As a person who does not know much about console gaming, I was really surprised when I saw the news about Halo 3, Microsoft's game for its Xbox 360 system, on CNN. They were talking about a possible greater first-day sales than Spider Man 3 movie! I then searched the net and Halo 3 was indeed everywhere! For example, you can read a coverage of the release of the game in USA Today. Are we witnessing "the biggest video game roll-out ever"? With Halo 3, I just realized how big the game industry has become.

I don't know how big the roll-out is, but what I can tell you is that after being drawn out of the kitchen by some unexpected stirring classical music on TV that the Xbox 360 marketing division has triumphed head and shoulders over the ps3's. (Never dug Wii's ads that much either, but didn't need to -- the console sells itself.)

Halo 3 will most probably be a loved game for the X-box, but X-box will never beat Wii in popularity; in my opinion.

AMC Theaters has been running Halo 3 ads for quite a while now; not the first time I've seen video game related ads at the movies but possibly the longest running for a single game!

I guess by now everybody has heard about the scratches on the limited editions - here's some photos at the NeoGaf (seem to be coming up a lot lately!) forums.

yeah, MS already acknowledged it and will be replacing the discs for free

I wonder if RE 5 will be this huge.

hell no

Let me guess...Halo 3 is the same as Halo 2 but with prettier graphics and one or two new features. Hooray.

I played the PC demo of Halo, was bored in 10 minutes, and wrote the game off as a loss. For the "BUT HOW CAN YOU JUDGE THE GAME WHEN YOU HAVEN'T PLAYED IT?!?!?!" crowd, shut up. I don't care. I like hating things irrationally.

From what i've heard about Resident Evil 5 plus all the hype that will remain from the new movie release, makes me think that RE 5 will be huge. Just saw a preview on g4 today, they compared it to House of the Dead. I think this new platform of the game might appeal to both the fps crowd as well as the RE followers. (assuming they arent the same people......most likely are)

Actually, no. That's true of the single player, but the new features in multiplayer are sigificant enought to completely change the game. In particular, there's a Forge mode where one team member plays as a monitor and goes around purchasing and placing equipment, spawn points, explosive barrels, barriers etc which makes for a very different experince than any previous game. Coop is also a lot better now because it's intergrated into the story rather than just having two master chiefs not reflected in cutscenes, dialog etc.

Gameplay-wise, the Halo series is a fantastic console experience.

Scenario-wise, it could have been a great Marathon spinoff but after a good start with Halo 1, everything went downhill. Halo 3 is nothing short of disappointing in that respect. If you were expecting a mindstorming crossover between the two universes, if you were convinced that Cortana and Durandal were the same AI... well, look elsewhere, because the solo campaign is just a plain orthodox FPS (albeit with great gameplay).

It seems the Bungie writers of the golden age (Pathway Into Darkness, Marathon, Durandal, Infinity, Myth) have left the place a long time ago, just like the Forerunners abandoned the Halos after building them. Disturbing parallel, if you ask me.

I actually like Halo 3. The online multiplayer is a lot balanced out, better vehicles, better maps, less cheap weapons that can kill you in one hit (sniper has been toned down so much thank god). All around the balance is better and you aren't cheap-shotted every two seconds.

But Halo is not worth it without friends. Without it that game is trite and boring. All of them are like this, if you don't know.

But the game truly is a bonding experience if you have good friends and a night to kill. Trust me, you'll make memories for sure.

I only played the first Halo on the Xbox and some multiplayer in the PC version and I don't see anything innovative warranting such hype. Even worse, its slow and auto-aiming gameplay is killing a lot of decent multiplayer games in eSports tournaments.

I wonder why I have no clue what Halo is.

If you end up finding out what it is, tell me, please.

I had a similiar reaction. They made a big show of Cortana suffering, but there wasn't any payoff. We didn't find out exactly what Gravemind's deal was with her, which was my main problem with the story. You just run in, get her and leave and that's it except for blowing up another Halo. As far as I can tell, she was onyl there a few days, which makes it all the more confusing. Overall, there seems to be less meat to it than the first two games, which is a shame, because there was so much improvement in almost every other area.

Just a quick reminder to everyone that HYPE is contribute-able too... at least when it's official hype from the publishers/developers. So for all of you who have been collecting advertisements, pamplets, sworn testimonies, flash webfeatures and whatever else hyping up Halo 3 (or any other game).... please review the information on an Ad Blurb submission and see if you can throw that stuff too up in the database.

And for those of you who don't believe you can write a game description without copying the back of the box/official website, that's also where it goes.

Unfortunately we don't have any mechanism (or permission) right now to archive the CNN video piece... but hopefully someday that may change. In the meantime, may it sit on youtube forever and make us all smile when Halo 4's launch is announced.