One of my students at Bard, Andy K----, told me he heard a rumor that the US Army was offering sniper training in Halo 3...I'm not an Xbox Live guy so I did some digging on the internet.
At 405th.com, poster Sean Bradley says that
On the XBL dashboard I've noticed a few little ads of a cross promotion between Halo 3 and the US Army referring to a sweepstakes and Halo 3 Sniper Training video series. I couldn't find the vids located anywhere in the marketplace, just through a clickable ad that occasionally appeared in the dashboard. Last night I accessed the ad, and it took me to a page in the dash that had four videos to download as well as a pic you download to enter the sweepstakes. I DL'ed two of the vids (XBL was running crazy slow so I didn't have time to get them all) and it was really informative.
Bradley says the vids are
1. Know Your Weapon (overview of long range weapon efficiency in H3)
2. Sniper School Beginners Tactics
3. Sniper School Intermediate Tactics
4. Sniper School Advanced Tactics
A Halo blog posts directions for finding the vids on Xbox Live.
You can find the first of them posted to YouTube. Note the "just like in real life" comparisons.
(The most disturbing thing about this video is that the narrator appears to be Canadian. Americans do not pronounce their "t"'s so sharply. Government funded agencies shouldn't be supporting the aggressive Canadian dollar.)
Here's the listing for the US Army Sniper School contest on Xbox's site. This contest is closed, but now there's a US Army Heavy Weapons contest. For both contests, players need to register their gamertag for a chance to win limited edition Halo merch.
Clearly Halo 3 is being targeted by the Army as a primer marketing venue. See:
+ An older Army/Microsoft co-lab: A blogger at Gemaga.com posted Microsoft's press release for the US Army's sponsorship of the first Halo Championship Tournament.
+ Gamepolitics reports back in September 07: "Military Recruiters Snag Underage Players at Halo 3 Launch Bash"
