The tail end of Bungie’s latest podcast contains an exchange of words between the two co-hosts, Brian Jarrard and Luke Smith, which tease at a possible July 14th reveal of some sort. Could it be a new Halo related project?

Brian: Isn’t there something going on on July 14th or something like that?
Luke: Yeah, around then.
Brian: Somehow that’s sticking in my head for some reason. Guess we’ll have to see.
Luke: Yep, we’ll just have to be patient. Who could say?

The tone of their delivery is best be compared to that of an adult playing hide and seek with a child. They know exactly where the child is hiding, but they still pretend they don’t.

While my fingers will remain crossed out of respect to those who want it, I highly doubt this is the Lego Halo game many gamers have been hoping for since EGM’s April fools joke. Ripten will be present for the Microsoft press conference on the morning of the 14th, so check back with us then.

Source: Bungie Podcast [Thanks Jon]

Chana Joffe-Walt, a National Public Radio journalist, recently had an interview with Halo: Contact Harvest author, Joseph Staten, and gave the best example to date as to why journalists who don’t play games shouldn’t be allowed to write about them.

Joffe-Walk visited Staten at Bungie Studios, and her first complaint is that the meeting room is full of Xbox 360s. I’m not too sure what she was expecting from the producers of one of the most important, and arguably one of the greatest, videogame franchises of this generation. In the short interview with Staten, Joffe-Walt asks some very deep and poignant questions, such as:

“Isn’t gaming all just shoot’em up? Why do you need story?”

To which Staten replied quite correctly:

“I think to understand why stories are important in games, you need to actually play them.”

From just this snippet alone, you can get a pretty good feel for how the rest of the interview goes. I challenge anyone to have a listen to it without screaming or crying in despair. I lasted until the following before keeling over and exploding:

Staten: “You’re dealing with an internet connection, high savvy audience.”
Joffe-Walt: “Geeks, you’re dealing with geeks.”

Halo: Contact Harvest is a New York Times best seller, and I would recommend buying it, if just to prove you know what a book is — Geek.

Source: npr.org

Halo 3’s crashes have resulted in a class action lawsuit against Microsoft and Bungie Studios.

Coming just after the trouble with the disc-scratching Legendary editions of the game, the lawsuit is based in the allegation that Halo “does not function with the 360,“ and actually harms the console by causing it to “crash, freeze, or lock-up during play.”

Randy Nunez is looking for a huge $5 million in damages, which is a small wedge of cash when considered in relation to the hundreds of millions the game made.

The lawsuit, available here, claims that the developers “deceived” many by suggesting the game would work with the 360, which apparently it doesn’t – despite being designed solely for the console.

Chief best leave this fight to his lawyers.