Beta Beta Beta: Worse than a sorority and less exclusive.

As you may or may not know the Halo 3: Reach beta came out today. That means that over 3 million boys aged 12 – 40+ either stayed home from school or work, or rushed right home and downloaded the beta for the final installment of the Halo series. It was quite amusing to see so many grown men giddy with excitement over this game, that’s not even really out yet. It’s just a beta, that means that there are limited things you can do, there are lots of bugs in it, and it is not actually finished yet, but still all these guys went wild over it! What’s kind of interesting to see is that the game companies, Bungie partnered with Microsoft, actually advertised the beta. That never happens. Sure a game company will release a beta or a demo or a preview and some people get excited and tell their friends and the company makes money off of it, but not like this. One of T’s friends actually worked really hard all of last week to scam his way into getting an early invite code so he could get a chance to play the beta ahead of almost everyone else. He wanted to get the pre-release of the pre-release. That’s like, crazy right? What’s worse is that LOTS OF GUYS WERE LIKE THIS. I mean, they were like 12 year old girls at a Jonas Brother’s concert getting white goo shot at them from cannons and loving every second of it. Or middle aged women waiting in line at a Twilight premiere for a glimpse of their beloved Edward (I will save my Twilight hatred for another post…or 12…I really hate that series…it’s just so…and the books…and the merch…I mean, HAVE YOU SEEN ETSY?!?!...save it Katie, save it…k I’m good now).

My point is that there was a lot of hysteria over a game that’s not actually released today, and it is mostly so that they can sell more games because people love the game before it’s finished. I bet Microsoft wishes people were this excited for their Office 2010 beta that’s been available for a month or so now…yeah I bet there are some very excited accountants. Wooooo excel spreadsheets! Graphs! Yeah…I’m a Mac. I’m waiting for the new iMacs to be released with the new i7 chips…sorry I was geeking out. I went to my happy place after being all upset by Twilight. I’m good now. Where was I? Oh yeah the Beta…

Of course, I’m not going to lie, I do like halo. I like to kill dudes I know and dudes I don’t know. I like to hear little 12 year old boys whine about getting blown up by a sticky grenade or seeing guys get gunned down by a pink player. I only started playing a few weeks ago, but I am pretty good for a beginner and I kick ass at Grifball. I love me some hammer action! Right now all the beta has is the multiplayer function of the game but it showcases some really nice and fun improvements. The controls are different for one thing – a lot of the buttons do different things, which I think totally blows because I just figured out that B punches dudes in the face. B for beat down. How am I going to remember that it is now punching is with the right bumper? Right Bumper is for…yeah I will have to think about that one. Also, now you can pick a super power at the beginning of the match and each time you die. You can have a jet pack (!) or be invisible, or run really fast or be invincible for 5 seconds. Each thing has a downside but the upsides are wicked sweet. Oh, and the weapons are way better now. All the dumb ones are replaced with useful things and the good ones have been beefed up. I will have to say more when I actually get to play because T has been hogging the TV since he got home from work. And the RHONJ is premiering their second table-flipping season tonight! Thank goodness for On Demand.