So, I like the Bush plan.  I am cool with immigrants who really want to be Americans becoming Americans.  The Bush plan is not amnestly, as I look at it.  It still makes people go to the end of the line.  It makes them pay a fine (to make up for taxes they skipped out on).  And, it makes them learn English.  Great!  Anyone that wants to be an American should be able to.

 

I am also a supporter of the fence.  Why?  Simple, if we don't do something, people are going to continue to beat the system.  Drug smugglers will continue to sneak through.  Plus, those people that don't care as much about being American as living a tax fee life in a better country are going to continue to sneak through the gaps.  This fence makes it harder. 

 

But, my main complaint is against my Senators...Senator Patty Murray and Senatro Maria Cantwell.

 

You see, Washington doesn't have a border problem.  We don't have Canadians sneaking through to work under the table while taking advantage of our education an welfare systems.  They have no freakin' clue. 

 

I spent 20 years in Arizona.  My folks are still there.  There are tons of Mexicans in Arizona.  How many are legal, I don't know.  But, I do know that a majority of Mexicans that I knew did not speak English...or, they spoke very poor English. 

 

Non-English speaking parents drop their kids off at school and expect them to get an education funded by taxpayers...of which many illegal immigrants are not. 

 

Health care, same thing.  It takes a lot of money out of the system to care for people that are not supporting the government that cares for them.  If they want the benefits, they have to earn it.  And, part of earning it is proving that you want to assimilate.  Prove that you want to be an American and not a Mexican living in America.  Until then, I support keeping them out. 

 

Where to start...coin flip.  Heads - AI...Tails - Lost. 

 

And it's...Tails

 

So...kinda slow this week...but what should I expect after last week's crazy cliffhanger. 

 

What did we learn?  More info about Dharma's "experiments."  We were introduced to "The Pearl"...a control room where subjects from other hatched are watched continuously on TV monitors...much like rats in a cage.  But, let me tell you what is weird to me about The Pearl.  Why did only one monitor work.  We know there are other hatched.  The tailies found one.  Obviously, more is happening...but for some reason, we weren't to see them, yet.  Perhaps that is still part of the experiment. 

 

Eko thinks it's more important than ever to push the button.  I have long been a fan of "Don't push the button."  (Ha...this brings back memories of Tiny Toon Adventures..."Don't you push the button.  I push the button.")  But, Eko is one of my favorite characters.  He is obviously tapped into the island somehow...much like Locke is.  But, I am still struggling with where the island ends, and Dharma begins...unless they are circular.  Hmmmm.

 

Questions I am asking after last night:

 

 

 

 

So...many of you know, as a Recruiter, Bungie is one of my clients.  I spend about 50% of my time supporting them and the other 50% supporting other Microsoft Game Studios.  I have known about Halo 3 for a long time.  I've even gotten to see many of the plot points (which I'm not talking about, so don't ask.)  But, I had not gotten to see the trailer, yet. 

 

Dispite the fact that I know a bit about it, this trailer still left me speechless.  In many ways, I wish I didn't know some of the things I do simply so I could sit back and be a geeky fan like the rest of the folks who are on the edge of their seats waiting for this game. 

 

Here's what went through my mind:

 

The trailer begins with a lone figure in the distance walking toward the camera allong a desert road, passing rubble from vehicles as well as a street sign.  It's clear that he is on Earth.  A Omminus chord breaks the silence as blue static fills the screen speaking words that are hard to make out.  This is most likely some kind of broken transmission. 

 

More walking...another chord and static interuption...this time more understandable.  "I am your shield.  I - am - your - sword."

 

Finally, through the mist walks our hero...Master Chief.  His armor is beaten up.  As we look at Master Chief, another static interpution: "I know you...your past...your future."  It is now clear that it is Cortana speaking.  But, from where?  Cortana's projection is left for a brief second before fading leaving us looking again right at Master Chief. 

 

Cue Marty:  "Bum-ba-da...bum-bum"  This is where I got choked up for the first time.  Why did I get choked up?  Remember toward the end of Halo 2?  Master Chief reluctantly left Cortana on Delta Halo to activate the self destruct on the Navy vessel and destroy the ring and the Flood currently infecting the Covenant.  For a moment, we see emotion in the Armor clad, emotionless Master Chief.  It's a very brief pause, but it's there.  He leaves her behind.  At the end of Halo 2, Master Chief (and the players) are left wondering what happens to her.  Marty's music is both a fanfare to our hero and an emotional reminder that he is missing a part of himself. 

 

Then...BAM...Master Chief looks over his shoulder to reveil to us a Huge Covenant Vessel.  Ghosts fly by.  As the vessel advances, we see many more.  The Covenant are on Earth IN FORCE.  The Halo theme is playing at this point.  Huge ships circiling some very large object that instatly sends out some kind of shockwave rattling the cliff MC is standing on and perhaps forcing the Convenant vessels to begin retreating as we now see them reversing course.  This object begins to open.  It's huge?  WTF is it?  What is it doing on Earth?  Why are the Convenant so interested in it.  Is it from the Forerunners? 

 

We look upon Master Chief once more as he watches this scene unfold.  Then, back to the object, which has opened almost fully. 

 

Then...quite...only the sound of violins as the object "fires!"  A huge bright light flashing out of the center and "exploding" into a blinding white that fills the screen.

 

Black...Chord followed by errie violins.  Then, Cortana's voice..."This is the way the World ends."

 

BUM-BA-DA  BUM BUM...HALO 3

 

BUM-BA-DA  BUM BUM...BUNGIE

 

BA-DA  "FINISH THE FIGHT"  2007

 

 

Well...I was going to talk a bit about why exactly I love Halo so much...but I spent the whole time gushing over the trailer.  Tomorrow, then. 

 

 

We officially announced today.  See the clip above.  Or, go here.  You can download it on Marketplace. 

 

From Bungie.net.  I didn't paste the pictures...so you'll need to check them out yourself on the website.

---

 

Bungie Shocks World with Surprise Game Announcement

Bungie announces Halo 3, the third and final game in the Halo Trilogy. Halo 3 will be released for Microsoft's Xbox 360 in 2007.

The game was revealed to the world at the Microsoft press conference at Grauman's Chinese Theater, in Hollywood, CA. By the time you read this, the announcement trailer should be available for download on bungie.net and directly to your Xbox 360, in full HD glory from Xbox Live Marketplace. Read no further if you want to avoid spoilers.

Nobody saw it coming. Halo 3! Who knew? For the last year or two, people have speculated about what our next project was and surprisingly, in all that time, not a single person guessed that it would be Halo 3. Not one.

We declare it the best kept secret ever.

 

Seriously though, it's been a chore biting our tongues on this one. Call it a combination of studio secrecy, corporate secrecy, Bill Gates already announcing it four times and, you know, whatever.

We won't ruin the content of our short presentation by describing it frame by frame, but we will note that everything you're seeing here is being rendered in real-time on the Xbox 360, using the current version of our Halo 3 game engine. The HDR lighting, self-shadowing, GPU-run particle system and many other effects should make it intact (and more) to our final game.

"The trailer was built to have minimum impact on the development process"

We demonstrated the real-time nature of the demo after the press conference (thanks to our friends at Pioneer with awesome audio-video assistance) to a small group of reporters, so we'll wait and see what their judgment on the presentation was, but you should feel free to make your own.

The trailer was built to have minimum impact on the development process, and while it required long hours and hard work from many, many Bungie staffers, it utilizes real-game assets, fiction and locations from parts of the "real" game.

 

In fact, it's the stuff it doesn't contain that gives it a strange kind of context. You can see how detailed the Chief is, but that detail applies to our other, unseen, unrevealed characters, vehicles, environment and so on. There's no AI visible in the demo, no multiplayer, and the entire thing has been left deliberately subdued both to give scale to the artifact and because this is our announcement. The real stuff will come later.

Fans of Halo fiction will be able to guess at a vast array of possibilities, even from this short piece, and discuss them in our newly launched Halo 3 Forum. For those new to the series, we'll make every effort to bring you up to speed on the story in forthcoming Bungie.net updates. We'll also be resurrecting the true purpose of the Update-proper - a weekly diary on the progress of the game that has been stymied recently, by the absence of (reveal-able) information.

Of course the trailer itself is a teaser - with no multiplayer, a single Earth-based locale, none of our sweet new AI or gameplay technologies. No physics to speak of, no new features other than a sneak peek at the graphics and audio engines…but the other stuff is there, and we'll reveal more as time goes on.

"Cortana and the Chief being a galaxy apart is a situation we haven't seen before"

CJ Cowan, Bungie's director of cinematics discussed one of the most startling moments in the piece, the return of Cortana, "Given the variety of character and story arcs at the end of Halo 2, we wanted to boil down our announcement to a few key threads. Cortana and the Chief being a galaxy apart is a situation we haven't seen before, and is something that is a powerful component to Halo 3. We are using her transmissions in the demo to give the viewer a few subtle clues to her situation and state of mind, without revealing any specifics we want to save for the game itself."

 

The Cortana reveal is the first evidence that this trailer might be for Halo 3, but the game's main protagonist is the item that seals that deal. CJ explains, "It is the Chief, back on a devastated and Covenant controlled Earth, standing over the excavation of a structure buried in the crust of our own planet that is the meat of our demo."

"The questions raised by these images, and the feeling that our assumptions about the Halo universe are being challenged this late in the story is what I am personally most excited about leaving with our fans. That's the type of thing that builds anticipation even more for the payoff to this trilogy we are preparing."

CJ's long nights are far from over. Cinematics are going to be as vital a part of Halo 3 as they were in Halo 2 and Halo: Combat Evolved. As before, they will use the game engine to keep the player feeling like a part of the action.

"There is a glorious, ancient artifact buried under the Earth’s crust "

Graphically, the game follows closely in the tradition of Halo 2, although obviously upgraded to take advantage of the Xbox 360's more prodigious visual abilities. As art director Marcus Lehto explains, "It was intended to be an understated announce of Halo 3 - the tone is that of mystery and suspense – the calm before the storm. I wanted to make sure that we re-introduced the Chief, show that Earth is thoroughly conquered, with Covenant everywhere, and that there is a glorious, ancient artifact buried under the Earth’s crust which will provide H3 with the epic journey which we all want."

 

Asked about the battered state of the Chief's armor, Marcus ventured, "The Chief is shown as warrior who has seen horrific battle – and it shows. The Earth is dry, barren, ravaged by the Covenant."

Grim stuff, but then things were grim at the end of Halo 2 when we left the Chief and the fate of the galaxy hanging in the balance. A cliffhanger about which we received over twenty emails... cough.

Marty O'Donnell's music will no doubt be heard over and over again. We can relate. The Studio has been thundering with the brass and bass of the trailer music for weeks.

Marty hired a 60 piece orchestra and a 24 piece choir to record the trailer music. "I want the viewer to have a feeling of anticipation and wonder for the first fifty seconds or so, up until Master Chief is revealed and they realize that it’s Cortana trying to tell them something," he says.

Marty's music was designed from the ground up to lull the listener into a sense of doubt, then wonder. "I want them to feel pride and longing the moment Master Chief walks out of the smoke," says Marty. "I want them to get excited and perhaps even froth at the mouth when they see the Covenant Capital ship and then the incredible buried artifact. I want them to be left with that, 'I can hardly wait to play this game' feeling by the end with a slight, 'I wonder what she meant by that' aftertaste."

"I want there to be no doubt in anyone’s mind when it is the right moment to applaud and scream. I hope they do, anyway."

As to the unmistakable new trumpety note, Marty is perfectly blunt. "The first time the world sees this trailer is at a live Microsoft press event in the Chinese Theater in LA. It is the first time we announce officially that Bungie is making Halo 3. My thought is that since it is an announcement event that is full of pomp and gravity, music will contain a fanfare and be somewhat over the top. I want there to be no doubt in anyone’s mind when it is the right moment to applaud and scream. I hope they do, anyway."

And we hope you enjoy it too. We'll keep you posted on more developments as the game progresses and look forward to more Halo 3 related goodies in the near future.

Your pals,

Bungie Studios.

PS., Make sure you check out the new Screenshot Gallery, Storyboards, Wallpapers, FAQ, About Page and of course, the forum!

 

 

 

HolyCrap

This is where some corporations suck.

 

Take 2 Interactive (which publish games like Grand Theft Auto and the super crappy MLB 2k6) has closed the doors to is studio Indie Built...maker of game series like Top Spin, Links, and Amped.

 

Indie Built used to be part of Microsoft Game Studios, so we have been getting swamped with e-mails and phone calls from former MS employees.  The way it sounds, nobody at the studio saw this coming.  It sounds like they showed up to work one day and were prevented from entering by both locked doors and security guards. 

 

How much would that suck?  Layoffs are a part of corporate life.  Most times, they are unavoidable.  Particularly in the game space.  If you are not making good games that sell, what is the point of keeping the studio open?  Apparently the last few Indie Built games didn't do so well, although Top Spin 2 just came out.  I don't know if it has really gotten a chance to thrive.  But, I digress.

 

My question is this:  Why would any company think it's okay just to lock people out without warning.  Take 2's press releases make it sound like they're treating the affected folks well with severance packages and whotnot.  But, what about the emotional hit that these people will take after being kicked out on the street?  How is that right? 

 

Anyway, a group of my peeps are flying down to Salt Lake City (FUN!) to meet with a bunch of potential candidates.  Hopefully we can hook some of them up. 

 

If anybody checks out my blog links on the right, you have probably seen Banjo.  I found his site many moons ago when I first started blogging.  I think I was searching for Harry Potter at the time.  Banjo is a movie buff.  I was reading his review of Flight 93 and wanted to make sure others got a chance to see it.  He adds some commentary to his review which I think is important...even if it is coming from a Canadian. 

 

I haven't decided whether or not I want to see this movie.  I am sure I will eventually.  But, I am thinking when I do, it will be by myself with a bottle of whine.  9/11 is still burned into my memory.  I was not in New York or DC and I do not have family there...but 9/11 hurt all of us.  I remember exactly where I was that day. 

 

I had woken up at the 7:00 to be to work at 8:00.  I was running late so I didn't turn on the morning news like I usually do.  I showered, dressed and ran out the door. 

 

I got in my car and turned on the radio...like I usually do.  They were talking about an attack on the World Trade Center.  I figured they were talking about the previous bombing in the garage.  That was old news so I changed the channel.  Attack at the World Trade Center.  Wait a second?  Is today the anniversary or something.  Changed the channel.  Attack at the World Trade Center. 

 

I called my girlfriend (who is now my wife) and asked her to turn on the TV.  She had to watch a bit to figure it out as they hadn't received the footage of the plane at that point.  All she could see was smoke billowing out of the buildings. 

 

I rushed to work.  I worked at a casino at the time.  All of the TVs in the casino were tuned to the news.  I couldn't believe it.  What the hell was going on?  How to two planes fly into buildings?  It was a horrible, horrible day. 

 

Anyway...that being said, and the fact that I cried when I read the first chapter of the 9/11 Commission report...I am not sure I can emotionally handle this movie right now.  Or, ever.  I am very glad it was made.  Both as a tribute to those who died and as a reminder of what happened...because I think some people have forgotten. 

 

Well...enough of that.  Go read Banjo's review. 

Look...I know the realities of illegal immigration.  I am sympathetic to those that want to become Americans but are forced to sit out 20 year waiting periods.  I also know that there has to be some sort of comprimise that we can reach.  I am not for making criminals out of tens of thousands of hard workers.  However, I am also not for granting citizenship to tens of thousands of people who are cheating the system.

 

But...regardless of how I feel, I am now annoyed.  For the second time in less than a month, people of Hispanic decent have left work to participate in a march that pretty much shut down transit in downtown Seattle.  Gridlock for hours.  Bus lines diverted.  Not to mention the litter left to pick up after such an event. 

 

I understand that there are a lot of Hispanics, both legal and illegal in this country.  I know how much you do.  I also know that there are tens of thousands of people who have become American citizens the right way.  So, now, I am annoyed. 

 

You are all welcome in this country.  I don't think anyone (that's not a racist jerk) would deny that.  But, to result to protests and work abandonment is annoying.  Is this going to advance your cause?  I'm not sure it will.  In fact, I think it will just piss people like me off.