XBox Halo 3 beta: three ways not to play!

Microsoft wanted to give XBox owners what they craved most — a sneak preview of Halo 3. But the first day of the game’s 21-day beta release was plagued with access problems.

Wednesday Microsoft emailed thousands of access codes to winners of a sweepstakes contest called “Three Ways to Play.” But yesterday there was an announcement on the game developer’s site. “[A]pparently not everyone has received that mail!” So yesterday at 3:00, Microsoft sent a second email to those same lucky thousands — re-sending the access code. And this time they used tricks to bypass spam filters, adding extra characters to the “from” address and sending the emails in small batches.

The special 21-day preview was also supposed to be available to gamers who purchased Crackdown. But according to the CBC, a glitch Wednesday left those menus grey — even after players had downloaded the necessary game updates. The Canadian newspaper noted that Microsoft sold 900,000 copies of Crackdown partly with its promise of access to the 21-day preview of Halo 3.

To make it up to users, Microsoft extended the preview an extra four days, through June 10. “We apologize for the delay and hardships this issue has caused,” reads an yet-another announcement on the developer’s web site, “and hope that it quickly becomes a distant memory clouded by good times playing Halo 3 with your friends.”

Microsoft has also implemented a ban on any modified XBox 360 consoles accessing their XBox Live service. Thursday a post on Microsoft’s Gamerscore blog linked the move at least partly to Halo 3. A post by “BIGVIP” announced Microsoft has “a no tolerance policy towards inappropriate behaviour like hacking or cheating,” then added that “this topic is more important than ever given the recent release of the Halo 3 beta”.

But if you made it past all that, here’s what you’d see. The Halo 3 beta preview grants matchmaking access to three maps — called Valhalla, High Ground and Snowbound. There’s a new grenade and a new weapon class, plus “secret features” hidden somewhere in the beta.

All the attention to glitches proves that fans are hungry for Halo action. They’re probably also hoping that by September 25 — the official release date for Halo 3 — Microsoft has worked out all the glitches!

• Who’s ready to play Uncharted 2 beta? (PS3)
• Final Fantasy XIV: Free-to-Play and beta announcement on PS3
• Halo 3 fans play early build,get banned for 7,992 years
• Halo 2 takes advantage of Tray and Play on Vista
• Sony talks PS3 Home – coming by year-end, but still in beta