Remembering The Fallen

Halo: Reach is still 3 weeks away, but that's no reason for Microsoft to wait. The Halo: Reach website is now live and you can enter your mark on the Reach remembrance memorial. Check out the site at rememberreach.com, link to your facebook and you can add a point of light to the memorial... If you look at it and CAN'T already tell what it is, don't bother getting Reach.

Rising Spartans

If you've missed it (yes, this post and indeed, half the ones i've just posted are a day or two behind) Bungie have released the next ViDoc for Halo: Reach. Titled 'A Spartan Will Rise' it takes a look at the members of Noble Team, and the epic mission laid out before them.

Reach's Recreations Continue

Three new maps have been revealed for Halo: Reach. The first is Spire and will be an assault map where Spartans will be tasked with storming a tower against the defensive Elites. Fans of Halo 2 will be happy with the rest of this announcement though, as the other two maps are remakes. Reflection is a faithful remake of Halo 2's Ivory Tower, which i'm sure will make for a fun battleground that will allow for some good uses of Reach's new abilities. Meanwhile, Zealot is a slightly upgraded version of Midship. Zealot is pretty faithful to the original, until you discover the third tier, complete with lowered gravity.

Bungie Prepares For War On Cheaters

One of the more inevitable things when it comes to online gaming (apart from high pitched squeals, pointless insults and the occasional meow) is glitches and people generally doing things that weren't meant to be done. Having learnt many valuable lessons from the online community of Halo 2 and 3, Bungie have been hard at work trying to make sure the multiplayer on Halo: Reach is as unbreakable as possible. While they admit many of the people who find ways to cheat the system are just players who are a little too smart and have a little too much time on their hands, they've said that between creating new tools to detect people cheating, and working with the Xbox LIVE team, they're going to be trying their best to find and deal with cheaters to the best of their ability. Exactly how people will be punished and for what is unknown, but i'm sure the banhammer will be in their arsenal somewhere. While not all cheating is necessarily bad (there's always fun to be had while roaming around outside of a map) it's work like this that keeps a game playable online and prevents the use of glitches that make the game unfair (like Gears of War's chainsaw glitch).

Quit Now

Everyone loves a quitter. Quitters are those people who decide of drop out of online games early for any reason, although typically it's because they're losing. It makes the game less enjoyable for everyone else, unbalances teams and most importantly, makes a huge delay mid-game. Well early quitter consider yourself warned. Apparently Bungie have a new set of tools that allow them to monitor peoples stats on Reach so they can spot players who habitually quit early and penalise them. Exactly how you'll be penalised is still unknown but it may actually be possible to remove you from the online population, which i imagine would make it much harder to find a good game.

Super Awesome Elite Spartan Squad GO!!!

Microsoft have announced that they are starting a search for the UK's number one Halo player. The person deemed the number one halo player will then lead a team of 5 celebrities into battle against 6 runners up when Halo: Reach is released. The celebrity team will be made up by the number one halo player (obviously), presenter of 'Gadget Show' Jason Bradbury, Manchester United player Rio Ferdinand, R&B artist Jamelia and two more celebrities who are yet to be named. The celebrity team name? Elite Spartan Squad. So, in short, Microsoft have announced a special competition that the majority of the world won't care about, for a prize that no-one really wants.

Media Much?

Comic-Con has meant heaps of new game videos and news, so click 'Read More' for my list of videos you need to see...