I avoided Matchmaking in Halo 2 like the plague.  I played a lot of Rumble Pit early on when I first got Xbox Live, and I’m sure that certainly helped me develop a lot of the necessary skills to be a somewhat competitive player.  My favorite type of match to play, however, were custom games with friends.  There were two reasons for this.

The first was that Matchmaking was rife with Timmies.  For the uninitiated, a Timmy is a play – usually a child or adolescent – who, regardless of skill at the game, mouth of with words that would make a sailor blush, verbally abuse anyone and everyone around them, declare themselves video game gods when they are playing well and accusing everyone else of cheating when they don’t, and spend a large portion of their time teabagging the virtual corpses of their opponents – whether they were actually the one who defeated them in battle or not.  The Timmies still exist in Halo 3 Matchmaking, of course.  It’s just a lot easier to put the mute on them and to stick bullets into them.

The second was that I was never quite able to match up competitively with most of my opponents.  In all my games of Rumble Pit, I can count on one hand the number of games I actually won.  When playing with my fellow Gunslingers, I always felt like the dead-weight who was more of an impediment than a help.  In Halo 3, I’m very competitive, having achieved skill levels so far in the 18-19 range, where I never consistently made more than a 12 or 13 in Halo 2.  I’m enjoying Halo 3 much more than Halo 2 – and for those who know me, they know how much I raved about Halo 2.  The games seem much more balanced now, and I feel like I still have room to go up in skill points.

The game itself is visually and audibly stunning, taking advantage of the full processing power of the Xbox 360 to provide a cornucopia of delights.  Forge is a beast, allowing you to customize maps to your heart’s content, and Saved Films, Screenshots, and File Share are revolutionary pleasures.  I’ve joked in the past that Halo 3 is probably the most expensive video game to date, since many of us acquired an Xbox 360 for the sole purpose of playing this game.  It’s no joke now, though.  Halo 3 is worth every penny, and I look forward to many more hours of enjoying this game with my friends and the Halo community.

DeeJ and L Askan tag-team to bring us more drool-worthy bits from the upcoming Halo 3.  It’s almost a sensory overload with all the promotions and advertisements and previews out there right now with this game.  Mountain Dew is even in on the action with their Limited Edition Game Fuel drink with Halo 3 labeling. 

Like DeeJ, I am, for the most part, in a self-imposed Halo 3 blackout until the 25th.  I know enough about what’s going to be in the game to be positively hungry for this game – Spartan laser, flamethrower, two or three new types of grenades, special items, gorgeous maps, beautiful gameplay, online co-op, Forge, Saved Films, and so much more.  I’ve little desire to find out much more, though, for fear of ruining the story, but I know I can’t wait to play.

Bungie has done something with the Halo franchise that I love to see in video games – they’ve built a beautiful and fun video game that also has a solid and intriguing storyline.  We have characters that we actually care about in the forum of Master Chief, Cortana, and even Sergeant Johnson.  Halo 2 ended in a cliffhanger that had gamers all around the world throwing their controllers across the room in frustration (but not me – I loved it), and Halo 3 promises to wrap up the current story arc and answer all (or at least most) of our lingering questions.  As I’ve said before, I can’t wait. 

But like I said, it’s actually pretty hard now to avoid all the information coming out everywhere about Halo 3 – pirated scans from magazines, Bungie-released previews, IMAX-powered gameplay previews, and more.  Heck, there’s even a new Halo 3 Xbox 360 and a Halo 3 wireless headset that will available before too long.  A number of websites are also giving away various Xbox 360 and Halo 3 packages as part of the gear-up for Halo 3’s release.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen a marketing campaign this ambitious – but it sure is a heckuvalot of fun to watch.

Sorry, I think my geek is showing again.  Carry on.