Tag: xbox

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News Video Games

Microsoft launching a Halo Monument for its Combat Evolved remake [UPDATED]

Halo Living Monument website

In mid-October I wrote about Microsoft registering the domain names HaloLivingMonument.com and HaloLivingMonument.net.

I suggested that Microsoft might be launching a website having to do with Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, which is set to be released on November 15th for the Xbox 360.

Well, today Microsoft temporarily put a website together (pictured above) on the web address halolivingmonument.com for Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, but it’s currently not operational. 

None of the links are active and the Windows Live sign in in the top right is disabled. 

I took a screen shot before the site was taken down by Microsoft, which occurred while I was writing this post.

It appears the website is part of the online marketing campaign for Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary as I suspected, similar to the Remember Reach website it released for Halo: Reach.  Remember Reach had visitors create a “living monument” of lights to honor Noble team members.

While details are limited, according to the source code pictured below, it appears visitors will enter their birth date when entering the site in order to view the multimedia.  The same way it works for Remember Reach.  . 

HaloLivingMonument.com source code

Apparently, Microsoft has been working on the site at halomonument.cloudapp.net (which I also noticed in the source code), but neither halolivingmonument.com nor halomonument.cloudapp.net resolve to a web page. 

The look-and-feel of the site is much like the product page for the game and has the exact same background.

With the game’s release only 2 weeks away, one would imagine the site will be back online within days, if not sooner.

[Update 1, Nov. 2, 5:00am EST:  Halolivingmonument.com has been officially confirmed.  A commenter on the Joystiq article who goes by MrGreenCastle points to The Halo Fan of The Decade Contest, where one winner will receive a chance to be immortalized.  All entrants will have their photos uploaded to the interactive Halo living monument beginning on November 13.] 

[Update 2, Nov. 3:  Microsoft has now posted a teaser page on HaloLivingMonument.com that displays nothing more than the launch date of 11-13-11, as shown in the picture below.]

Halo Living Monument teaser page

[Update 3, Nov. 13:  HaloLivingMonument.com has gone live.]

Discussion: Joystiq

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News Trademarks Video Games

Microsoft files trademark for Iron Brigade combat video game

Iron Brigade

Microsoft has filed a trademark for a video game called Iron Brigade, according to the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Not much is known yet about which military unit the game refers to, but as states across the country commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, it’s possible the title is a reference to the “Iron Brigade”, an Union Army infantry brigade which suffered the highest percentage of casualties of any brigade during the Civil War. 

Other possibilities include present day U.S. military units such as the 2nd Brigade of the U.S. Army’s 1st Armored Division, but with the timing of the filing, it seems more likely the game will be centered around the American Civil War.

The trademark filing  (Serial Number: 85381616) occurred on July 26, 2011 and says nothing more than for use as computer game software.

A filing back in June for Bloodforge, turned out to be a combat action title set in ancient Celtic world for its online game hub Xbox Live Arcade.

I will update this post as I get more information.

Discussion: Joystiq

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News Video Games

Halo4.com story sparks lively discussion about domains, squatting at video game news sites

XBOX Halo 4

My Wednesday night story on Microsoft acquiring the domain name Halo4.com from Scott O’Reilly sparked discussion about domains across a number of video-game news sites and blogs.

Kotaku, part of Gawker Media’s “Gawker” network of sites, was the first to publish this story with proper credit to this blog.

After the story went online at Kotaku under “The Annals of Cybersquatting”, almost 24 hours later and thousands of page views here, more video-game news sites and blogs from around the globe wrote about the acquisition including MeriStation, 3D Juegos, Gamers.fr and more.

Discussion among readers got lively.

Here, I selected some of the best comments.

The Owner of halo4.com Probably Made a Lot of Money, but He Isn’t Saying [Kotaku]

Vondruke:  Things like this shouldn’t be allowed and I wonder why it is. I mean if you own the IP you should be able to own the URL.

Kimochi Sama: you’re just jealous because you couldn’t snap the domain first to sell it for sizable cash

Microsoft obtains Halo 4 domain via secret dealings [ComputerAndVideogames.com]

Nitramuse:  Probably rubbing his hands watching his bank account increase. If MS was herassing him, he’d say it…I’m sure.  And now, he receives a s**tload of money, under the condition to “not talk about it, or we want our money back and we’ll keep the domain name. Sign here, please”.

StonecoldMC: *lightbulb moment*  Goes off to register the domain of halo5.com

Microsoft Obtains “Halo4.com” Domain from Man in the US [VGChartz]

scat398: it’s actually against the law to squat on domain names now…so more than likely his rights to the name were taken…with little or no money changing hands.

KylieDog:  In other news, a side character going by the name of “O’Reilly” was just revealed in Halo 4.

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News Video Games

Microsoft Corporation acquires the domain name Halo4.com, price unknown

HALO 4

Just a little more than a week ago, in a post on this blog I asked the question whether Microsoft would broker a deal for the domain name Halo4.com, after Microsoft had revealed Halo 4 at E3 without owning the domain. 

You read it here first:  The company now owns and re-directs the domain to its official Halo 4 site on Xbox.com.

The domain literally just changed hands today.  Yesterday, it was still registered to Scott O’Reilly (the seller), who I’ve contacted for comment and will update this post if I hear back.

Though the company doesn’t own Halo.com or Halo1.com, it owns Halo2.com, Halo3.com, and now Halo4.com. 

As of today, here are the WHOIS records for Halo4.com.

Domain name: halo4.com

Administrative Contact:
   Microsoft Corporation
   Domain Admin ()
      Fax: +1.11
   One Microsoft Way
   Redmond, WA 98052
   US

Name Servers:
   ns1.msft.net
   ns2.msft.net
   ns3.msft.net
   ns4.msft.net
   ns5.msft.net

Yesterday, the WHOIS records still pointed to Scott O’Reilly. 

Domain name: halo4.com (as of June 14, 2011)

Registrant Contact:
   –
   Scott O’Reilly ()
   
   Rochester, MN 55901
   US

It’s hard to fully understand Microsoft’s strategy of announcing game titles, then purchasing the domain names after the fact.  

One can only imagine what the effect is on the price.

[UPDATE:  Wednesday, June 15, 2011 08:15 PM EST:  I just received a reply from Scott O’Reilly, the previous owner of the domain.  When I asked about the selling price/negotiations with Microsoft, all Scott could tell me is that the only term of the agreement that he can disclose is that he can’t disclose any terms of the agreement.  So, there you have it.]

Discussion: ComputerandVideogames.com, VGChartz, and Kotaku

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News Video Games

Nearly a month after acquiring domain name, Microsoft starts redirecting Kinect.com to Xbox web page

Xbox Kinect

Earlier this month, I was the first to report that Microsoft acquired the domain name Kinect.com for its controller-free add-on for the Xbox. 

However, if you typed the URL, kinect.com, into your browser’s address bar in the past 30 or so days, you were taken to Bing’s search engine results page for the keyword “Kinect.”.  The exact URL: http://www.bing.com/search?q=kinect&form=MSSRPD

Today, Microsoft released its second-quarter results which were helped by the success of its Kinect game device. 

“Sales at the company’s entertainment-and-devices division jumped 55% on the success of the company’s Kinect motion-based controller, which were a hit during the holiday season and boosted sales of Xbox 360 consoles. Operating profit for the division has surpassed $1 billion so far this fiscal year.”, writes The Wall Street Journal.

Though the change looks to have taken place in the past week, redirecting the domain name Kinect.com from Bing’s search engine results to the Xbox Kinect page appears to coincide with the release of the company’s second quarter results.