Bada Bing Clan

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2012-01-31T16:56:00.001-08:00

If you download the Anniversary
Map Pack, you can play with us using your Halo: Reach disc.

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2012-01-24T11:59:00.001-08:00

You know the drill. Bored? Provide feedback.

100K cR for Reach in 10 Minutes

2012-01-17T23:36:00.000-08:00

OD pointed out a tip at 343 Industries for an easy 100,000 cR in Halo Reach. We have both verified that it works, but you may need to actually go into Reach and play a game for it fully register.

There is a secret terminal called the 'Threshold' terminal (which is supposedly the name of the gas-giant seen from Halo). To unlock it:

Unlock all terminals in the campaign
Write down the symbols which appear at the end of each one (also included below)
Start up Halo Waypoint
Press button
Press the buttons on your controller that correspond to coloured circles that appear on your screen
Enter the 5 symbols from the end of each terminal

Do this for every terminal and you'll receive:

7,000 cR per terminal (37,000 for the last one)
The terminal to watch in Halo Waypoint
The secret "Threshold" terminal after entering the ten sets of 5 symbols

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2012-01-17T11:21:00.001-08:00

The usual.

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2012-01-10T11:12:00.001-08:00

Game on kids.

Clan night tonight. 9:30pm PT. Halo CEA.

2012-01-03T17:46:00.001-08:00

Sorry for the late notice. I'll be on a little bit after the Sugar Bowl.

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-12-27T11:00:00.000-08:00

It's the holidays and I know nobody's working. What's your excuse for not playing?

Patriot Xporter USB Flash On Sale NOW

2011-12-25T16:07:00.001-08:00

The Kinect generation of Xbox 360s use USB flash for portable memory instead of the proprietary Microsoft memory cards. Good in theory, except that they have a minimum performance requirement that most USB memory sticks don't meet. The Patriot Xporter XT Rage does meet performance requirements and is what I use to move my gamertag and save games between consoles. On sale at Amazon right now, for hella cheap.

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-12-20T09:24:00.000-08:00

Here's some stats from Waypoint. Think you're better than me? Show up and put up.

Gamertag	BPR	Rank	K/D	Challenges	Armory	Commendation
gtdroptop	65	Brigadier	1.21	262	22%	54%
darknorpo	63	Colonel	1.13	174	14%	40%
FishBone10	60	Warrant Officer	1.17	21	11%	16%
Octurian Pewn	57	Colonel	1.10	209	33%	44%
OmniscientDeath	57	Brigadier	1.08	343	12%	57%
BeerMonkeee	55	Captain	1.01	46	11%	24%
Spix	50	Lt. Colonel	0.89	92	41%	41%
CoolerSopranos2	49	Colonel	0.92	255	41%	49%
MEAN MR MONKEY	46	Major	0.92	72	17%	28%
FragginURdoodz	39	Lt. Colonel	0.81	76	14%	40%
TimMAY 1023	38	Sergeant	0.78	3	9%	5%
Beer4Porter	18	Warrant Officer	0.35	4	12%	7%
Mean Mrs Monkey	14	Warrant Officer	0.29	12	10%	7%
Masher24	0	Sergeant	0.86	2	11%	5%
BeefierBen	0	Sergeant	0.00	0	9%	6%
thematthenry	0	Private	0.00	1	8%	0%
UnsavorySamurai	0	Corporal	0.00	0	8%	3%

Can't Say I've Never Considered This

2011-12-15T12:47:00.000-08:00

Google engineer builds ultimate LAN party house

"Kenton Varda, a software engineer with Google, moved into his dream home in March but has just now revealed some of the inner workings of the gaming-centered house. On the surface the house appears pretty typical, but when guests are over the space transforms into a haven for gamers. Twelve fold-out PC stations are built into the walls for easy storage and are split between two rooms for team vs. team matches."

http://www.gizmag.com/google-engineer-builds-ultimate-lan-party-house/20833/

Turtle Beach headphones on sale

2011-12-13T11:57:00.001-08:00

From OD:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005EEMYCO?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Today only.

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-12-13T11:42:00.001-08:00

I'll be on. You should be too.

Halo BPR

2011-12-10T20:23:00.000-08:00

I think this stat has been around for a few months, but the new Halo Waypoint makes it more obvious. Battle Proficiency Rating (BPR) is a number between 1 and 100 representing a player’s overall skill in Halo: Reach’s Multiplayer mode. This rating tracks your Kills, Wins, Assists, Deaths, and Betrayals across all matches played. You must play at least 10 Invasion, Arena or Competitive games to calculate. i.e., it's an overall rating of "how good you are." Interesting to peruse the clan numbers. :)

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-12-06T10:26:00.001-08:00

OmniscientDeath will be your host tonight. Look for his games and party starting at 9pm PT.

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-11-29T08:27:00.001-08:00

Look for darknorpo to be hosting games.

Halo CEA Bandana Skull

2011-11-23T14:39:00.000-08:00

There are skulls hidden around Halo CEA. They unlock achievements, but they also modify the game in different ways. They don't affect your achievements, so some of them can be very useful. Arguably the most useful is the Bandana skull which gives you unlimited ammo, making those Legendary runs a lot easier. Also negates the Famine skull to make it easier to get your 3 skull achievement. Being the most useful, it happens to be the hardest skull to get (so far). This video makes it a hell of a lot easier:

Clan night tonight. 8pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-11-22T09:27:00.000-08:00

I have family staying with me, so playing earlier gives me a good excuse to step away. Lots of things to go do in CEA, I'll let the first ones on decide what we do. Be sure to join the Xbox Live chat party. Remember you can join that even without an invite, so please join even if you see us in an unjoinable game. Then you can at least talk with us and find out what the plans are.

Halo CEA Reviewed

2011-11-17T09:52:00.000-08:00

So we've had a couple of days to play with Halo Combat Evolved: Anniversary edition. It does appear that you need to download the classic Halo 1 multi-player maps by using the code included in your game. Some thoughts:

Campaign: It's sad that this is 2 player only, but it's still a pretty fun campaign with great music. It's gorgeous compared to Halo 1, but I wouldn't say that it's quite "current gen." Hitting the Back button is neat to see the original graphics. The Grunt Funeral skull is a game changer, it basically makes killing Elites trivially easy. Headshot one grunt in the squad, and everyone goes boom. Also makes it dangerous to melee grunts now.

Firefight: This is satisfyingly fun to play on the Halo 1 campaign maps, and a nice alternative to campaign. It basically gives you a way to play snippets of the campaign as 4 player co-op, on XBL, with Challenges available.

Multiplayer: This is launched from the Halo CEA disc, but takes you into the Reach matchmaking engine. The game types and maps prefaced by "Anniversary" are the classic game types and maps. Beaver Creek was the most familiar, but Damnation and Prisoner showed up several times as well. Here are averaged clan stats from clan night, some things never change:

Clan night tonight. 8pm PT. Halo CEA.

2011-11-15T09:50:00.000-08:00

Early clan night for the new game. Cooler has the delusion that because he was good at Halo 1 10 years ago, that he'll be good in this game. Over/under for when he quits in frustration is set at 45 minutes. Achievements on the table:

http://www.xbox360achievements.org/game/halo-ce-anniversary/achievements/

Clan Meeting

2011-11-11T06:53:00.001-08:00

As seen on failblog:

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Players choice.

2011-11-08T12:16:00.001-08:00

Last week before Halo CEA. I'll let those on first choose what we play. It's Halo Reach by default, but I'm kind of hankering for some Rainbow Six Vegas lately.

Two weeks left

2011-11-02T19:09:00.001-07:00

Thanks to OD for the tip.

Get More: GameTrailers.com, Halo Anniversary - Exclusive Campaign Trailer, PC Games, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

iPhone Games

2011-10-31T17:03:00.000-07:00

No clan night this week because I'm traveling again. Sorry I didn't send out a notice last week, was also traveling. Note that Halo CE: Anniversary will launch in two weeks on clan night, and that we'll be switching to that as the official clan game. Halo Reach has a beta playlist open in anticipation of Halo CEA if you'd like to try out some of the game mechanics. My impression is that the pistol does not feel the same.

As an aside, the clan now has critical mobile mass on iPhone. I think there's an opportunity to expand our gaming platforms. Here's some games that might be fun to play as a clan on iPhone. They're all turn-based multi-player, so we can play at our own pace and not be tied to anybody's schedule. If you're interested, leave a comment on this post and we'll see if we can hit critical mass. If you have other suggestions, I'm open to those as well.

Uniwar - Cost: $0.99. UniWar™ is the online multiplayer turn-based strategy game for the iPhone. Up to 8 players take turns building their army and fighting against each other using the strengths of their units while taking advantage of the terrain. It is like chess or checkers but with a lot more possibilities and different boards. Join several games and move up the ranks to become the top player! Play anyone, anywhere at anytime!

This game is a classic! It is a blend between Advance Wars and StarCraft. Also in the same genre as Lux DLX on the iPhone but with a real online multiplayer mode added. Whether you are looking for an RTS or RPG, UniWar will satisfy your needs.

Carcassonne - Cost: $9.99. Play the original award winning board game Carcassonne with friends, family, or other board game enthusiasts - online or offline.

Build a medieval landscape, tile by tile, claim landmarks with your followers and score points. As a winner of the prestigious "Spiel des Jahres" award in 2001, the game allows for a plethora of play styles and strategies. If you like social gaming or board games you will love Carcassonne! Supports up to 5 people.

Settlers of Catan - Cost $4.99. "Catan", the legendary strategy game on iPhone and iPod touch provides gaming fun any time, anywhere. True to the original game, you can compete with up to four players for the most settlements, the longest roads and the largest army. You can trade with each other and claim the precious land with all its resources.

If there are no other players available, various Catanians, each with their own individual characteristics, will prove themselves worthy competitors: the pirate Jean, who knows no compromise, Vincent the merchant, who never allows himself to be cheated, Sean the knight, who takes what is rightfully his...

Clan night tonight. 9pm PT. Halo Reach.

2011-10-18T12:34:00.000-07:00

A multiplayer beta playlist showed up a couple weeks ago featuring "zero bloom" weapons. It has now become clear that this is in support of Halo CE: Anniversary releasing next week. Those who played 10 years ago will remember that you could fire away as fast as you wanted with no decrease in accuracy. Halo CE: Anniversary will use the Halo Reach multiplayer system and engine, but retain the old maps and game engine. As such, weapons will be zero bloom, so the new playlist is ostensibly to exercise that system. If it's still active, we'll try jumping in there tonight.

Achievement Unlocked Sounder

2011-10-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

With the newly released iOS5, you can now specific custom sounders for incoming text messages on iPhones. This coincides nicely with Microsoft (via Major Nelson) making the "Achievement Unlocked" blip sounder publicly available. It's very satisfying. :) Download here.