Much like Batman: Arkham Asylum, Halo 3: ODST seems to have just been released not too long ago this year, but both games have follow-ups on the way. In Halo‘s case, however, we’ve known that the Bungie team was making a new game called Halo: Reach, and we had even seen a very tiny super-teaser trailer. At last night’s VGAs on Spike, a brand new teaser trailer for Halo: Reach was unveiled, and it gives us a nice little cinematic peek at the game and what we can expect.

Where Halo 3: ODST was a prequel to Halo 3 and was the first game where you did not play as the SPARTAN II soldier known as Master Chief, Halo: Reach is a prequel to the entire series, presumably based on the novel Halo: The Fall of Reach. The game will take place during the war between the Covenant and the Humans during the Battle of Reach. We will be playing as Lieutenant Noble Six, a member of Noble Team, which consists of SIX of the Master Chief-like SPARTAN II super-soldiers.

No word on if Master Chief himself will appear in this, the last Halo game that Bungie will make, but we will find out when the game is released in the Fall of 2010, or when it “Falls 2010,” as they like to put it.

Click over to watch the trailer for Halo: Reach!

One of the most exciting things to receive as a gift on Christmas is video games. For me personally, nothing beats the morning I was given the Sega Genesis system I never thought I would possibly get, and playing Sonic’s elusive blue hide right into the ground. And even though that childlike joy will never be experienced again for me, and video game systems are a whole lot different and more expensive these days, it’s still exciting to open up a new video game you haven’t played yet.

To try and help some of you create this joy for your video game playing loved ones, we wanted to create a list of 2009’s best and most-desired game titles. These are the games that most people are going to want if they don’t have them yet, and these are the games that have made the most impact. Obviously you’ll want to make sure they don’t have specific titles in mind, but for the most part, this is where to start reading up on and shopping for video game gift ideas.

Click on over to the other side to check out our very own Holiday Gift Guide: Video Game Edition ’09 for selections to play on Nintendo Wii, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 game consoles, as well as on your PC.

And don’t procrastinate! No one enjoys last second shopping or the hell that is your local mall a few days before Christmas!

Last month, we learned that Steven Spielberg himself was in negotiations to pick up the dead Halo movie project and develop it himself (Read: A Beacon Of Hope Emerges For The D.O.A. “˜Halo’ Movie & Its Name Is Steven Spielberg). Whether this means the movie will ever finally be made or not remains to be seen, but it is exciting for those who are dying to see this happen. We first got a glimpse of what a movie version of the mega-hit game would look like when District 9 director Neil Blomkamp filmed his own live-action version as a promo for Halo 3, but unfortunately, a huge estimated movie budget killed that project off. Now, fittingly, for the release of the spinoff game Halo ODST, a new director in Rupert Sanders has made yet another live-action promo, and it looks pretty fantastic.

Blomkamp proved that a budget was really no issue if you spend your money wisely — he made District 9 look like it cost $115 Million when in fact it only ran $30 Million. Before Spielberg got involved, Blomkamp said that if the Halo movie did indeed come back to his table he would probably turn it down, so the question became “Who else could do it?” This is a question that apparently Rupert Sanders thinks he has the answer to.

Click on over to see both Blomkamp and Sanders’ live-action Halo shorts, and choose who you would rather helm the movie if it ever happens.

To briefly recap on the story so far as we know it: Neil Blomkamp — director of the upcoming District 9 — was the first to attempt bringing Halo to the big screen. He even went so far as filming a live-action short video for Halo 3 promotion, and to show what the popular video game world could look like in live-action without any budget at all. The videos were great and the project was eventually put in motion with Peter Jackson acting as producer, but sadly, it became apparent that the budget would be way too large, and the Halo movie was put down Old Yeller style.

It really didn’t look like this movie was ever going to get made, but we all may have assumed a bit too soon. IESB is reporting that Steven Spielberg himself may be the man to pull this project from the cold grasp of cinematic death and breathe that sweet, sweet life back into it. The news was confirmed multiple times that Spielberg is currently in “active negotiations” to develop the Halo movie himself.

Click on over to see the live-action videos that were made to initially pitch the idea for a movie.

It has been a few days now since the E3 video game and electronics convention just came and went, leaving many exciting previews and announcements in its wake, but we here at Geeks of Doom wanted to put together a basic wrap-up for those of you who missed it all and do not yet know of all of the treasures that came of it. The big dogs in Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo all had exciting conventions, with Sony and Microsoft making some magnificent announcements. Included in this mass of geek-tastic announcements: A look at Microsoft’s motion-capture attempt with Project Natal, Sony’s motion-capture prototype, and games like Mass Effect 2, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Halo: ODST, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, God of War III, and others.

In celebration of the convention and all of the great things that came out of it, we’ve decided to put together this little recap of the biggest and brightest things that we saw. We will do our very best to offer information on the products, as well as the mind-blowing videos that were shown! To start, we’ll go over the three main outlets and what they presented to us. After that, we’ll take a look at all of the games and videos that were also presented by the various publishers.

Click on over for some great videos of the future of gaming via motion sensors, as well as a collection of wonderful trailers and videos to watch!