Pyroman and mr smiley's MST3k-inspired spoof of the cutscene between Floodgate and The Ark.

...or is Sarcastic Gamer just happy to see you? More of you than they can handle, apparently, since the site is no longer accessible, leading me to depend on a report from Kotaku that the site, along with CVG, is citing the usual "sources" that a new Halo game will be announced at E3. Halo Chronicles? Halo 4? Lego Halo? Nothing at all? Time will tell.

UPDATE: This one continues to make the rounds: ActionTrip, Fragland, Xbox360FanBoy, and NeoGAF. The last seems to focus more on the "Superintendent" image and a possible non-Halo title.

UPDATE: I couldn't open SarcasticGamer when I posted this item, but it is visible now, and the editor assures us below that the site has been running the entire time. Specifically, the site claims Halo 4 will be announced at E3, and they've added a link to the story at CVG as corroboration of their original claim.

Apparently some readers disbelieve the rumor because it's "too early" for the announcement of another Halo game. SG replies that there's a difference between announcing game development and announcing a release date-- but in this case it really may be too early, as Halo 3 wasn't announced until 18 months after the release of Halo 2, and the release of Halo 3 was only nine months ago. Unless this game is really a content release for the Halo 3 engine, or Bungie has magically figured out a way to halve its development time for Halo games (three years per game, give or take) it means that the wait for Halo 4 will seem even longer.

I arranged Leonidas for my jazz band for the end of the school year. Unfortunately my band teacher didn't have faith in us and decided to not even try the piece even though we just stood around and did nothing that day. Anyway I wanted this piece to be used by someone so I am putting it up for anyone to use. I hope that someone can play this with a band or just enjoy the music. Thanks!

Marcus B.

The word on the street (or at least in the Bungie.net update this week) is that Cold Storage, the remake of the classic Halo 1 multiplayer map Chill Out, will be released this July 7, Bungie Day, for free.

From 5:00 to 7:00 PM Eastern next Friday, July 11, you can play Hail to the Chimp online with the developers, Wideload Games.

The play session will include Bungie alums Alex "The Man" Seropian, Matt Segur, and Doug Zartman.

The team at TeamXbox rated Wideload's sophomore effort, Hail to the Chimp, a 7.9 out of 10, scoring highest for audio and innovation. One of the game's greatest strengths might ironically become one of its weaknesses:

While the game presents a unique take on the party game formula, Hail to the Chimp is actually at its funniest when you're not even playing. The main menu of the game is presented as a news broadcast from the GRR News Network. From the deadpan delivery of news anchor Woodchuck Chumley to the hilarious commercials and PSAs, you'll find yourself watching the game more than actually playing it.

TeamXbox suggests that when you are playing Chimp, you play with friends, since that is where the game really shines.

It's tough for a game to be funny. So it's no slight praise when GamesRadar says that Hail to the Chimp is funny-- if you're in your 20s:

Through it all, the comedy keeps flowing, often in the form of commercials or news reports. Just how funny these bits are is debatable here in the office, but we have the same arguments about Family Guy and Saturday Night Live. However, we can all agree that Hail to the Chimp is definitely a step above most games that bill themselves as "hilarious." And also that you have to be in your 20s to appreciate it.

Maybe feeling like in you're in your 20s will be sufficient. GamesRadar scores Hail to the Chimp 7/10, or "good".

The news isn't all bad for Crackers the chimp, though. 1Up's reviewer gave the game a B+, and the average of users and editors on the site is an A.

The site praised the game for the humorous news segments as well as the unabashedly strange gameplay elements.

And when this plays into the objectives, the game becomes great fun. One of my favorite modes places campaign posters in a literal mud-slinging competition -- the more clams you collect, the more mud you can throw at opponents' posters, and the last person to keep their poster clean wins. Every mode is built around competition, so the game is more replayable than something like Mario Party despite having fewer modes.

Hail to the Chimp is a good concept executed well, and available at a discount price-- remember this is $40, not the usual $60 next-gen minimum.

Game Over. Insert Coin.

The balance between carrot and stick, reward and punishment, in game design was so much simpler back in the arcade.

Take the gamer's money and give them a limited number of chances to progress, usually called "lives" since failure nearly always means death. When the player runs out of lives, they can pay to keep playing if they agree within a given time period. If not, the game resets itself to the start.

In some ways, it's a magnificently simple and beautiful state of affairs compared to what PC and console gaming has become, where the entire price of a game, hardware included, is bought and paid for in advance, and "pay for play" means online access fees and MMO subscriptions.

How, in an environment where you can't hit the gamer in the pocketbook for failing to demonstrate the requisite skills, can you punish them? Should you even try? Arcade games were designed to be "finished" only by the best of the best, but today's story-driven, cinematic AAA titles cost millions to make-- is it wise to reveal the entirety of one's design only to a select few? Might that not tempt designers to leave the ending out (I'm glancing in your direction, Halo 2, and yours, too, Indigo Prophecy) and focus energies on the beginning-- the part that most reviewers will see?

Is death in games supposed to be punitive, or is it there only to prevent the player from progressing through the game until they've demonstrated a certain minimum level of proficiency? If it is supposed to be punitive, what does it say about designers' opinions of their own game if the worst punishment they can come up with is playing the game more? Isn't the idea of dying, the message of failure, more important than the actual consequences? Or is it? Can a game design aspire to have replayability and still consider repeat play as a punishment for dying? What other punishments can there be? Should there be any punishments at all? Can any punishment be as useful or effective as requiring the player to insert another quarter, and if not, should gaming return to the arcade model, or should it abandon player punishment altogether?

 Click here for the complete text.

More or less at random I happened upon The First Hour blog, which reviews only the first hour of a video game. Game #12, reviewed back in September 2007 (just in time for Halo 3 to come out) was the original Halo.

As an extension to that blog, Beyond The First Hour reviews games after they are finished, and that blog features a review of Halo 3. No love for Halo 2 apparently, but that's par for the course now, isn't it?

For a game company that made its name with a game about a zombie who used his body parts as weapons, it's ironic to say that only now, with the release of Hail to the Chimp, are things starting to get ugly. Problem is, the ugly thing is the reviews.

Citing game modes that are too similar to each other and AI that was often unclear on the concept of how to play the game, IGN gave HttC a 3.5 out of 10 and said it had "zero redeeming qualities". Ugly, indeed.

Transcription of Last of the Brave, written by Martin O'Donnell, transcribed by Mike Poe.

This song can be heard during Crow's Nest in Halo 3.

Enjoy.

Another disappointing review for Hail to the Chimp: Variety says this political humor game isn't funny, and isn't really political. Ouch!

Kotaku's list of game releases for this week has Wideload's Hail to the Chimp slated to hit store shelves on Tuesday, July 1-- and features the cover art for the game as the lead for what they call a "thin week".

mr smiley teamed up with Pyroman to try to beef up the "Master Chief Theater 3000" series a bit. Two heads are better than one, right? They have big plans for this series, and are excited to be part of it. Check out the first (episode 4 of the series) of many episodes to feature BOTH of their voices and writing.