Eurogamer is doing a retrospective on the top twelve exclusive franchises for the first Xbox console. Halo 1 and 2 unsurprisingly clock in at #1.

Ars Technica notes that recent decreases in the costs of parts and manufacturing may mean Microsoft no longer has to subsidize the sales of their Xbox 360 console with profits from software: they may be making as much as $75 on each console sold, according to iSuppli.

Meanwhile, it is estimated that Sony will lose about $240 on each PlayStation 3.

No Xbox 360 price drops have been spotted just yet, but Microsoft would seem well-positioned to offer one if they so choose.

One of the oft-discussed topics among those following the upcoming Halo Wars RTS game by Ensemble for the Xbox 360 console is whether or not a workable interface for a strategy game can be created for a console. Many commenters have offered that RTS games just belong on PCs to be played with mice and keyboards, mirroring the comments of many PC gamers before the release of console FPS games like GoldenEye and Halo.

What are they to say now? Now that the Command & Conquer series is also coming to the Xbox 360?

1Up's latest Halo feature is a retrospective on the Halo series. The teaser on their three weeks of Halo 3 microsite mentions the "Halo/Marathon universe" but there's nary a mention of Marathon there, and as we all know, the two universes are separate anyway. Right?

Of course, they've also got coverage of yesterday's revelations about the public beta, new Halo 2 maps, and the Halo 3 CG TV ad.

[image:42829 left hspace=5 vspace=5 border=0] Bungie commemorates the fifth anniversary of the release of Halo with an announcement that touches on both Halo 3 and Halo 2.

First, there will be a Halo 3 television commercial airing during Monday Night Football on December 4th.

Secondly, in the spring of 2007 there will be more Halo 2 maps available. They won't be free, and you'll need a 360 with the hard drive (required for Halo 2 backwards compatibility anyway).

Thirdly, next spring will also see the launch of some kind of Halo 3 Public Beta. Fans will get a chance to play Halo 3 multiplayer on Xbox Live before the game is actually released.

Last but not least, a new screenshot from an actual campaign level, recently reproduced in Newsweek magazine. We've added it to the Halo 3 gallery.

UPDATE: Microsoft has an official press release on the announcements as well; a copy has been posted at Team Xbox.

Five years ago today, Halo shipped to eager Bungie fans and the unsuspecting masses of Xbox early adopters around the world. To commemorate this (and whet your appetite for whatever big news is to come later) Frankie has put up an Anniversary Panel of game journalists and fansite editors (including HBO's own Louis Wu) to ask them about what they're looking forward to in Halo 3 and what their favorite things about Halo and Halo 2 are.

The newest installment of 1Up's Three Weeks of Halo 3 looks at player complaints about Halo 2's online play and how those are being addressed in Halo 3, including weapon spawns, dual-wielding, player icons and more.

In particular, Ferrex mentions how the weapon spawn system in Halo 1 was made, and how in Halo 3, it'll be a revolution, not an evolution, since "weapon spawns have been rebuilt from the ground up."

Can't wait.

1Up continues their "three weeks of Halo 3" online series to accompany their chocked-with-Halo 3-goodness December issue. The latest addition is a Humpday Challenge writeup where Bungie cheats and multiplayer lead Tyson "Ferrex" Green graciously stops at the appropriate number of 7 kills to leave 1Up with some self-esteem. Just not much.

Gilbert Arenas of the Washington Wizards spends a lot of time online playing Halo 2. He brings an Xbox 360 to the hotel with him on the road and connects to Xbox Live through their Internet connection.

What does he want to do next? According to Xbox.com, he wants to be a modder.

"First it was just a lot of team play, then I got into sniping," said Arenas. "Now I'm into modding. I want to mod. I've been modded against so many times it's messing up my ranking. As soon as I'm about to get up to a higher ranking, I get modded three times in a row. I'm getting my mod box."

Here's hoping Arenas is joking, or that Bungie and Microsoft won't be treating celebrity cheaters any differently than the garden variety.

You'd have to have been under a rock (or on a business trip, natch) to have missed the revelations about Halo 3 multiplayer from Swedish gaming magazine, Level, last week. Similar material is upcoming from EGM, and their online presence, 1Up, is doing a special Three Weeks of Halo 3 page. They also summarized the information in that issue. MyGen summarized the information from Level, as did XboxAddict.

Out of respect for Bungie's wishes, we aren't hosting any scans, or links to scans. If you really must find them, you know where to go, you don't need to ask me.

However, nobody owns the rights to the information that's in that article, which seems to boil down to the following:

• Halo 3 will have new weapons.

  No huge surprise there. Bungie added quite a few weapons to Halo 2 after Halo 1, as well as making changes to old weapons and adding in the dual-wielding system. New weapons appear to include the "Brute Spiker", the "Spartan Laser" and the "Nail Grenade".

• Halo 3 will have new vehicles.

  According to the article, the Mongoose ATV that was originally slated for inclusion in Halo 2, but was removed because there was no good mission placement for it, will be in Halo 3. It supposedly seats two and is weaponless, so unless you can fire a weapon while driving (now there's some dual-wielding action) the only support fire you're going to get is from your passenger.

• Halo 3 will have a new Man Cannon.

  I'm not sure what happened to the old Man Cannon. In fact, I'm not even sure what a Man Cannon is. Some articles have likened it to jump pads from Quake and Unreal Tournament, but Halo 2 multiplayer already had those-- the jump platform in Ascencion and the air vents on Foundation and in other levels. Others seem to think this is an object you carry, like a weapon, that you can aim at the ground and use to launch yourself in the air, or perhaps the Halo version of the gravity gun from Half-Life 2, allowing you to manipulate enemies and objects in the level from a distance. That last idea would be cool; the gravity gun was easily the most fun thing about HL2.

• Halo 3 will have new controls.

  The Xbox 360 has moved its black and white buttons to the shoulders, above the triggers. It has the same number of buttons as the previous controller. Apparently, in Halo 3, the shoulder buttons independently reload the gun on each hand; left shoulder button, left gun reload. When there's no weapon in the left hand, the left shoulder switches between plasma and frag grenades. There's no word on where the headlight/active camo function is going, and tantalizing hints about what the X button will do now that it doesn't need to do reloading duty.

• Halo 3 will have new eye candy.

  Your secondary weapon will apparently be visible on your body, hanging from your shoulder. Personally, I think it's a small touch, but it's great to see. Halo's two weapon restriction is a great example of a less-is-more philosophy, and while realism is not really a priority in this game, eliminating the "where does that huge sniper rifle go when I switch weapons" question is worth it. Whether there is tactical value in being able to see an opponent's slung weapon is yet to be seen, but it's a nice touch anyway.

• Halo 3 will have new packaging.

  Supposedly there will be as many as three editions of the game, culminating in a collector's edition, called the Legendary Edition, that will come with four discs of content and be packaged in a Spartan helmet (or a package shaped like one). At least one source mentioned a Halo movie sneak peek in this content, but with no studio backing for the film now, that sounds a bit premature unless it's just interviews with Peter Jackson, director Neill Blomkamp, and the Bungie gang. Not that there'd be anything wrong with that.