snip]...

War in space: Satellites are so vital for surveillance and for communications that both sides try to blind or destroy the other's satellites. Old-fashioned versions have vanished. Instead, each side relies on micro-satellites in low-Earth orbit.

UAVs: Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) loiter over the battlefield. Some drop supplies to troops on the ground. Some are also sensors, surveying the battlefield below; others cruise over the landscape and unleash precision-guided bombs on enemy troops.

Buggy era: Tanks and other easily detected heavy materiel have vanished from the battlefield. The new strike vehicle is an electric-powered buggy.

Death by robot: The battlefield is littered with robot sensors to detect movement, noise, heat. A computer linked to the sensors then calls in fire from UAVs or robot weapons.

Supersoldiers: The army is composed of an elite force of older, smarter soldiers-like today's Special Ops forces.

Parafoils: Some supplies are dropped from the air.

Lethal airspace: Computer-controlled antiaircraft missiles have proliferated. As a result, unmanned aircraft have taken over most missions.

Location: The ground troops' main task is not to destroy the enemy forces themselves. Instead it is to identify the enemy forces' locations, and pin them down long enough (by destroying their electronics) to call in fire from elsewhere.

The swarm: Small squads of 25 soldiers-linked by superb communications equipment-roam the battlefield. When one squad finds an enemy, it summons the others, and the units swarm.

Cyberwar: Both sides try to disrupt the other's homeland-and cut off the enemy's command of its forces-by sabotaging essential computer links.

Submersible landing strips: Old-fashioned aircraft carriers are easy targets. The solution: go underwater. Submarines link at the surface to create giant landing strips. Submarines have also become artillery weapons. They lurk beneath the water, surfacing swiftly to launch salvos on command.

Some interesting concepts here and a possible alternate name for a Halo "clan" or "squad"... a "swarm". Might prove popular!

Feb 12, 2000 (Saturday)

Damien Jones <email address withheld on request> writes:

Maybe this is mentioned on another page, but while reading up on the Marathon Story (to get some background for Halo) I flipped through the Cortana letters, and was somewhat *aghast* that a tiny smidgen was overlooked. In response to the automated reply to the second letter, the subject line is altered:

Subject: Re: Mail consternation request (MR-343)

While it's correctly pointed out that 3 + 4 + 3 = 10, somehow it was totally overlooked that 7*7*7 = 7^3 = 343.

Just my own tiny contribution to the tru7h.

This subject header was sent in by Nathan Bitner during the alleged 2nd letter coverup. Those who remember the Page 2401 puzzle will no doubt be familiar with the number 343. ;-)

Feb 14, 2000 (Monday)

Marathon/Cortana/Halo speculation a plenty on the Core and HBO. Two articles with similar titles: Cortana Revisited and Cortana Letters Revisited and both posted on the same day? Coincidence or...

Feb 16, 2000 (Wednesday)

Halo-like Lynx Phoenix ad discovered. See the Lynx Phoenix ad section for full details.

Feb 18, 2000 (Friday)

Zach Stroum <durandal@u.washington.edu> wonders why in the recent Incite Halo movie it gives the impression that Bungie work in some historic building rather than on the 7th floor of an office block?

Feb 23, 2000 (Wednesday)

Matt Soell, the Master of Obscuration at Bungie Software, made an interesting post on the halo.bungie.org forums. I've taken the liberty of reprinting this in full below since it's one of those memorable posts that shouldn't get lost. In otherwords I'll keep reminding Matt that he wrote this etc. Right Matt? ;-)

Re: How's it going Matt???? RSVP
Posted By: Matt <matt@bungie.com>
Date: 22 Feb 2000, 16:46

In Response To: How's it going Matt???? RSVP (Dave Fin')

I don't blame anyone for being curious. But there's a difference between desiring more info and demanding it. ;-)

No one ever said all the fundamental, difficult stuff has been put to rest. No one from Bungie, anyway. The fact that it's not necessarily all done right now does not mean it will never be done. Skepticism is admirable in this age of extraordinary gullibility, but doubting the very existence of Halo is a bit much.

We have this situation with Halo where _everyone_ is watching us, and there are those who are eagerly waiting for us to make some misstep so they can be the first to criticize it. Because we are conscious of that (and also because the corporate marketing focus is currently on Oni) we're not to show off some features until we're totally comfortable doing so. If I keep my mouth shut about certain things it's generally for a good reason, though that reason might not be apparent to someone who doesn't work here.

But hey, in the spirit of greasing the squeaky wheel, here are some tidbits for everyone to squeak about.

- What has two triggers and belches flame? Bonus points if you can guess what the second trigger does. Speculation on public forums is, as always, encouraged.

- Beware of wall-hugging hippos. No, this is not a joke. Nor does it necessarily mean what you think it means.

- Cortana sure has been quiet lately. I wonder if that means anything.

- What will be in the E3 build, and will it be playable? No one knows yet, but when I do I'll let the forums know. We'll probably have some impressive downloadable goodies in the same timeframe for those of you who can't attend. (Figured I should toss in a straightforward one to keep you on your toes.)

- There will be a lot of surprises in Halo, but the old-school Bungie fans will perhaps be the most pleasantly surprised of all. I wish I could be around to see your faces the first time you see... well, you'll see.

-Matt

Note the last part "...the old-school Bungie fans will perhaps be the most pleasantly surprised of all." You've still got your old-school tie right? ;-)

E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo 2000 is scheduled for May 11-13th in Los Angeles, California. More details can be found here. And if I hear another "Bungie are at booth 2900 (9-2 =7)" I'll scream! ;-)

Feb 24, 2000 (Thursday)

Harry Al-Shakarchi <tomeone@bungie.org>, maintainer of Oni Central, has put up a translation of a recent German Macnews interview with Doug Zartman. While the interview concentrates primarily on Oni there are some tidbits on Bungie and Doug himself. For example:

macnews.de: Do you already have plans for the future or are you concentrating on finishing Halo?

Doug: No, we have more than one game planned for the time after Halo. But we must divide our working force. Our development studios are working on a few games at once, not only Oni and Halo. At this time there are 50 people at Bungie, 12 work in the Oni team, 9 work in the Halo team. Along with that we have 2 more development studios at Bungie. Along with that is customer support, sales, accounting and marketing, which I do.

Check Oni Central for the full translated interview.

Chris Hebner <chebner@erinet.com> writes:

Just an interesting tidbit for you. One of Jupiter's 3 rings is named Halo, it is about 100,000 km from the center of the planet Jupiter. I wonder what other similarites exist between the two....

3D Action Planet have a Halo preview which contains some rather odd story info. With regard to Covenant technology the article says:

Their technology does not seem to be too far advanced from ours, but their numbers are.

The Pillar of Autumn is described as having faster-than-light travel capabilities. I quote:

...in a last-ditch attempt, we send one of our final ships, the Pillar of Autumn, into subspace. Suprisingly, they follow. When we come out of hyperspace, we are suprised at what we find.

The article gives the impression that the Covenant already know about the Halo's existence which presumably explains why the whole Covenant fleet follows the PoA rather than continue on their destructive path towards Earth. I quote:

A Covenant fleet emerged from behind Threshold. It appears that they already knew of Halo's existence.

Lastly the article provides some detailed numbers and another reference to cyborg characters in the game. I quote:

Some 2600 of us survived, a few hundred being cyborg.

Not sure if this info comes directly from Bungie or is third hand at this stage. The article does get the name of the moon wrong "Basic" rather than "Basis".

Feb 25, 2000 (Friday)

As noted on halo.bungie.org Bungie are advertising for a producer for Halo. In addition they are also looking for a programmer for their Chicago base. Full details are available on Bungie's Job Opportunities page.

Feb 26, 2000 (Saturday)

Oh boy! Did I miss this! Thanks to the DEHc-3 HALO site for the heads up. Back in Oct 28, 1999 I mentioned that Orbit Books (UK) in conjunction with Iain M. Banks were running a competition to name Culture ships for Iain's new Culture novel. Well the Orbit site has now published the winners and the ship names. I've taken the liberty (as always) of reprinting Orbit's announcement below. Halo fans will no doubt recognise the name "Purity of Spirit" amongst the favorites.

Iain M. Banks has finished writing his new SF novel. It's a Culture novel, it's called LOOK TO WINDWARD, we're publishing it in August and it's fantastic.

A couple of months ago, we ran a competition to name a Culture ship, and Iain has now looked at all the entries (there were a lot!) and picked his favourites. Iain particularly liked the following:

ASKING FOR A SLAP, BILL ME LATER, CERTAIN SENSE OF WONDER, DRAMA QUEEN, FEIGNING INNOCENCE, HIGHLY STRUNG, INNOCENT BYSTANDER, LOOK BOTH WAYS, NERVROVOROUS, OH WELL, RTFM, SUBJECT TO CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS, SWEPT ALONG BY EVENTS, ATROCIOUS TABLE MANNERS, BUDGET CUTS, CONSOLATION OF DREAMS, FASHIONABLY LATE, GUESS WHAT, IMAGINARY FRIEND, JUST VISITING, MIND YOUR HEAD, NOTHING PERSONAL, PURITY OF SPIRIT, REASONABLE DOUBT, SUBTLE NUANCE and TARNISHED REPUTATION.

Of these, Iain's top five were:

SWEPT ALONG BY EVENTS, CONSOLATION OF DREAMS, IMAGINARY FRIEND,
NOTHING PERSONAL and REASONABLE DOUBT.

And of these, Iain's favourite was É REASONABLE DOUBT.

There were also two entries which Iain had already thought of (he keeps a big list!), and one that was very similar, so we've decided that it's only fair to count these as additional joint winners:

COLLATERAL DAMAGE, SURPLUS TO REQUIREMENTS and SPEAK SOFTLY AND CARRY BIG GUNS

Congratulations to Ian Hopkins, Dragi Raos, Charlie Kay and Michael Maddux, who sent the winning entries.

Feb 29, 2000 (Tuesday)

Dan Marketti <reconn@captured.com> makes this interesting observation:

...if you browse through the Scientific American article:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/2000/0200issue/0200johnson.html

More specifically this part:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/2000/0200issue/0200johnsonbox2.html

It may be the Halo team has really done their research. As the moon Io orbits jupiter, the magnetic field of the gas giant interacts with it, creating a "flux tube" in which gas from the moon is "scooped" up.. well, read the second link. This flux tube carries a five million ampere electric charge.. the charge would probably be bigger on a gas giant much larger than Jupiter as shown in the Halo map hologram.. maybe enough to power an orbiting Halo?

Seth Graham <sether@xzzy.org> writes:

I was reading a technical review of the up-and-coming OS X, and under this URL:

http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/1q00/macos-x-dp3/macos-x-dp3-4.html

You find the word 'halo' in green, linking to.. halo.bungie.com. ;)

The source URL for the review is:

http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/1q00/macos-x-dp3/macos-x-dp3-1.html

Mar 19, 2000 (Sunday)

You've heard of the Face on Mars. Now we have the Face on Halo. Chris Hebner <chebner@erinet.com> writes:

I just noticed something about the day 4 of bTV halo clips. There is a bust in the landscape. I have no idea who it is or why, but I'm sending a jpeg that I hope will show it. I think that this shot is from 1:53 in the movie.

You can see Chris' pic here.

halo.bungie.org now have an FAQ section thanks to long time Marathon veteran Mark Levin. Definitely worth a read. Send all comments/corrections to <halofaq@bungie.org>.

Mar 22, 2000 (Wednesday)

Well after repeated pleas I've started to update the Halo submissions page again. The last update was for Sept 18, 1999. To find the more recent submissions to the Story page regarding Halo you had to wade through the What's New sections. Not an easy task. Now the Halo submissions page has been updated to Dec '99 and subdivided into 3 sections:

Halo submissions for July 1999

Halo submissions for Aug - Sept 1999

Halo submissions for Oct - Dec 1999

So if you want to find out about Island Four, Armor, Halo's low tech look, the Greek Flag, the source of the Halo transmission quotes, Jason and Castle Grayskull, the long forgotten Halo weapons page, a picture of Nathan, SolCore, Halo orbits, and a host of other stuff you might find it on the newly updated Halo submissions page... if you look! ;-)

Mar 29, 2000 (Wednesday)

Interesting post from Matt Soell on the halo.bungie.org forum which is worth reposting so I've taken the liberty:

Re: Matt? Pah!

Posted By: Matt <matt@bungie.com>
Date: 28 Mar 2000, 16:02

In Response To: Matt? Pah! (Troy Lawlor)

> I can see it now... "All will become clear soon."

You big meanie.

How about this:

"Change of direction" is one of those phrases that's vague enough to be interpreted (misinterpreted, really) as something of ominous import. It's not that way at all.

There's new footage coming which better represents Halo because it shows battle, not just a lone guy running around. For that reason it's a more accurate representation than the old footage, which was more of a technology demo.

There is no sweeping "change in direction" that invalidates your collective idea of what Halo will be like. Stuff is tweaked all the time, and will continue to be tweaked until we ship; there are differences, refinements, additions which make the old footage no longer truly representative of the state the game is in. If anything, the fact that we don't want to show old footage of the game is a sign of progress.

When you see this lovely new footage, and when you see what we're showing at E3, and as you watch the game continue to progress, I think you'll agree that Halo is still the same game we showed at MacWorld NY last year - just better.

-Matt
Tru7h Technician
Bungie Software
"Making the Tru7h Hurt Since 1995"

Apart from the up-coming new Halo footage it is interesting to note Matt (and also Doug recently) using the word "tru7h" in their posts. I don't remember seeing this before.