Frankie said in the last weekly update that they had started the Microsoft internal Beta and that it consisted of about 200 employees. I suppose this is the result.

How long until they scream that "This doe not represent the finished product! It's just a Beta!" I give it 20 minutes. They are going to scream that right up until launch day even though I don't believe the core of the game changes significantly after it's in the Beta stage.

May 16th, whether they actually mean to or not, will be the day that Bungie decides their own fate. If the beta is fundamentally broken, nothing they can do will be able to fix the damage that will result. It looks like they might have slightly sped up your movement, couldn't see the autoaim in effect very well from that, the shield thing looks like it could have some very interesting applications.

DJ

Looks like right bumper picks up and reloads weapons. I suppose left bumper will change the type of grenades and that the mic will be always on like GoW (vice pressing the white button/left bumper in H2).

You obviously have never met bamahalo. Let's hope he doesn't come around here to often.

Good find, though.

The inside of the base in the new Zanzibar looks like something straight out of the old Area 51 Arcade shooter. Watching the video, I half expected aliens to start coming out of the woodwork and get into their stationary firing positions. I was longing to grab a plastic gun, point it at the screen, and start shooting!

That map seemed a lot bigger than the original version. The power station seemed like it should a level by itself.

It looks like there is a new jumping animation. The MC's almost do a ninja-style flying kick while jumping.

I did a search on some of the gamertags in the video. Some are .NET developers at Microsoft.

It wouldn't be hard to track where this video came from. Bungie could just search for the games that had those 6-10 visible gamertags in the game. Then they could look at the stats and match them up to the kills that were happening in the game.

I bet this will be the first of several leaked videos.

Saw the HD version on Megaupload....I will have the HD version in both QT and WMV up for download later if anyone wants it...sweet vid.

List info gleaned from a frame by frame analysis from 360 Fanboy:

Matchmaking Menus
New veto system implemented.
Military ranks are used and the use of XP points help to determine a player's skill level.
Three types of matches: Ranked, Social and Custom.

General Multiplayer
Spiffy new spawn animation we call the "blue grid sweep".
Spawn with an Assault Rifle and two frag grenades
Map is called Last Resort and is a re-creation of Zanzibar, but on crack.
Every HUD notification (deaths, awards, weapon pickups) pops up very bubbly-like.
Air lifts are included in multiplayer.
Teammate's letter/code identifier expands when near, revealing their gamertag.

Weapon Information
Weapons featured: Assault Rifle, Battle Rifle, Plasma Pistol, SMG, Sniper Rifle, Shotgun, Spiker and Spartan Laser.
The Sniper Rifle's radar features a bright green picture in picture scope.
The Shotgun now holds 6 rounds instead of 8.

Equipment Information
Equipment items featured: Bubble Shield and Power Drainer
Equipment item listed under grenades on HUD.
First equipment item is picked up by walking over it, no button pressing needed.
Bubble Shield is a cone type device that doesn't move, can be entered by any person, but no weapon can penetrate it.

Vehicle Information
The Warthog, Ghost and Mongoose are shown. Both the Warthog and Mongoose are demoed.
Hold the "RB" to get into a vehicle.

http://gamingtv.org/home/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=172&Itemid=1

63mb Hi-Res QT, 75mb WMV. enjoy :-)

Trigger I can't even get to your site. Let alone download anything from it.

http://thepiratebay.org/tor/3671665

I used that instead.

It would be nice, however unlikely, if the finished product was much different. If Bungie actually released a graphically dumbed down beta, so that everyone would be hugely surprised and pleased when the real thing came out.

Man, it would have to be leaked by some yahoo who doesn't know how to demo stuff. I wanted to strangle that guy for not using some of the stuff he picked up.

Wait, Bama, was that you on the video? ...no wonder.

So it would seem, jayWHY. Thankfully I have contacted my host on AIM. He'll have it back up soon. Ill edit when its back.

EDIT-G2G.

Very good to go, downloading now. Hopefully I'll have some extra space on one of my drives so I can make a mini vid from H3 :).

DJ

trust me. i've got plenny of H3 beta videos. i could show you stuff that would blow you're mind. ive even got some halo wars videos to show. i would post them here but you probably wouldnt understand the awesome game. halowars is very complicated and youve got to be pretty smart just to play it.

using it on a 360 elite helps alot though.

maybe i will post them on myspace pages

Frankie in today's BWU:

We have to make sure that Halo 3 scales well to a large population, and that will help us improve and test our netcode, as well as try out one more feature that we’re including in the Beta. A feature that definitely requires a lot of stress testing in a big population. Conspiracy theorists can drop their 128-player game theories at the door. Halo 3 is still a 16-player game, and the reality is that most people prefer smaller games than that.

No, this feature we’re testing is for the moment, just a fun addition, that’s planned to grow into something pretty amazing by launch, and that feature is Saved Films. The version you’ll try in the Beta, is very, very, very limited. We just want you to play around with the general concept. You’ll be reading more about this in the gaming press in the next month or two, and of course you can try it out for yourselves in less than a month.
In the recent BWU, Frankie says this about the public beta test:

"As for the Public Beta itself, it’s pretty close to finished and a lot of folks have worked really hard to make it happen, with late nights, early mornings and a constant diet of Cheetos and evil. So to those brave men and women who sacrificed themselves on the Anvil of Bungie, under the Hammer of Crunch, we salute thee. Your smeared remains will be remembered.

Although the Public Beta may seem like a simple sampling of the MP levels from the finished game, extracting those and packaging them into a playable bundle, with off-schedule bug testing, gameplay tweaks, code fixing and netcode support, is a herculean task. Hopefully it will pay dividends and players will get tremendous enjoyment from these maps and game types.

Since we’re testing matchmaking, you won’t have the kind of control you’re used to with custom games, but we’ll be there to guide you into a very nice selection of Matchmade game types – and don’t worry, the playlists will almost certainly have your gametype in there, in some shape or form. "