Supernostro pointed out an article at IGN suggesting that in Q1 of 2007, the CPU in the Xbox 360 will get an upgrade that will make the console more reliable:

Chartered Semiconductor will update the 360 CPU to a 65nm process, the current state-of-the-art in chip manufacturing techniques. The new Xbox 360 CPUs will benefit from lower power consumption, and thus much lower operating heat. The change will likely have a dramatic impact upon Xbox 360 reliability, as the console, especially the first batch of units manufactured before January 2006, has something of a reputation for being prone to hardware failure and the dreaded "Red Eye of Death."

Of course, I'm sure Microsoft would rather that hordes of potential buyers don't skip out on buying a 360 this holiday, assuming they haven't already, so don't be surprised if this upgrade either gets moved up, or denied altogether.

Frankie and SketchFactor, over in Barcelona for the X06 event, decided to do a different sort of Humpday Challenge this week, applying their Halo 2 skills to other games available for play.

The two pitted themselves against bots in Shadowrun (the bots won) and then against each other in Gears of War (Frankie won).

To cope with all the new things we're tracking now, we've made some additions to the site. There is now a Halo Wars image gallery and a mirror of the QuickTime version of the Halo Wars trailer; this is a mirror of the same file provided at HBO and re-encoded by Louis Wu.

The image gallery has the five official images from the HaloWars.com website, as well as a series of 17 screen captures from the QuickTime trailer.

There are also keyword tags for Ensemble Studios, for Halo Wars, for Wingnut Interactive and for their upcoming series of Halo games, which for the moment we are codenaming BLAM because no title has been announced.

The Features menu in the left sidebar has a new widget for Ensemble, and this is where the Halo Wars content will live. If you've got javascript enabled, each of the hierarchical menus with a triangle sign can be open or closed without reloading the page by clicking the triangle.

From Ensemble Studios' own web page is this announcement for Halo Wars, which may assuage some of those already screaming that the meagre amount shown in the trailer contradicts known canon:

Breaking News - Ensemble Studios is bringing real-time-strategy to the Xbox 360 and to the Halo universe. Designed exclusively for the Xbox 360, Halo Wars allows you to take charge of the human UNSC armies and see the Halo universe from a totally new perspective.

Halo Wars is set during the UNSC's first deadly encounters with the Covenant, allowing players to lead the crew of the UNSC's "Spirit of Fire" from initial skirmishes to an all out war against the evil Covenant.

It's been pointed out that the very first Covenant-Human encounter was at Harvest, when no Spartans were present. However, I certainly think there are enough gaps in the record of the Human-Covenant war as presented in the novels to place a ground battle on a human colony world with Forerunner artifacts the Covenant want access to, where Spartans are in play and the Covenant are not yet glassing all Human worlds as a matter of policy, or are perhaps avoiding glassing one in particular for specific reasons.

Everybody calm down.

There's an embarassment of riches in Halo-related news out of X06:

• Kotaku: Jackson Working On New Halo Game
• Kotaku: Halo RTS Announced
• Joystiq: X06 Live Blog
• Major Nelson: X06 Live Blog
• Gamasutra: New Halo Releases, Partnerships
• GameSpot: Wingnut Unscrewing New Halo Franchise
• GamesAreFun: Bungie and Ensemble team up for Halo Wars (360) RTS
• Xbox.com: Microsoft announces partnership with Peter Jackson
• Slashdot: Jackson Making Halo Game
• eToyChest: X06 Impressions Day One
• Next Generation: Peter Jackson Forms Another Halo
• Blue's News: Microsoft's X06 Announcements
• Voodoo Extreme: Halo Wars Announced
• PlanetXbox: Get Ready For Halo Wars

Xbox.com has put up an item on the Halo Wars announcement; there's one particularly interesting tidbit there that places the game at the beginning of the human-Covenant conflict:

"Halo Wars" places the player in command of human UNSC armies as they deploy for mankind's first deadly encounter with the enemy Covenant forces.

Given that the novels tell us the Spartan program did predate this conflict, it certainly doesn't preclude them from being in the game-- and the trailer does show them.

Since real Bungie fans don't trust a word that is said about the Halo franchise, or indeed any Bungie game, unless it comes straight from Bungie, KP has now posted at Bungie.net to give the official imprimatur to the heretofore scurrilous rumors spread in Spain by Peter Moore and Peter Jackson.

To wit:

• Ensemble Studios is making Halo Wars, an RTS game for the Xbox 360.
• Wingnut Interactive is working with Bungie on an as-yet unrevealed Halo project.

The latter is being referred to as a "new chapter" in the Halo series; no doubt this prevents any conflict with the idea that Halo 3 will be the "end" of the Halo story, as it will only end that particular story arc. Where or when these new games take place isn't yet known.

In addition to the projects mentioned above, Wingnut is also working on original intellectual property.

Major Nelson did a backstage interview with Peter Moore before the press event. Despite the latter's predilection for annoying golf claps punctuating his presentation, he does redeem himself with his good taste in beer, mentioning that Bass ale is one of his green room requirements.

A link to the video interview can be found here:

mms://wm.microsoft.com/ms/xbox/video/x06/Peter_Backstage_300k.wmv

The press event saved the best for last, in an almost Steve Jobsian "just one more thing" sort of way, with a trailer for Ensemble Studios' upcoming Xbox 360 title, Halo Wars.

It features a battle between Human and Covenant forces, as well as Spartans other than the Master Chief. The latter, of course, has been a fan request for nearly five years; and the former, I can only assume, means either the game is set in a time period before the close of Halo 2, or that the postulated human-Covenant alliance against the Flood never actually occurs.

No indication of whether or not the Spartan group referred to in the trailer as "Omega" bears any relation whatsoever to the RvB character of the same name.

The trailer has a link to www.halowars.com. Some users have reported problems with the site, but so far they have pages for downloading their trailer and a FAQ, which mentions that Halo Wars is an Xbox 360 exclusive, not a PC title as well as I posted earlier. There are also forums and a gallery of screenshots.

Peter Jackson has just been on stage with Peter Moore to announce the formation of Wingnut Interactive.

I really believe that there is a new form of entertainment that is not a film and is not a game. I am not a game designer. But what I am really interested in is in the idea of taking games and stories that could be films, but might not be films.

According to Jackson, the games this new studio will be working on are not going to be traditional games, but new "blends" of entertainment with the emotional impact of a film and the interactivity of a game.

Moore says that Jackson is working with Microsoft beyond just the Halo movie, and "Bungie is working on content beyond Halo 3".

Moore closes the Wingnut Interactive segment with a bullet list, indentifying Wingnut with a new Halo series produced by Bungie and Wingnut, and a new, original property to be developed by Jackson and Fran Walsh.

Halo still hasn't gotten more than a token mention in the press event so far, except for Moore's statement that fans should expect something new related to Halo 3 "before the end of the year".