Chronique:BWU 02/05/2008

Posted by Frankie at 5/2/2008 6:45 PM PDT

Luke is still in Europe, and still out of reach of the vast web of internets. Normal Update service will resume next week. Until then...

Third Worst Update EVAR!

The Bungie.net writing team has been effectively rendered incapacitated. Frankie is out of the office, Shishka is too, Luke is still on vacation and Sketch is busy with important business… I tried waking up the webmaster to respond to some of your letters but he was so drunk he couldn’t spell his name. Writing team all gone!

So the web team brings you “Stosh’s Top Ten Most Awesome Halo 3 Screenshots, A Tribute to Humorous Moments in Halo 3 According to Stosh” and “RocketMoose’s Mostly Useless Stats that Didn’t Make it to the Online Page”.

Apologies in advance, but if you don’t like… Blame Stosh! Actually, don't blame Stosh, blame Frankie who came in at the last second and still didn't save the day.

Stosh’s Top Ten Most Awesome Halo 3 Screenshots

A Tribute to Humorous Moments in Halo 3 According to Stosh. All accidents. All mental.

"Tell me if this is uncomfortable for you."

"This looks Shopped. I can tell from the pixels and from having seen quite a few Shops in my time."

"I hope you like Bloom. I has a surfeit."

"I got your rockets right here."

"CROTCHPUNCH!"

"Punt."

"Take me to your leader."

"Please kill me now."

"Flame on."

"No, your other leader. The hot one."

RocketMoose’s Mostly Useless Stats that Didn’t Make it to the Bungie Online Page

• Storage Space on Bungie.net servers: 300 Terrabytes
• Most Gamertag name changes in the last month: 25 name changes. (We would tell you who it is, but he has probably already changed it again).
• Players Promoted to General today: 76
• Players using the female voice setting in multiplayer: 8.6%
• Players who have completed the campaign SLASO (Single-Player Legendary All Skulls On): 2
• Players who have completed ANY campaign level SLASO: 25*

High Scores for Campaign (group total, or single player total)

• Sierra 117: 176780
• Crow's Nest: 187830
• Tsavo Highway: 130927
• The Storm: 135297
• Floodgate: 121470
• The Ark: 369690
• The Covenant: 306528
• Cortana: 135808
• Halo: 131130

Players with gamertags starting and ending with the letter ‘x’ (eg: “xx Stoshy xx”): 205,337

RocketMoose’s level in Rocket Race: 41

Total Multiplayer Medals awarded in Halo 3: 23,745,811,355!!!!

That is a lot of things. Disparate, incredible, occasionally random things. And here's another random thing. An excellent item from the community:

Ascendant Justice on Terminals

Ascendant Justice is a Halo blog quite unlike many others. Its main purpose is to look at corners of the Halo universe that aren’t quite as familiar to folks as others. Recently, ascendant Justice began a three part series exploring The Terminals – a facet of Halo 3’s campaign experience that falls somewhere between easter egg and deep canon.

In truth, it’s both and gives a deliberately enigmatic look at the backstory of the Forerunners. It was designed, first and foremost as a gameplay and intellectual challenge for fans of the very deep fiction. Find it, read it and understand it. Now that the Terminals have been fully explored, it’s time they were fully understood – and Ascendant Justice’s explanation of the Terminal story is ambitious, readable and frankly, pretty close to perfectly accurate.

If you don’t want the story spoiled for you and you want to find it all yourself, then sure, go find and read the Terminals – but if all that work scares you and you’re curious about subjects as diverse, mysterious and intriguing as the origin of the Flood menace, or the fate of the Forerunners, then this is an excellent place to start.

Part one is called “A Voice From the Tomb” and deals with the entirety of the story, serving as a broad synopsis with interesting commentary and insight. You can read that here:

http://blog.ascendantjustice.com/halo-3/the-terminals/a-voice-from-the-tomb-i/

Part two deals specifically with the Forerunner point of view and the struggles they dealt with 100,000 years ago dealing with the Flood, the conservation of species and their own tortured morality. It’s called “She Died in Eden” and you can read it here:

http://blog.ascendantjustice.com/2008/03/30/the-terminals-ii/

Part three sheds light on the role Forerunner AIs played in the fate of the galaxy for good, evil and eventually redemption. It’s called “The Thunder and the Surf” and is right here:

http://blog.ascendantjustice.com/2008/04/30/the-terminals-iii/

The amount of care, love and attention that has gone into this dissection of our fiction pretty much rivals that which we spent creating it, and Vociferous’ effort with graphics is to be appreciated as much as his prose. There are other contributors to the blog too, and their hard work is well recognized.

This is just one example of an amazingly engaged and thoughtful community creating prose, art and invention that makes us proud and humble. So congrats to Ascendant Justice – but also to everyone out there creating stuff in and around the Halo community.

And then there's this...