Ever wonder just why grunts look the way they do? Or if the inspiration behind the Forerunner architecture came from Frank Lloyd Wright? Or if the Warthog always looked like a jacked up Jeep 4X4?

Just in time for the 10th anniversary of Halo: Combat Evolved, Titan Books along with Bungie have released The Great Journey: Halo: The Art of Building Worlds. Inside is close to two hundred pages of original concept art from Halo: Combat Evolved all the way to the most recent Halo: Reach and everything in between.

Halo: The Art of Building Worlds takes players through the journey of Bungie as they created not just Halo: Combat Evolved but the universe that surrounds it. Some of the artwork are full two page spreads, beautifully painted works, that show the lush environments of the Halo universe. Other pages include series of sketches of everything from variations of Elite and Spartan Armor to the unused fauna concepts that never made it into certain games.

These pieces are some of the most interesting as you get insight into the Halo that never was, including the original concept for Master Chief and the completely un-iconic name he was almost graced with back when Halo was still an RTS game. Much like looking at classic Star Wars concept art, this book is a literal nerdgasm of “what if”.

In his foreword, 343′s Frank O’Connor explains how Halo has become this generation’s Star Wars. Looking at the artwork and stories that have come from them in this book, we have to agree with him.

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It’s hard to talk about video games and not mention the Halo franchise. Constantly breaking records and taking names, Halo is a system selling behemoth of a property for the XBox 360. It was one of the games so popular, that it would go on to spawn multiple Machinima series, animated shorts created using assets from the respective games. These included everything from Phil to Arby ‘n’ The Chief to what may be the most famous Machinima ever, Red vs. Blue.

Smartly coinciding the release of the 8th season of Red vs. Blue entitled Revalation and the Recollection three disc set with the release of Halo: Reach, Rooster Teeth helps provide Halo fanboys with more Halo than they can handle in the biggest week of their gaming year.

The Recollection contains the second full story arc of the Red vs. Blue universe. Not a part of any official Halo canon, Red vs. Blue takes aspects of the game world never explained like the constant fighting in multiplayer of the different Spartans and tries to explain it. Taken with a grain of salt, the story even gets a little meta and makes a viewer step back and wonder how much applies to them. But for the most part, there is just lots of great comedic moments and swearing over a finely animated and even dramatic story.

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Ever wonder what your toys do when you aren’t around? (And no, the proper response isn’t “They aren’t toys, they are collectible action figures.”) Well one Machinimist did and combined it with his love of Halo 3 to make Arby ‘n’ the Chief.

Instead of having someone from the real world voice a video game character, DigitalPh33r took a different approach when he showed the Master Chief is actually an action figure who hops on to Halo every now and then when his owner isn’t around and is terrible at it, as well as completely immature. In addition to flaming of opponents and denial of his own lack of skill, Chief tries to overcompensate with constant failed attempts of LEET speak.

And did we mention that Chief is voiced by Microsoft Sam, the in-Windows text to speech program, instead of having an actual voice actor? Surprisingly entertaining for this fact alone, it doesn’t end there for the Chief as he gets a roommate in the first episode of the series, rekindling the infamous video game odd couple when his owner receives a package containing, you guessed it, an Arbiter action figure.

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It’s not a secret. A good percentage of the Machinima world is created using Halo or one of its sequels. The reason for that may lie in the most popular and successful Machinima series Red vs. Blue.

With its first episode posted by the folks at Rooster Teeth just under seven years ago, Red vs. Blue has a loyal following with some of the most iconic and entertaining characters in Machinima. Subtitled “The Blood Gulch Chronicals”, Red vs. Blue follows the tales of two armies stuck in the box canyon of Blood Gulch.

Each team starts off with only a few members but quickly grows to reveal the eight main personalities that drive the series. These include Red’s miserable leader Sarge and his personal brownnoser Simmons as well as Blue’s lovable Caboose.

Over the show’s five seasons and an astounding ninety-eight episodes, the teams venture in to other worlds and encounter some unreal scenarios such as a never-ending game of Capture the Flag and a love struck tank named Sheila.

Much like Halo on XBox Live, the language of the series isn’t kid friendly. The characters go to great lengths to combine various expletives together in never before seen and incredibly funny ways.

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Anthologies can often be either one of the best ways to explore a concept if executed properly. The idea explored here is Halo and the mythology surrounding it. For the first time, one work tries to take from all other source material like the Halo games, novels and comics in an effort to fully explain the world of Halo. In the process, it also helps actually add new substantial concepts to this much applauded franchise that show that the fight isn’t really over for Master Chief and the Spartans.

As seen before with Batman: Gotham Knight and The Animatrix, Halo Legends is an anthology of seven distinct and separate stories about the characters and ideas of Halo as seen through the eyes of various anime heavyweights. With writers and directors who had worked on everything from Cowboy Bebop to Bubblegum Crisis and MASK to Dragon Ball Z, the spectrum of top talent in this field was pieced together to put together Halo Legends.

The first story, “Origins”, comes in two pieces and may easily be the most important of the seven parts to the greater Halo universe. For the first time in full detail, the audience is given a look at exactly what happened to the Forerunners that caused them to disappear with the creation of the Halo rings. Most interesting about this feature comes from the revelation of what the Forerunners looked like and how they became revered as the gods of the Covenant.

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Starting this week, The Flickcast will be taking our love of Machinima and turning it in to a weekly feature. For those who don’t know, Machinima is real time 3D rendering of graphics to generate computer animation. What that means is people take different video games and their associated mods and create different short films or series based off of them.

This week, we will be taking a look at Phil from Black Light Productions. Named after its main character and created using Halo 3, Phil revolves around a Halo newbie as he learns his way around the XBox Live world with the accompaniment of the standoffish Zack and overly nice and naive Wally. Unlike some Machinima which has the players reacting as if the events of the game are “real life”, Phil, Zack and Wally acknowledge that they are playing Halo 3 and communicating over Live.

Following them through the series’ thirteen episodes, we get to see some of the biggest faults in online gaming portrayed in a very humorous way. Everything gets covered through the series from trash talkers, glitchers, griefers, competition and clans… and even a little bit of romance.

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If you love video games and think they deserve more recognition, how about an awards show to help them get more time in the spotlight? If you think that’s a good idea, you’re in luck so read on from this official press release.

Between now and December 7th, community voting is open for the Gamers’ Choice awards. It’s a very unique and cool (if not first of its kind) voting mechanic: there is one video for each nominee, and each video view counts as a vote. Each video contains clickable links to easily navigate around all the categories and nominees. There’s even a community contest, with five $1,000 shopping sprees up for grabs.

The awards show itself will be held at the Redbull House in Santa Monica, CA on 12/11/09, one day before the VGA’s. Then on 12/15/09, a special episode of Inside Gaming will feature all of the winners and related industry news.

The “Inside Gaming Awards” will form two special editions of the “Inside Gaming” series. The first special was broadcast Friday, November 27th, 2009 with “Inside Gaming’s” host “The Dead Pixel” launching over 90 nomination videos across 18 categories. Nominees will be eligible for two separate awards – the official industry “Inside Gaming Award” and a “Gamer’s Choice Award”, which will be chosen by community votes between the dates of Nov. 27th and December 7th.

Community votes will be counted based on the number of views each nomination video receives during the two week voting period. Check out the full list of Inside Gaming Awards Nominees for 2009 after the jump.

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For those of us who are a fan of the franchise, we all know the headache that comes with waiting for a live action Halo movie. From Peter Jackson to Steven Spielberg, the film has gone through so many rumors and incarnations, there’s no way of knowing if we’ll ever get to see the Spartans fragging aliens on the big screen. With that in mind, we have to take pleasures in the smaller things.

In promoting Microsoft’s Halo 3: ODST, out later this month, they produced a TV spot in which we see the life, and death, of an ODST Spartan. The team just released the uncut version, which is about a minute longer. It has a very strong Battlestar Galactica vibe, which works, because BSG can very easily meld with the Halo universe.

The video shows everything we’d expect to see from a Halo film trailer: the Spartan masks, a Covenant brute, explosions, and lots of yelling. Check out the uncut trailer after the jump, and pick up your copy of Halo 3: ODST on September 22.

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As we reported last week, XBox Live got an update this week featuring the Avatar Marketplace, Games on Demand and Ratings. We’ve decided to put together a list of the newest features, and show you some of the things added with this update.

Avatar Marketplace

The most anticipated addition is undoubtedly the Avatar Marketplace. Instead of waiting for small incremental additions to the Avatar clothing options, XBox Live subscribers will be able to purchase clothing, costumes, accessories and props for their Avatar to wear and show off to their friend’s list and appearing in games likes 1 vs. 100 or Bomberman Live.

For day one, Avatar Marketplace came with a large variety of items from eight different games like Gears of War 2, Halo 3 and Star Wars: The Clone Wars, three different clothing brands like Adidas, and two clothing styles, Steampunk and Recessionista. While there is a large variety to choose from, some items feel very expensive and may be overpriced since this Marketplace is still trying to learn its pricing structure.

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You’ve spent probably hundreds of hours since Halo came out with the original XBox in 2001 fighting as Master Chief against the Covenant and Flood forces and battling your friends online in Halo 2 and 3. And as much as we all love Master Chief, a change of pace doesn’t hurt every now and then.

With the upcoming September 22nd release of Halo 3: ODST, you will be able to step in the shoes of different UNSC soldiers for the first time as you play through the events that take place right before the start of Halo 3 as various Orbital Drop Shock Troopers (ODST’s) in their defense of the city of New Mombasa. Also for the first time for those who preorder the game, you’ll have the opportunity to step in to the shoes of one of the most recognizable supporting characters in the Halo universe in the game’s new Firefight cooperative multiplayer mode, Sergeant Avery Johnson.

Longtime players will recognize Sgt. Johnson as the gruff, trucker mouth, cigar smoking UNSC commander who plays a pivotal role throughout the Halo game franchise, often interacting with Master Chief during missions. Fans of the Halo novel series will also know Sgt. Johnson as the main character of Contact Harvest, where he was one of the characters present for the first contact between the UNSC forces and the Covenant. Obviously, we all know how that turned out.

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