Halo 3 in Iraq

[Demon G Sides]

Bungie and MS sent over some Demo Boxes for American Soldiers to play with (http://www.xbox360fanboy.com/2006/12/31/halo-3-tested-in-iraq-by-our-soldiers/)

Best PR ever? Yeah. Probably.

[Coca Cola Zero]

I'm tempted to sign up for this beta test, but shit.. the requirements are way worse than the whole signing up for the forum Shadowrun beta thing.

[ElGuapo]

A lot, and I mean a LOT of soldiers in Iraq play videogames. In fact, almost every single soldier I've personally known that's been in Iraq plays videogames. Some of them are on my friends list.

That being said, more than one has been advised by their doctors not to play realistic shooter games due to PTSD. So games like say, GRAW, Rainbow Six: Vegas, and especially games like Battlefield 2 and BF2: MC are out. Plus obviously, the Desert Storm series and anything set in urban and/or desert combat, even Counterstrike.

So Halo is the perfect series for them. Not real weapons, sci-fi setting, but it gets that shooter game in. I'm sure there are many well adjusted examples of people that can handle it, but people that have seen a lot of urban combat seem to not really dig computerized versions of insane shit they just went through.

[Kitus J.]

A lot, and I mean a LOT of soldiers in Iraq play videogames. In fact, almost every single soldier I've personally known that's been in Iraq plays videogames.

Thanks for sharing that. That's cool. What a great way to spend some time sitting in the middle of the fucking desert. Hopefully they get a chance to escape reality for a little while and feel like they are sitting home on their couch chilling with some games.

[Demon G Sides]

Its the only thing that keeps them sane. One of my teachers, who was a sniper, and is now in the airforce, never plays video games at home. He doesn't even have a console.

But I brought my Xbox in to school one day, and we started talking halo 2 strategies. It was amazing.

But hell, I'm glad that Bungie shows support.

[shift6]

I've sent a few care packages to friends over there and besides little things (chapstick, etc) all they ask for is entertainment: DVD movies, video games, RPG books. That's it.

[Jason Cross]

I tell you, I'm pretty jaded and cynical, but it's hard for me to just chalk this up to a PR exercise. This is just plain NICE. WTG Bungie/MS.

[Malderi]

It works really well for costs, too. Of course, duplicating the software costs next to nothing, and Bungie's parent company is Microsoft and so can send over the consoles at cost. So it's not free for them to do so, but they're in a great position to do it and it's much cheaper than it would be for others.

Edit: I wonder what all would be included? Bungie is notoriously tight-lipped about single player campaign story. I have a feeling it'll just be multiplayer and possibly system-link, but even then they'll have to let out more weapons than they have so far. We only have two confirmed weapons, so either they're going to do this after a big announcement or lots of stuff will leak. (On the other hands, soldiers are used to OPSEC...)

Anyways, WTG Bungie/Microsoft. This is pretty damn awesome.

[Kadath]

That rocks. Good on Bungie.

[Uncle Larry]

It's bad enough that our forces are stretched thin and short-supplied, now they have to fucking beta test for Microsoft? To congress!

[John Sansker]

It's bad enough that our forces are stretched thin and short-supplied, now they have to fucking beta test for Microsoft? To congress!

Well, at least they don't have to pay to be beta testers for MS. ;)

[Demon G Sides]

It's bad enough that our forces are stretched thin and short-supplied, now they have to fucking beta test for Microsoft? To congress!

And its still fun, right?

Still, great PR. Imagine all the older brothers who write home to their little brothers and parents, and are like "I got to play Halo 3. Its amazing. Buy it for (Insert name here)."

Yeah, so there was only like 3 of those happening, but still... Spreads the wealth.

And I think the video said that it was only the Multiplayer Alpha that the many Journalists got to play.

[Kunikos]

"Hey, this almost makes up for the fact that I lost my lower torso in Fallujah!"

[olaf]

Yay bungie.

We got some dudes in my WoW guild that are Army infantry over in Iraq and they manage to get on and make raids every once in a while.