Halo 3 Video Game Hits The Ground Running

Unless you have been on a desert island for a while you have probably heard that Microsoft has a video game called Halo 3 that was recently released. It has been all over the news lately as journalists, gamers and the entire video game industry are raving about it in a high profile manner. Some are even calling it the biggest event in entertainment history.

Even if you have no interest at all in video games, chances are you have heard about this one. just about every television news show and news oriented website on the Internet has run some kind of story recently about the September 25, 2007 release of Halo 3, which makes it kind of hard to not know anything about this new video game.

The Halo video game franchise is a very successful one and it has a rather significant following behind it. Serious video game enthusiasts consider it to be the best first person shooter game of all time. The fans of this game are members of what is called the Halo Nation and they are as devoted as any Trekkies or Star Wars fans. Many of them waited in long lines outside retail stores that sell video games in hopes of being the first one in their inner circle of gamer friends to buy and play Halo 3.

Some retail stores like the best Buy store in New York city and EB Games in Los Angeles held special events at the stroke of midnight on September 25 to sell Halo 3 to eager customers who literally did not want to wait any longer than they had to in order to get their hands on this popular video game. with eager fans like these beating down the doors of their local stores to purchase Halo 3, Microsoft reportedly made 150 million dollars in the first 2 days of sales.

Bungie Studios, which is a division of Microsoft released the first of the Halo video games, Combat Evolved in 2001 and the franchise has been a hit ever since. Numerous other products have been created around this video game including a few more video games, a variety of action figures and five novels. It has become quite a cultural phenomenon in the world of entertainment.

Halo 2 was released on November 9, 2004 and by February, 2005 more than 9 million video games had been sold. Halo 2 shattered records for sales of video games up to that time. Halo 3 is expected to break those records relatively quickly.

Microsoft is expected to make about 560 million dollars from the sales of Halo 3 video games with a 90 percent profit margin. They will also sell millions of Halo 3 versions of their Xbox 360 video game consoles that are already on the market. Millions of dollars will also be made from online live video game versions and there will be a lot of money made from action figures and other trinkets.

The Halo series is based around a futuristic setting in which humans battle aliens across the galaxies with sophisticated weaponry. The main character is named Master Chief Petty Officer SPARTAN-117 and the name Halo refers to a large, round structure. Master Chief is clad in futuristic body armor and he is armed to the teeth with technology and weapons. He is fully equipped to do battle with aliens.

Microsoft has spent about 55 million dollars so far on Halo 3. About 25 million of that was spent on development. A dream team of computer programmers and artists numbering in the hundreds was assembled for the making of this project. They worked full time for over 3 years to create what some are calling a truly amazing interactive video game experience. The top level employees of this team are expected to be paid 20 million more in bonuses. The rest of the budget is being spent on marketing and promoting this highly anticipated Xbox 360 video game.

While Microsoft will be spending 15-20 million dollars on television marketing, this is a paltry sum for the amount of promotion they will be getting overall. Big corporations like Burger King, Pepsi and Pontaic will be footing the bill for the rest of the publicity as they hitch their products to this giant among video games.

Last year at this time it was Nintendo Wii, Playstation 3 and PSP by Sony that were getting all the media attention. Right now it is Microsoft and Xbox 360 games that are in the publicity spotlight. The recent release of the video game Halo 3 along with products like video game consoles for Xbox 360 with the Halo 3 name on it will undoubtedly put them back on top of the video game industry once again.

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Natural Plant Medicines and the Shamans of the Amazon Rainforest Part 2

Howard G Charing, and Peter Cloudsley join Amazonian Shamans, Javier Arevalo and Artidoro in discussions about the medicinal & spirit healing plants and their use.

Rosa Sisa

These are a kind of Marigold, and they are used in baths particularly for children with mal aire. This malady occurs when a family member dies and leaves the child unhappy and sleepless. The spirit of the dead grandfather - or whoever it was - lingers and makes the child sick. The spirit is sad to go and stays in the house after the person is buried and it tries to caress and comfort people in the family. This makes them ill. Rosa Sisa also controls vomiting in general, as well as being used in floral baths for good luck.

Typically an envious neighbour will grab a handful of earth from the cemetery and throw it into your house to spread boredom and heavy feelings. Again, when something is wrong in the house - people are bored or agitated - you get a bucket of water and add crushed Rosa Sisa flowers and Camalonga and wash the floors of the house with a brush to cleanse it.

Alternatively you could have the flowers in a vase in the house for the same purpose. Many people grow them either side of the front door of their house to absorb the negativity of people who look in enviously to see what possessions they have. The flowers go black but later they recuperate themselves. Marigolds can also be used for making wishes, blowing with the wish in mind - like we do with a dandelion - because it is yellow, the colour of the sun.

Manchare or susto (fright) are maladies commonly suffered by children, and treated with Camalonga a tree which grows wild in the forest, but many people grow it in flower pots in the city. It smells like onions and garlic and can be macerated in alcohol to be rubbed onto the person. In cases requiring soul retrieval a prayer or chant would be used at the same time.

Typically a child gets Manchare when playing in the trees and jump down to the ground and receive a much bigger bump than they expected. In this case the Rosa Sisa is tied into a bunch with a white ribbon and brushed all over the body from the head down. This is because the spirit returns through the crown of the head. A little prayer is said to invoke the spirit back, using the name of the child. It can be used in emplasts for fevers too.

Huairacaspi

It comes in two varieties, a high tree with a thick trunk and a small slim tree with little leaves. It is the same tree as tornillo which is good timber. The branch can be bent double without breaking, and is good for doing yoga and for flexibility in general.

It is good for prolepses, chronic diarrhoea, hepatitis, arthritis, broken bones, and cold in the body. As a teacher plant it is good for disorientation, and sense of being lost. After drinking you need to take a shower as it makes you sweat out all the toxins.

Ushcaquiro

This plant is very little known and used. Like chuchahuasi, it is good after operations, mothers caring for their babies, vaginal discharge, cancer, cold. It is prepared in water or alcohol. Painkiller. Ushcaquiro, Huairacaspi and Chiricsanango together make a good treatment for arthritis.

Guayusa

Has a female spirit and makes you dream of beautiful things and takes the laziness out of you.

Albaca

This is good to have in the house, it works better than an aerosol spray for fresh air because the flowers burst into flower with a perfume. Also good for floral baths to make you smell good so you attract lots of friends. Also if you have a row with a friend, they will come back to you. In cases of gastritis, appendix or gale-bladder problems you can take it as a tea. Even when dry is still smells.

Shimi Pampana

Is a root like a potato and a constituent of Pusanga. It comes in male (white) and female (red) forms and tastes like yucca. It is very good for people with excessive anger. You grate it to get the juice, and put it in soup, coffee or whatever and sometimes it is put secretly into a persons drink to calm them down, especially when there is a lot of arguing in the family. You can bathe in it too. The dry powder obtained from drying the root, is good for sun burn, common in summer when the river is low and people go to the beautiful beaches to swim. It takes out the impurities of the skin without desiccating it.

Howard G. Charing, is an accomplished international workshop leader on shamanism. He has worked some of the most respected and extraordinary shamans & healers in the Andes, the Amazon Rainforest, and the Philippines. He organises specialist retreats to the Amazon Rainforest at the dedicated centre located in the Mishana nature reserve. He is the author of the best selling book, Plant Spirit Shamanism (Destiny Books USA), and has published numerous articles about plant medicines. He was baptised into the Shipibo tribe of the Upper Amazon, and initiated into the lineage of the shamans of the Rio Napo. Howard is also an artist who's paintings have featured in major exhibitions in London and elsewhere. His artwork has also been featured on book covers.

His website: http://www.shamanism.co.uk email contact: eagleswing@shamanism.co.uk

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