So, at about 3pm on Sunday, July 12, 2009, roughly 16-18 people gathered, via XBOX Live for some Halo 3 fragging action. The event was hosted by reps from Inside the Circle (myself and Neville) and members of the 360 Junkies community. I have to say that the event far exceeded what I was expecting. Not only did we manage to run games with a full 16 person roster but we also managed to play several games using color-coded groups and talk large amounts of smack over the headsets.

And I think I convinced someone to try Zune in the process. Score!

For those that don't have any earthly idea what I'm talking about, Inside the Circle has launched a new series (that, for now, will be monthly) called Club Social. These will be cross-community events designed for people to meet, greet, talk smack and have fun. For the inaugural event it was 360 Junkies and Halo 3.

I'll admit going into this, I didn't practice much on Halo 3. I did some of the single-player campaign just so I could get used to the controls. It also helped that I had once owned Unreal Tournament, so engaging in a free-for-all frag fest was nothing new to me. What was new to me was playing such a setup within the Halo universe.

The one thing I didn't like was that in certain game modes, you had to hit a button on your controller in order to speak to everyone. I kind of like it (ala Gears 2) where you can just talk in open communication with everyone. Having to hit a button to talk kind of took away from the flow you'll be in when you're going around smacking people in the back of the head (oh, I'm sorry I mean when people are going around smacking ME in the back of the head -- thanks Seeson!)

One of my favorite modes coming out of the event was playing with missile launchers. I never thought that having 10 people run around with a missile launcher firing it at each other could be such a literal and figurative blast. Some of my coolest kills was when I was able to fire at someone from a distance and land on target sending their carcas flying across the screen somewhere. It made for good times -- but don't try that in real life, kids. This is a public service announcement from Tromboneforhire.

So what about Zune? Well towards the end of the event one of the participants began asking me about Zune. He was considering switching to the player and, upon finding out that I was a Zune MVP decided to ask me about it and why it's worth checking out. I told him what I tell all of my friends when they are considering Zune: First download the software (it's free, no-cost risk to you), from there try the 14-day Zune Pass subscription and then if all of that is working to your satisfaction get a device to take that music on the go with you. I never have people start device first because that's a financial investment only to possibly find out it's not what they're looking for. The software + 14-day trial of Zune Pass is all free to help folks get used to the Zune style of things. He tells me that he plans on checking it out. Party on, good sir!

Overall, I'm quite happy with the initial Club Social event. I got to meet some new and awesome people, reconnect with some folks I've met at E3 and it gave me the confidence to continue this series. To the 360 Junkies, I want to extend a hearty thanks for helping me pull this together and making it as fun as it was. Your contributions are greatly appreciated and we'll definitely schedule another event between us in the future.

As a sidenote, the 360 Junkies also host their own community events. One is called Recess, which involves folks getting together on an XBOX Live Arcade title and the other is Slaughterday (I love that name!) which involves taking a portion of your Saturday to mame and destroy someone. So go to their site and check those out.

Oh, and Neville -- headset...gotta have one! :-)

Look for another Club Social event coming soon.