Larry posted the news earlier today about how the Halo 3: ODST “Transport” vehicle will be making the rounds at several Gamestop outlets, starting today. This gives some lucky folks the opportunity to try out some of the game, and possibly even win some prizes, while getting the word out about the new upcoming game in the Halo 3 line.

This is one of those Microsoft [MSFT] – Bungie – Gamestop [GME] dealies that helps to drum up excitement as the gaming schedule enters the autumn doldrums… Of course, this particular year will be jam-packed with several other sequel titles, so the need for the ODST Transport tour will be double-pronged: increase the general excitement for the Xbox 360 and its games, and differentiate Halo 3: ODST from the other hot titles coming soon.

Well, it has been a bit more than just “a few days” since we last mentioned the upcoming arrival of Halo 3′s Mythic Map Pack, the one that allows for all of those extra Achievements (with attendant Achievement Points!) and new amounts of of multiplayer hilarity…

Fortunately, the Mythic Map Pack is now available, from Xbox LIVE Game Marketplace, for 800 MS Points.

The excitement for Xbox 360 gamers that has been building about the expected Mythic Map Pack for Halo 3 culminated  with an announcement seen on Xbox LIVE that the map pack will be released shortly: first, as a bonus for the people buying Bungie’s Halo Wars Limited Edition on March 3, 2009, and then a few days later, as a Xbox LIVE DLC.

So now, while you’re waiting for the Halo 3 ODST to show up, you can be marshaling your armies around in Halo Wars and taking a few breathers with the new maps from the Mythic Map Pack… and racking up more Achievement Points.

In a curious twist of fate (wherein Halo 3‘s Legendary Map Pack was offered as the launch offer), Bungie’s original Halo game is being offered as this week’s Holiday Deal of the Week on Xbox LIVE.

For those of you who already have the original game in its original form, you most likely won’t need this unless you’re a diehard fan who just has to play it on your Xbox 360 against all of the latecomers trying to catch up on Halo-mania.

As reported by Larry (Major Nelson) earlier today, Xbox LIVE will be starting a new promotional program called “Holiday Deal of the Week”. Obviously on a weekly cycle, there will be an offering that is typically sold via the Xbox LIVE Marketplace that will be discounted or otherwise provided with a purchasing incentive. The announcement for the item should occur on a Monday, the product will be available at the discounted price the next day (Tuesday), and the promotion is intended to last for one week from that point; then the next item will be announced, and the cycle begin anew.

The first item on the block is Halo 3′s Legendary Map Pack. Now, given the popularity of Halo 3, a lot of people who would be interested in it have already purchased it. But for more casual gamers who have Halo 3 but have hesitated on buying any of the game add-ons, or just are waiting until the add-ons are given away for free, this may be a good way to pick up things much earlier. 

This program is intended to run until the end of December, so stay tuned!

While the (non-)news about “Halo 3: Keep It Clean” roared onto the scene early last week and continued throughout, until the Xbox LIVE outage earlier today, the more surreptitiously released Halo 3 Title Update 2 (affectionately acronym’ed as “TU2″ by Bungiers themselves) came online on 9/23/2008…

Even I hadn’t realized the relevance of this that day, when I had inadvertently slipped my Halo 3 game disc into my Xbox 360 console to fire up the game to check on my multiplayer stats. The update modal dialog popped up, I clicked “OK”, and the update chugged along. I didn’t check my Achievements list, so I’ll be checking this shortly.

According to Bungie, there are plenty of new Achievements, many of which are tied to Xbox LIVE multiplayer actions, and several require both the Heroic and Legendary Map Packs. And many of the new Achievements are not actually attainable… yet.

So there may be plenty of new excited gamers out there, who have already made the Halo 3 game investment and want to further maximize it– or merely pwn noobs and laziers.

The Setup

For several months, there have been rumors that, in addition to Halo Wars, there would be another Halo game, in the same vein as the blockbuster Halo 3. Was it all wishful thinking on the parts of the unwashed Halo gunners out there? Or was it a carefully orchestrated PR campaign by the Precursors-That-Be over at Bungie?

The Premise

Starting this week on the Xbox LIVE Marketplace, as well as on the Bungie blog, a video was floating about showing teaser cutscenes from the “Halo 3: Keep It Clean” entree. To jam on the fun, the video was reported to be released at 7:07 AM PST on 9/25/2008.

Is it a completely new game? Is it a game add-on, to be available via the Xbox LIVE Marketplace? Is it multi-platform? Rather than answering these questions, it seems (in typical recent Bungie fashion) to merely deepen the mystery… basically, heightening the curiosity levels of interested folks.

The Action

Some outlets have conjectured that “Halo 3: Keep It Clean” will be an “add-on campaign” to the Halo 3 game, but that term may be interpreted in a lot of different ways. It may be a new game, but positioned within an earlier portion of the Halo universe timeline and apart from the Halo Wars title.

However, given the recent influx of new games this season (both just released and in the pipeline for 4Q 2008), “Halo 3: Keep It Clean” (or will it be Halo 3: Keep It Clean ?) is going to have to be an over-the-top fun escapade to capture the hearts and minds of the gamer l33t and their fans.

N.B.

Other related Javamancy posts (in reverse chronological order):

• Bungie Day
• Coming Soon: Bungie Day
• In-Game Advertising Alive and Well

Er– What?

Happy birthday to a game?!?

Sure, why not?

The Bungie Blockbuster’s Birthday

Last year on this day, Bungie’s major blockbuster FPS was released to much anticipation, with the start of the long gamer lines in front of stores and the subsequent absenteeism at many companies across the U.S. and the world.

This year, in a more subdued fashion, Bungie had a short blurb on its blog, and the Hawty McBloggy (blog) held a screenshot contest to commemorate the fun-ness.

Here’s the winner announcement… and here’s the screenshot.

N.B.

Don’t know about Hawty McBloggy, or her gamer alias bs_angel? Here’s a quick note about the blog and its creator-owner.

In another case of irony, there are apparently tons of popular blogs running on PHP and WordPress, as opposed to any of the ASP.NET blog packages.

Get ready, fire up your Xbox 360, and log into your Xbox LIVE Gold account!

It’s Bungie Day!

So log in, download the freebies, and enjoy Halo 3 multiplayer.

Whoa! A bunch o’ holidays so close to each other?!?

Actually, Bungie Day was newly minted by the guys at Bungie Software to announce the release of their new Halo 3 map, Cold Storage, as well as some giveaways in the form of free gamer pics and theme. Also, there will be a drop in the pricing for the Halo 3 Legendary (Map) Pack.

Of course, these are on Xbox LIVE, so you need to log in and start fetching!

I wonder if I should dust off my copy of Halo 3 and try to remember how to play it again…? Any hotshot Halo 3 kill3rs out there?

More Reading

Previous external news that may interest you:

• Bungie Weekly Update: 6/27/08