Rocky origin

Launched on April 22nd 2004, the site was originally created to describe the amazing rockslide megabattle in Halo's second level. At this time I'd been playing the battle for many months after first stumbling into it. I couldn't find anything about it on tips pages, yet to me it looked like being easily the most important 'extra' for any trigger-happy Halo fan to know about. The combat was so much more intense than normal Halo fare, and the terrain offered so many possibilities. So I did a lot of writing and launched the site.

When I advertised it in the HBO forum (which was new to me then), it turned out that some people had bumped into the megabattle before, which didn't really surprise me since all you have to do is leave when the dropships start arriving, and come back later. However, I don't think it had been written about very much or was known very widely, so I think the site did its intended job of helping to spread the word. The site also included the beginnings of what are now the Halo 1 fun section and Combat tips section.

Later megabattles

By now we actually have four megabattles to play with in Halo. Here's how things unfolded in regard to the other three.

I posted my first account of the spiral path megabattle in September 2004, and as with the rockslide megabattle, it turned out that at least a few other people had bumped into it beforehand. Actually I'd already stumbled into it myself when the site launched, but I was too busy revelling in the rockslide and didn't fully realize the potential for a while. In fact it's very much on a par with the rockslide megabattle in being something every Halo fan ought to know about, bearing in mind how easy it is to arrange.

The dustbowl megabattle arrived in May 2006, and as far as I'm aware, this one was completely new to the Halo community. It certainly came as a big surprise to me to find a megabattle lurking in level 3 of all places. It was just bizarre to suddenly see so many enemies together there! I can still remember laughing at those first hilarious Grunt swarms. It wasn't quite as good for serious battling (tricky environment to survive in, plus there's no Marine support to enjoy), but it was still a lot of fun.

Finally there was the twin bridges megabattle in November 2006; the biggest ding-dong of all. It was actually something I'd had a hint of in January 2006, but it was a while before I finally put the work into exploring it fully and realizing just how good it was. I never expected the rockslide and spiral path megabattles to be rivalled, but this new rumble seemed to take hectic combat to an even higher level. Battling alongside a large squad of Marines here was a revelation. As far as I'm concerned, this last megabattle plus the first two provide easily the best combat situations in the whole game.

More and more fun

The Halo 1 fun section and growing Halo 3 fun section are pretty much the core of the site, devoted to squeezing additional fun out of campaign play, particularly in regard to obtaining novel combat situations, be they serious or mischievous. The majority of this stems from my own explorations, but there are also quite a few items based on things I've read about or that people have suggested by email, which I try to make clear as appropriate.

I've tended not to look at tips pages much, just so I can enjoy discovering and exploring possibilities for myself. That can often mean I'm lagging behind on some of the things the tricks brigade get up to, but never mind, I'm in no great rush.

Actually though, 'tricks' have never been a strong interest with me, except in their potential for opening the door to new combat situations or mischief. For example, when I eventually found that I could descend into the main facility abyss in The Silent Cartographer, something the tricks folk had done long before, the best thing about that was in realizing how it enabled you to launch a novel prong attack on the enemy, giving lots of new fun; much more so than the descent itself, which is hardly something you'll be interested in doing again and again. Another well known trick - this time one I'd read about early on in a magazine - is getting up on top of the island. Sure you can just admire the view, but the main thing is that there's a whole lot of fun you can have once you're up!

Say hello to Suzie

The whimsical Frontline with Suzie series kicked off soon after Bad Cyborg launched, the first broadcast going out on May 9th 2004. The name 'Suzie Hoffenblatt' was actually taken from the Soapbox page I'd written earlier. I suppose I was thinking that she'd done a nice enough job of interviewing me there, so we'd pack her off to get busy on Halo. I'm a bit peeved that she still hasn't sent me a postcard though.

I had several broadcasts written at that point, but the first one posted was actually the first I worked on. Followers of the series might notice that it's a bit different from later episodes. A central theme of the series has been for Suzie to be in places we've all been ourselves as MC, and often to talk with specific enemies or allies we encounter. It makes things more engaging to have Suzie woven into the campaign like that. But I only fixed on that idea after writing most of that first broadcast, in which she was simply aboard an unspecified 'enemy ship'.

After broadcast 10 there was a gap until October 2004 when we heard about Suzie's grunty encounter on the Silent Cartographer island, in Danger! Falling Grunts. That broadcast was inspired after experiencing the Grunts' amusing tendency to fall off the hill as they rush over to attack you. Suzie returned in Feburary 2006 with another five broadcasts, and a year later with four more, making a round 20 to be going on with. Maybe we'll get more in due course, but she does have to send them halfway across the galaxy, so you can never be too sure when they might turn up.

Some of the entries in the Halo in a nutshell page (October 2004) were influenced by bits in earlier Frontline broadcasts. After all, both are concerned with poking fun at things in the game. In turn, some of the nutshell entries (such as the one about Captain Keyes following a brief career as Flood goo) influenced or inspired later broadcasts.

Everybody welcome

Here at Bad Cyborg we're into inclusivity, with a friendly "fun for all" sort of atmosphere. You can be playing on Legendary, you can be playing on Easy - we're all just here enjoying Bungie's masterpiece (oh, and Halo 3). I myself arrived quite late on the Halo scene, not getting my Xbox until about a year after launch. Halo was actually my first FPS and I can remember having trouble on Easy! So I know just what it's like to be a newcomer to the scene.

Sorry, no images

Occasionally when I post new material about some novel bit of Halo fun, people ask if I can post screenshots or something. However, I currently don't have the technology to get images from my TV onto my Mac, and I'm not on Xbox Live either, so for now the site remains word-based. That said, I do have ambitions of including imagery and movies some day. I've often wanted to be able to show stuff such as megabattle footage and other novel action, partly as a way of encouraging folk to set it up for themselves, and partly just for the entertainment value. But in the meanwhile you'll just have to make do with the 380000+ words I'm afraid. Sorry!

And no Halo 2 fun either

Unfortunately I didn't get along at all well with Halo 2, as you may have gathered from my Halo 2 disappointment article. So aside from that article, the site is purely about the original Halo and now also Halo 3.

I can't tell you how much I was looking forward to Halo 2; yet I ended up trading my copy back to the shop within a month or so. The only thing I missed at all was the visceral feel of the battle rifle - until I remembered how quickly it ran out of ammo! A big part of why I decided to finally part with the disc was that the altered aliens were spoiling my image of the Covenant too much, particularly those Elites talking hammy English. It just destroys the menace of the original guys. As for those Jackals, they were awful too; character completely lost! Meanwhile the Grunt voices were different and the little guys were nowhere near as hilarious as the originals. And then there were all the other changes of course, including the ruination of the previously glorious needler (all hail, mighty dispenser of stingy pink death). No, I couldn't take it and it had to go!

Of course, you may have quite different opinions, and if so, good luck to you. Don't bother emailing to point out the error of my ways; you have your preferences, I have mine, let's leave it at that. Save your aggro for the covies. Actually, along with people suggesting I was crazy (the logic apparently being that they like Halo 2 and therefore so should I), plenty of people emailed to agree with much of what I said, and were really pleased to see someone saying it. So I'm far from being the only one unhappy about it.

HBO: Where bananas can kill you

I advertise most of my site updates in the HBO forum (see here for links to some of my posts if you're interested), and very handy it is too. If you don't already know the site, go visit. There's a ton of stuff there, and the front page carries snippets of Halo news daily - sometimes giving my site updates a mention! The front page carries an amusing byline that varies and which often gives me a chuckle right away. It's a nice idea. I think my favourite is still "HBO: Where bananas can kill you".

What next?

As for the future, there's still more gameplay fun to come at Bad Cyborg. For the moment I'm concentrating on Halo 3 but I've actually still got quite a backlog of Halo 1 fun to post sometime; and who knows, there may yet be more to discover in Bungie's classic. You can also expect more from Suzie. I've got some ideas for other stuff too, and some ambitions concerning movies and images as mentioned earlier, but it depends on how much time and energy I can muster. Keeping that rockslide clear of Covenant scum really takes it out of me…