I am a strange person. I’ve heard it all throughout my life. There was nothing more fun to me as a child than getting up on a Saturday morning, watching cartoons with a big-ass bowl of cereal and then spending the rest of the day gaming on any and all systems that I had access to. Growing up a gamer in the early eighties has enabled me to see the rise of every game console except for the original Pong. I’ve been gaming since I learned to read at the age of three, when I learned how to run my old man’s Commodore 64 all because I wanted to play Time Pilot.

Many of you have been fervently reading and commenting on my other posts that I’ve done since my inception to MEGATONik, and I can’t thank you enough for your support. In thanks to you, the community, I’ve decided to put in a ton of work and bring you a special post that near and dear to my heart, my Top 50 Console Games of All Time.

I will try my damnedest to explain the reasons why I think why a certain game is deserved of it’s spot. Certainly many of you will disagree with the order I have put the games in but I always welcome your comments and suggestions. It is thanks to all of you in the community that I have been able to hone my craft by subjecting you to my subjective opinions about video games. Without any further ado… let’s get this thing started! Hit the jump to be defeated by a wall of text designed to titillate and please you.

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I’ve heard plenty of people complain about how melee works in Halo 3, and while it may not annoy everyone there are those that find it to be an issue. Fortunately, Bungie has been listening to the community’s feedback in between designing new maps and building castles with their money (or maybe pulling a Scrooge McDuck if that’s their style), so the next update will include some changes to the way melee is handled. Certain aspects like shield depletion and simultaneous strikes, among others, will be adjusted to make it more fair:

The bottom line is that we felt it could be improved without alienating folks who hadn’t noticed any problem and so we’ve been working with real life players, like one or two external hardcore clans, as well as the MLG guys, to make sure the changes are satisfactory, balanced, fair and fun.

What I think is really great is that they aren’t only listening to suggestions, but letting outside sources actually be a part of fixing the problem and making improvements. Getting direct help from the players themselves seems like the best way to get it right. Hopefully the vast majority of players end up liking it as well, since they are going pretty in-depth with what needs to be changed to make sure it will actually be better:

We chatted about the general nature of the changes – subtle versus significant, perceived fairness versus actual fairness, system link versus online. Then we rolled up our sleeves and got stuck in. Obviously the MLG guys wanted to see the nature of the changes, so we played a couple of games where points were only awarded for front-facing melees, just to force the issue. The number of simultaneous deaths goes up as a result of some of the changes – but it was the visceral response we were looking for.

Looks like those of you who always blame your losses on cheap melees will have to think of a new excuse (perhaps blaming the rest of the team for being “noobs” and not helping?), since bashing someone over the head with a gun will soon be a much more refined action. The update, which will include a lot of other changes in addition to the melee fix, should be out in a few weeks.

Not only does the Halo series promote violence, but now it’s starting a new trend with school kids: teabagging. The Asbury Park Press reports that in Point Pleasant Beach, kids are teabagging each other outside of school grounds.

The report states:

A group of boys has been involved in bullying others, and officials said their actions have included physical attacks, taunting and sexually harassing victims by making their crotches touch other boys’ heads while fully clothed — something apparently inspired by the Halo video game series, in which players can perform a posturing move over a defeated enemy.

Jane Chmielewski said her son, a seventh-grader, was assaulted by a pack of boys who then sexually harassed him. However, since that incident took place outside school grounds, district officials said they were not able to investigate the situation or punish those involved.

Jane Chmielewski’s son was apparently approached by 10 boys, put in a headlock, and teabagged. He was also recorded with a cell phone camera. Before this incident happened, another altercation occurred, in which the boy was thrown to the ground, kneed, and got a garbage can placed over his head.

Schools classify this as sexual harassment, and that this new teabagging trend is most likely inspired by the Halo series. The Board of Education has introduced a new policy that allows them to punish students bullying outside of school grounds. The punishments range from verbal warning, to expulsion.

Get ready for some incredibly big numbers because I’m about to unload 2007 videogame sales on you and they are really massive. According to the NPD group overall videogame sales (console software, hardware and accessories, etc., etc.) were nearly $18 billion for 2007. This would be an increase of 43 percent over 2006 and is also commonly referred to as a shit-ton of money. Someone better be pulling a Scrooge McDuck money vault swim right now or it’s all going to waste if you ask me.

Breaking the numbers down, software sales totaled $8.64 billion for the year, an increase of 34 percent over 2006 with Halo 3 and Wii Play being the top selling games of the year with 4.8 million and 4.21 million units sold respectively. Looks like a free controller can do a lot for a game. Hardware wise it’s no surprise that the Wii and the DS dominated the market selling 8.5 million and 6.29 million units sold, respectively. Xbox 360 followed, selling 4.62 million, PS2 sold 3.97 million, PSP sold 3.82 million, and PS3 sold the least, with 2.56 million sold during the year. Of course with a year like this even coming in last isn’t that bad as the PS3 has been seeing a steady resurgence and sales are up for everyone.

Thanks mostly to the Wii and its plethora of peripherals (say that three times fast) peripheral sales were up 52 percent with sales reaching 2.26 billion dollars. The Wii Remote and nunchuck were the top sellers despite the release of this. Hit the jump for a list of the top selling games and some quotes from everyone’s favorite quote givers, analysts.

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I don’t know about all of you wonderful readers out there, but there’s nothing that I love more than making Top 10 lists. Maybe it’s a genetic imperative that I inherited from my OCD father. Or, it could be the hours of David Letterman I watched as a kid. Whatever the cause may be, it warped my mind into the categorizing, importance-assigning machine that it is today.

With that being said, tonight’s Top 10 is one that many of you out there will either be enthralled by or absolutely disappointed with. To see what type of reader you are, just click that little jump down there. You know you need to.

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A couple of weeks ago, we brought news that new downloadable maps were coming for one of the best shooters of the year, Halo 3. Earlier today, the maps went up on Xbox Live for a price of 800 MS points. The three maps are detailed below:

* The symmetrical valley of Standoff, with its entrenched bases and fields of boulders is ideal for mid-sized objective and Slayer game types.
* The vast, labyrinthine passages of the Rat’s Nest bring something completely new to the multiplayer experience: an indoor vehicle paradise. Strongly influenced by the Campaign mode, this map is ideal for big team battles.
* Foundry is the ultimate Forge map. Players can edit every single object in this voluminous industrial warehouse, placing stairways, walls, bridges, and tunnels to create an entirely new play space and build almost any kind of map imaginable.

While 800 MS points (or $10) may seem like a lot for three maps that will be available in a couple of months, hardcore Halo fans, such as myself, won’t be able to resist.

You may remember when Halo 3 first came out, some people with way too much time on their hands decided instead of enjoying the game for what it was they would rather count the pixels. When they did, the result was not the promised resolution of 720p but a mere 640p upscaled to 720p - and with some simple arithmetic it is revealed that Bungie “cheated” gamers of a whole 80 pixels of vertical resolution. That’s right, Bungie had the nerve to lower the native resolution by a mostly unnoticeable 80 pixels for the sake of greatly improved lighting.

Now, Class Action Connect is offering a lawsuit against Bungie, so that gamers everywhere can get the money they deserve for having to enjoy the incredible lighting in less-than-HD 640p. Bungie is finally being called out for their grievous affront to humanity, and they could have to pay for Halo 3’s unforgivable lack of 80p. The description from Class Action Connect:

A team of class action attorneys has launched an investigation into complaints that Halo 3 was falsely marketed as a high definition product, but does not actually render native high definition resolutions. These complaints are that, although Halo 3 was advertised as having a 720p resolution (720 pixels), it natively renders at 640p (640 pixels) and is simply scaled up to 720p. Read more about it here. If you purchased the Halo 3 game, you may be entitled to recover money.

Justice prevails once again. However, Halo 3 is not the only game to withhold pixels, or even the worst offender, so it’s time to bring all the other developers who have made games in less than 720p and make them pay too. It is inconceivable that anyone would makes aspects other than the resolution their priority, and even if they made a fun, entertaining, and amazing game they need to be brought to court for every slight aspect that was promised but not delivered. These lawyers need something to do with their time, afterall.

[Via Xbox-Scene]

Halo 3’s saved films have changed the game, and even added some more depth since every moment can now be relived from any angle, and your best kills can be scrutinized endlessly. Now you actually have to back up your claims, and the things you used to think were amazing seem like nothing compared to the feats others have shared.

However, sharing your Halo 3 videos with people who don’t have Xbox 360s of their own can be hard without the right equipment - well, until now. But GeeVee.com’s new GeeVeeGrab for Halo 3 makes it incredibly simple. All you need to do is supply them with some basic information about the video and they’ll do the rest.

First of all you need to make an account here, then go to the GeeVeeGrab for Halo 3. Enter your gamertag, the name of your film on your file share, and then the title and description for the site. Then just click “Grab,” and they do everything else for you while you wait for them to send you an e-mail as soon as your video has been processed and is available on their site. Videos can be up to 45 minutes, so you shouldn’t have to worry about length - but I really doubt anyone’s going to want to sit through almost an hour of you getting your ass kicked. However, it is still in beta so there may be problems and it can take a while for your video to be available. Still, it’s well worth the wait, and I tried it with one of my videos and was definitely satisfied with the whole process.

It’s really great to be able to upload your Halo 3 videos to the internet so easily, and it means the amount of insane Halo 3 clips circulating the internet is about to grow a lot. However, everyone is going to start uploading their videos, so there will also be a lot more lame videos to go through. Just because you thought it was amazing doesn’t mean it really was - yeah, we’ve all gotten a double kill or ran over someone with a vehicle. Don’t assume it’s special just because you’ve never done it before.

[Via the forums - Thanks SRX]

Veteran’s Day was a week ago, but this Halo 3 screenshot, entitled “Band O Brothers,” was too good to not share with you all. Xbox Live user BigToe67 and four of his friends decided to pose with the flag on Valhalla. However, I have to echo the sentiments of one Bungie forumite who said that it would be better in green.

Good job, BigToe67. You are a true patriot.

One of the most unique features in Halo 3 is that it’s playlist rules and map layouts can be altered at will. Luke Smith over at Bungie.net just recently announced the newest changes. Most significant is a social Rocket Race playlist. The best way to describe this variant is exploding vehicular mayhem. There is also a Swords gametype (which I will probably veto every time), and something called Hammerzeit, which probably has to do with Gravity Hammers. Check out the full list of updates after the jump.
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