Crispy Gamer News

Full Sail University in Orlando, Florida will help present the very first video game wedding event, “A Match Made in Halo.” The wedding will take place on Saturday, January 17 at 1:00 PM at the Orlando Science Center.

The couple will be married during Otronicon in front of 3,000 local guests in a fully-themed Halo wedding event. Elements of the Halo theme include: game Master Chief serving as the officiant; bridal party attire featuring bride and groom’s Halo emblems; a string quartet to play Halo soundtrack music; a Halo-themed wedding cake; and Halo décor throughout the ceremony and reception.

The bride and groom are Desirai Labrada and John Henry, who met while playing Halo online in December 2004 through Xbox Live. In August 2005, Labrada relocated to Florida and began her studies at Full Sail University in the Digital Media Degree Program. The couple continued their relationship while now living together in Central Florida.

“As a graduate of Full Sail, I have had the opportunity to attend Otronicon and have always enjoyed this one-of-a-kind event,” said Labrada. “Now as a bride and a Halo fan, I cannot think of a more perfect setting to celebrate our wedding day. John and I are greatly thankful to all involved for their generous contributions in making our Halo themed wedding dream a reality.”

I’ve heard of weddings inside massively multiplayer games Ultima Online, EverQuest and World of Warcraft, and virtual worlds like Second Life, but never in a video game to my knowledge, so this story is slightly interesting.

Tor Books has launched Halo: The Cole Protocol by Tobias S. Buckell, just in time for the holidays. The new novel is the latest in the New York Times bestselling series based on Microsoft and Bungie Studios’ Halo video games. The Halo novels, Halo: Ghosts of Onyx (Tor 2006) and Halo: Contact Harvest (Tor 2007) became instant bestsellers, along with the three previous novels.

In Halo: The Cole Protocol, Buckell take us through the first desperate days of the Human-Covenant War, when the UNSC has enacted the Cole Protocol to safeguard Earth and its Inner Colonies from discovery by a merciless alien foe.

The 368 page paperback is available now for $14.95 at most major book sellers nationwide.

To go along with today’s official announcement on Halo 3: Recon (the previously super secret project from Bungie), We offer the official launch trailer. Right after the jump, of course.
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For some time now, Microsoft has been teasing gamers with talk of more titles set within the Halo Universe, from the upcoming Halo Wars real time strategy game to a mysterious Peter Jackson helmed Halo project. There was even an ambiguous trailer released last week from Bungie Studios about yet another mysterious Halo project. Well last night, at Microsoft’s Tokyo Game Show press conference, the curtain was finally raised on that last one, as the company formally announced the development of the standalone expansion, Halo 3: Recon.
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According to Bungie Audio Director, Marty O’Donnell, the pre-owned games market had “big” effect on sales of Halo. Speaking to to GameInustry.biz, O’Donnell said that smaller studios face a difficult future if they can’t get a return on their investment due to the sale of a pre-owned copy of a game. But in the very same breath he admits that he doesn’t actually know what that impact is - he just assumes it’s “big.”

O’Donnell is certainly not alone in his assertion that pre-owned games sales hurt overall sales of games: In an interview with GI.biz, David Braben, chairman of Frontier Developments, said that it is his “belief” that the pre-owned games market is “damaging” to single-player titles. In that interview he suggested an alternative rental system, involving the supply of rental discs to retailers at no cost in exchange for a percentage of a store’s rental profits.

 Jens Uwe Intat, EA’s European Publishing General Manager, in yet another interview with GI.biz, said that the company is trying to find ways to discourage pre-owned game sales by engaging the consumer beyond the initial purchase of a game.

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Bungie.net reports that the second title update for Halo 3 will go live on Sept. 23. After they flip the switch on this title update you’ll notice that it adds a new ranking system, some changes to the playlist, some new Achievements (everybody loves Achievements right?), and some visual changes to Bungie.net.

The update, ripped from the pages of Bungie.net, right after the jump:

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McFarlane Toys has teamed up with Microsoft Game Studios to create action figures based on Halo Wars, the Ensemble Studios-developed strategy game based on Bungie’s ultra popular Halo game universe for the Xbox 360. These action figures (kung-fu grip not included) are expected to hit stores in spring 2009 and retail for around $10 each.

The figures are 2.5 inches tall and have mobility at the waist - which is important for when you are posing them in heroic moments on your shelf of real-world desktop. Yeah, if you need to pose your action figures then it might be time to get a life… Each three-pack features Halo Wars characters with different poses, colors and weapons. Series One features four unique three-packs, listed after the jump:

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