Just in case you weren't keeping (weekly) track of the most played games of 2008, our pal Major Nelson thought he'd do the community a service by listing the Top 20 Live Games of 2008, based on Live connectivity over the course of the past 52 weeks. We copied 2008's top five 360 games below, because we can, but you can view a listing of 2008's twenty most played games after the jump. For those who are interested in XBLA and original Xbox 2008 stats, Major posted those as well. Congrats to Halo 3, Castle Crashers and Halo 2 for being so darn popular.
In this week's more traditional edition of the Bungie Weekly Update, the Bungie guys (and a few gals) inform us that Halo 3's once controversial and still annoying push to talk communication is being all but removed. With the next wave of Halo 3 matchmaking updates (set for release mid January) push to talk will only be used in matchmaking parties over six players. That means that open chat, once restricted to parties of four or less, will now be used for all gametypes with six or less players per team. It's a smart and well appreciated enhancement, but sort of useless now that we have New Xbox Experience parties to chat in.
The mid January Halo 3 matchmaking update will bring other changes, including hopper edits, gametype switching and some restructuring. Head over to Bungie.net for all the juicy deets.
Last week, Bungie teased us with a single screenshot of Halo 3's upcoming Orbital multiplayer map (one third of the Mythic Map Pack), and now today we're treated to much, much more.
Bungie just posted a Spartan sized bundle of Orbital screenshots (some new Assembly screens as well) that give us a pretty good taste of what multiplayer goodness Bungie has in store for us come the Mythic Map Pack's release. We've added the new Orbital screens to the gallery below, so feel free to browse and speculate about the awesomeness to come.
After getting a looksy at and a chance to play upcoming Halo 3 Mythic Map Assembly, Bungie has been rather mum regarding the other two maps that'll be included in next Spring's mythical map pack. But that changed today with Bungie's first screenshot unveiling of the second Mythic map, Orbital. Check out an embiggened version of the Orbital screen here and drool over its potential awesomeness. Lovely, no?
Remember, the Halo 3 Mythic Map Pack includes the three maps Assembly, Orbital, and Sandbox and releases to the XBLM in March. Sometime around the release of Halo Wars.
Marcus Fenix and crew aren't going to be happy to hear this; Gears of War 2 has slipped even further down the most played games on Xbox Live charts. Gulp ...
For the week of December 8th, Halo 3 has again claimed the number one spot, followed by World at War, CoD4 then Gears 2. Yes sir, a fourth place spot for team Epic. There is a chance Gears 2 could climb the ranks heading into next week with the release of the new Combustible DLC. Then again, with all the controversy surrounding its timing and price, we wouldn't bet on it. As far as Arcade titles go, Street Fighter 2 remains top dog, followed by A Kingdom for Keflings, Banjo-Kazooie, then everyone's favorite, UNO.
Sorry Marcus, just be sure to keep your manly chin up. Aight?
It wouldn't be a shock to hear that we love us some Halo 3 but our love (and/or obsession) doesn't come close to Bryan Simon. Known throughout the Halo community as the guy who sang himself into Recon armor, Bryan Simon is holding a special concert on December 11 where he will play through his entire catalog of Halo 3 related music. If you aren't familiar with Simon's work, think Flight of the Conchords if they were uncomfortably in love with Bungie.
Luckily, a fan-swag giveaway isn't necessary for this concert because tickets are free ... well, that is to say the entire concert will be streamed online via UStream. We like to imagine the entire event is taking place at Carnegie Hall but knowing his addiction, Dustin probably kidnapped Bryan and is making him play the songs from his basement. Bryan, if you can read this: Blink once if you're okay, twice is you want us to send in the cavalry.
Bryan Simon's Live Halo Love concert takes place online on December 11 at 7:00PM EST and you can also check out a rehearsal session tonight at 7:00PM EST at the same UStream link.
There's a new top games of Xbox Live list up over at MajorNelson.com and, for the second week in a row, Halo 3 is sitting atop all other Xbox 360 games. That includes Gears 2 and World at War. Funny thing about World at War, this past week it actually beat out Gears 2 for the second most played game on Live. Poor Marcus, he never had a fighting chance ...
This week, Major also brings us a new weekly top ten list of Community Games, which should help you weed through game candidates and give you a weekly list of hot games. You know, hot games like Mr. Silva's ZSX4 Guitarpocalypsewhich made it into the top five.
Well, that didn't take long. After a short stint, Gears of War 2 is no longer the king of Xbox Live (there goes our three month guess'timate), being taken over by none other than teh Haloz.
According to the oh so informative Major Nelson, Halo 3 topped Gears of War 2 as the most played Xbox Live game last week which was also a Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Gears 2 did hold the number two position with CoD:WaW, CoD4 and GTAIV rounding out the top five. We find it surprising that Gears 2 lost its Live multiplayer dominance so quickly post-release even with the release of last week's matchmaking fixing patch. Somewhere there's a Cliff Bleszinski hunched in a dark corner shedding a tear and cursing at a Master Chief action figure. Guaranteed.
Major Nelson sends word that Microsoft is beginning a new promotion this week, the Xbox Live Marketplace Holiday Deal of the Week. Throughout December, Microsoft will announce a new deal of the week for Gold members only on a certain content from the Xbox Live Marketplace. This week's deal is the Legendary Map Pack for Halo 3, which will be discounted from 600 Microsoft Points to 400 starting tomorrow (Halo fans may recall that the original 800 point price was reduced to 600 earlier this year).
For only five bucks, you can grab three maps for Halo 3 which include Ghost Town, Avalanche and Blackout. The deal will only be available for one week -- again, starting tomorrow -- so you'd best think fast if you want to take advantage of it. A new deal will be announced next Monday and more deals are expected to follow throughout December.
You may recall that a recent Eurogamer article profiled the performance of several popular Xbox 360 when installing them to the hard drive (one of the new features of the NXE). While some games received improved performance and shorter load times and others saw little to no improvement, it turned out that Halo 3 actually fared worse when installed to the hard drive. Apparently Eurogamer wasn't the only outlet to notice the difference, as Bungie has officially commented on the issue and explained why the load times are actually longer when Halo 3 is installed.
The answer lies in how Halo 3 loads map data. Each map is cached onto a certain part of the HDD that is reserved for game use. Once the game is installed on the HDD, it has to read the data on one part of the drive and write it to the reserved section. While data can be read from the DVD at the same time the HDD is writing data, the HDD can't read and write at the same time. As such, loading from the HDD takes significantly longer. Bungie advises gamers not to install the game, especially if you play online, as all other players will have to wait the extra time it takes to load and cache each map.
Recently, the contents of the Halo 3: Recon issue of Game Informer made their way online, detailing some never before heard Recon deets and also confirming what the Vidmaster achievements unlocked. But also inside is information (and the first screens) of the the Halo 3 multiplayer map Orbital, which is one of the three maps that'll be included in the Mythic Map Pack. From what we can read of the text, Orbital is a map based on an orbital tether that's hovering above Earth and is comprised of two asymmetrical tunnel hallways that overlap. It looks good, sounds good and gets our inner Halo fanboy giddy with anticipation. Joy!
We all know that the Marty O'Donnell composed Halo musical score is one of epic proportions. So epic, in fact, that over the course of the Halo trilogy, Bungie has released five discs of Halo soundtrack goodness. All of which you should own. For those who have yet to fulfill their Halo soundtrack purchasing duty, then this product should be of interest.
It's the Halo Trilogy - The Complete Original Soundtracks boxed set featuring all five soundtracks spanning the entire Halo'verse. The Amazon.com listing pegs its release for December 2nd and slaps a $29.98 price tag on the complete set. Not too shabby of a deal. That is if you're one who legally obtains their music ... ahem.
According to the latest issue of Game Informer which is full of Halo 3: Recon info and deets, those who unlock all of the Halo 3 Vidmaster achievements will be awarded the (build suspense) Recon armor permutation. No joke! You can haz Recon!
All along, Bungie has hinted that those who earn the Halo 3 Vidmaster achievements will receive something of value and all along people have jokingly speculated that it would be Recon armor. Well, that's exactly what it is, Recon armor. But don't get too excited just yet, because all the Vidmaster achievements cannot be earned because there is a Vidmaster achievement tied to the Mythic Map Pack. So, possibly this February, you can haz Recon.
All weekend long, Bungie is offering double experience points to those who want to play Team Flag in Halo 3. That's right, it's another Halo 3 Double EXP Weekend and this week we're being treated to Team Flag, a 5v5 flag'tacular playlist that's made up of flag gametypes
The big question is whether or not anyone is all that interested in a Halo 3 double EXP weekend when a certain curb-stomping game just released. Sorry Halo, this weekend you're taking the the back seat and letting Marcus drive the Xbox Live vehicle. Unless you're willing to offering quadruple the EXP ... then we'd think about it.
This week's actualBungie update is light on details but includes twice the podcast punch. As well as releasing a new episode of its popular podcast, Bungie has finally released the "Lost" E3 episode from its cage. After E3 plans to reveal an unnamed title were cancelled by Microsoft, which was later announced as Halo 3: Recon, Bungie has decided the time is right to let fans hear what they thought of what was supposed to be a newly announced title. Head over to the Bungie Weekly Update to download the shows directly and take a look at some Halloween inspired Halo 3 screenshots.
