Whenever I look to pre-order a game, I look to the place with the most freebies. I’m going to spend the money anyway, right? So why not pick up something extra?

For those of you looking to do the same with Halo 3: ODST, you might want to consider Amazon. They’re putting $10 back into your Amazon account on September 22nd, the day the game ships out. They’re offering the same deal on the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Prestige Edition. You know, the package with the night vision goggles?

Consider yourself a true Halo fan? Spend the $10 on books 1-3 of the Halo series, including The Fall of Reach, and get ready for the next franchise installment early.

Now that Bungie is officially done with Halo, they’re looking for publishers for their new IP and are apparently very close to signing someone. Who that is has yet to be seen, but it sounds like Bethesda might be looking for the job.

Ashley Cheng, a producer for Bethesda, said on his blog that his company was one of few positioned to “snag” Bungie’s new project.

You can count on one hand the number of publisher’s[sic] around who can afford to publish Bungie’s next game: EA (via EA Partners), Activision, Ubisoft, Microsoft, and of course, Bethesda. I can only imagine how much it will cost to snag their next title.

Cheng also mentions Sony but calls the prospect “unlikely.” Whoever the publisher, the game won’t be restricted to any platform, unlike the company’s most recent efforts. That will probably be a great thing for Bungie, and going with Sony might only hurt the increased revenue they would see from a multi-platform release.

Will we have a Fallout 4/Halo 6 mashup?

Microsoft’s initial announcement of Halo Waypoint was short on details and long on promises about integrating with your “Halo lifestyle.” I don’t even know what a “Halo lifestyle” means, but I can think of a few years of my life in which I tried to find out. Former Bungie man Frank O’Connor stopped by Comic-Con to release a few details on the upcoming Waypoint.

According to Frankie, Halo Waypoint is about more than just games and videos. It’s a place for fans to get together and enjoy content. “We’re going to aggregate everything that you would want to watch from the halo universe on that site,” he said. “But it’s a lot more ambitious than that. It’s going to evolve in features and functionality to make it the prime destination for the Halo fan.”

Well thanks, Frank. That really clears things up. He goes on to say that you’ll be able to view things like old E3 trailers and potentially access new multiplayer features. To be Frank frank, Frank wasn’t very forthcoming. In fact, no one’s clear whether Silver members will have access to Waypoint in its entirety or if there will be features exclusive to Gold members.

The one thing O’Connor did actually give details for was the premier of the Halo Legends anime episodes. The episodes will be available on a “staggered schedule” over Waypoint. It won’t be quite like a television broadcast, but there will be time constraints between the initial viewing and a Blu-Ray/digital distro release.

It’s no secret that Bungie has been working on new IP for some time. According to the now independent developer, Halo: Reach will be the last Halo game, from Bungie anyway.

In a recent interview, Senior Designer Lars Bakken had this to say:

In terms of a platform for Halo games made by Bungie, yes. I can’t answer that question for Microsoft though. Whether they have something in the works or not, I don’t know if they’re actually ready to talk about it yet, but in terms of Bungie-produced Halo games, ODST and then Reach is probably all you’re going to get.

That’s it folks. No more Halo from Bungie. That doesn’t count out Microsoft’s new 343 division, which is said to be handling everything remotely related to the Halo franchise.