Rampancy

Just a quick note; the podcast pages have been slightly reorganized to clear up some things that were confusing.

We've always uploaded an enhanced AAC file in an M4A container first; ASE is authored in GarageBand, and this format, readable by iTunes, supports features like embedded links, chapters and chapter images. If you use iTunes, the best way to get this version of the podcast is through iTMS or you can manually add the feed in iTunes' advanced menu.

If you're not using iTunes then you may want to download individual episodes or just use the embedded flash player on the site. For this, you want the MP3 version. Many times in the past these versions were uploaded much later, and the only way to find them was to find the AAC version first and then find a cross-link. No more. The podcast block on the front page, as well as the podcast's own page, will now prioritize the MP3 versions, which should mean no more problems with the Flash player not working (it can't handle the AAC files) or wonky downloads (Safari seems to add an extraneous .mp3 extension onto the .m4a files when downloading those versions directly.)

Jaime "Case" Griesemer, longtime Bungie designer, gave a talk at GDC about game balance in Halo, with some specific mention of the sniper rifle:

Spectacle, too, is important to keeping players in flow, with the sniper rifle creating a contrail and sound effects being subject to a delay over long distances. Such exaggerated causality makes the gun look good on YouTube, because viewers can easily see what's happened, and players don't break out of the game's flow in order to figure how what's just happened. And most sniper rifles aren’t fun, he claimed, because they don’t generate flow.

A full rundown of the talk is over at Edge Online.