The update itself doesn't seem to be quite large at all, and as of this writing, it has become available even at my undisclosed location. After successfully downloading the update, you'll see the number "1.1" in the lower right-hand corner of Halo 2's main menu screen. This disappears once you login to Live and reappears when you logout.

Roppongi Hills-- a noted gaijin hangout in Tokyo-- will host an Xbox 2 press event next month, prior to E3, according to Computer and Video Games. The invite-only event on May 13 will feature a viewing of the MTV broadcast scheduled for that date. Thanks BDGamer.

Aside from bringing in Frodo and the Killers (there's a band name--Ed.) it appears that Microsoft's MTelevised launch for the Xbox's successor is going to leave a lot to the imagination, with more details to be fleshed out at the later pre-E3 event and then still more at E3 itself; at least, so says corporate VP Peter Moore to GameSpot. Thanks Eurogamer.

Littlebigman pointed out GameSpot's latest Rumor Control column, that sports purported images of the Xbox 360's controllers that seem consistent with the partials seen at ourcolony.net. (Mini-editorial: For all the ribbing Microsoft took for the original "Duke" Xbox controllers, I grew to like them, not for their bulk, but for their button layout.

Xbox365 today has a press release that US registration for the World Cyber Games 2005 championship tourney is due to open April 15 at us.worldcybergames.com. At the time of this writing, the site was not yet up. Halo 2 is one of the WCG events.

The Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) has announced that their Halo 2 Xbox tournament is changing format from 5x5 to 4x4, due to "overwhelming support" for that format. Thanks Louis Wu at HBO.

SketchFactor has posted the summary of the latest Humpday Challenge-- after a short hiatus following their humiliation against typical Japanese Halo players, Bungie rewrote the rules (they now pick one of the gametypes and actually practice as a team beforehand) and rebounded with a solid victory over Art Vand3lay, flechette, goatrope, Ducain, Sorahn, and Jphan7om of

Halo 3 garners a mention in today's Penny Arcade cartoon, as a pawn in the ongoing chess match between Microsoft and Sony over the next-generation console launches.

In case you've been hiding under a rock for the past few days, it appears that Microsoft has scheduled the Xbox 2 introduction-- to be MC'd by Elijah "Frodo Lives" Woods and accompanied musically by The Killers-- for May 12 on Music Television. Xbox365 (and many others, including HBO) has the story.

Other items:

SPOnG has a story speculating that the on-again, off-again adventure game Kameo will be released finally on the Xbox 2 rather than the Xbox. More surprisingly, it claims that it was ported to the new console by Rare only six weeks after they received their first Xenon development kits, and that they could have done it even faster.

(Could this give credence to rumors of Halo 2.5 for Xbox 2 as a launch title? Only the Shadow knows --Ed.)

Eurogamer has a story quoting Shane Kim at Microsoft Game Studios that the Xbox's most popular franchises, including Halo, Fable amd Project Gotham Racing, will be making their way onto the next console:

"Without giving away all the surprises we have in store, gamers that love franchises like Halo, Fable, and Project Gotham Racing can safely assume we will continue to invest in them as we move into the next generation."