Messenger Kit, Halo pads dated

By Tom Bramwell Published 1 September, 2007

And priced. Readies at the ready!

If Microsoft's Halo 3-themed Xbox 360 isn't sufficient to gobble up all your money at GBP 280 a pop when it launches on 26th September...well, you're overpaid. Also, you could spend the run-off on Limited Edition Halo 3 Wireless Controllers! And green wireless headset!

You may tut, but how else are they going to claw back the USD 1 billion they spent fixing all your consoles? So, give generously when you consider purchasing the Todd McFarlane-designed Covenant Brute and Master Chief Wireless Controllers, both of which launch on 26th September and cost GBP 34.99. Or the Spartan green headset, which is also GBP 34.99.

Also coming this September is the much anticipated Xbox 360 Messenger Kit - arguably more interesting than any of the above, but it's too late to rewrite the entire item now - which arrives at an estimated price of GBP 24.99 on 7th September. You can see what it looks like in our Xbox 360 Messenger Kit photograph gallery.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (34) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • DanWhitehead #1 5 years ago

    Todd McFarlane-designed controllers? Do they crouch on church steeples and have loads of OMG KEWL chains coming off them?

  • captainrentboy #2 5 years ago

    They do look kind of groovy actually, I might go for the 'Goodie' one.
    Speaking of Spawn, remember the movie? Y'know the one that was sooo bad that it actually made a select few go permenantly blind. Well McFarlene wants to direct the sequel. SEQUEL!!! Not only that, but he wants Spawn to be kind of hidden in the shadows throughout, so his attacks are all the more confusing, no big ole set pieces like in the first film, blah blah blah.... So in translation, basically he has a directing budget of around a tenner.

  • DanWhitehead #3 5 years ago

    McFarlane's been banging on about a Spawn sequel for ten years. No studio in Hollywood wants to touch the damn thing, so he's now going to pay for it all himself. Bear in mind, this is a man who paid half a million dollars for a baseball.

    Anyway, Halo pads...

  • Azazel #4 5 years ago

    You may tut.

    I say 'tat'.

  • Shinji #5 5 years ago

    I don't really get the Messenger Kit, to be honest. Why not just plug an old USB keyboard into the Xbox, if you're that keen to type lengthy messages on it?

    With that as an option, I don't really see why you'd plump for a thumb-pad, although I guess if you're all about having a nice neat living room setup then a wired keyboard might not exactly fit the aesthetic :)

  • morriss #6 5 years ago

    I sit about 2.5-3 metres from my TV, so buying a USB keyboard and an extension cable and having leads all over the living room isn't really conducive with the missus' plans. :)

  • Chewy #7 5 years ago

    @morris - dump her! :-)

    Reasonably priced, I think a purchase is inorder.

  • bioreit #8 5 years ago

    @Shinji

    I have a wireless USB keyboard for my 360, which was just fine and dandy............................

    .....................................until I got my Sumo Omni.

    Now, if I want to type a quick message in Battlefield 2:MC, I have to lean forward to grab the keyboard, ruining the comfortable groove I'd been cultivating for the last hour or so. Rocking back into the Omni, my not-so-slender rear usually ends up forcing the once-snug seat into a precarious perch!

    The chatpad would end all of those problems and seeing as I can text at a faster rate than most of my friends can type on a full-qwerty, using a Blackberry-style mini-qwerty should be no problem for me. And even better, Gameplay have it for £19.99 :-)

    And I'm usually in a private chat with one friend, so I don't like to quit out of the chat just to send an audio message to either another friend or the camping helicopter pilot I just sniped out of the cockipt.

    Although my desire for the chatpad could diminish slightly if they bring in a group-chat function in the Autumn update....

  • oceanmotion #9 5 years ago

    How shit do those Halo 3 pads look. Ouch.

  • DrDamn #10 5 years ago

    £25 for a little keyboard seems a tad on the expensive side to me.

  • ProtoformX #11 5 years ago

    Might pick up one of the pads as I've only had one controller for my 360 for over a year now and ned people to play games with. The keyboard may be useful too - try typing a message on a Guitar Hero II controller!

  • Ryze #12 5 years ago

    Awww, f*ckin 'ell.

    I thought when I saw the headline that they had made a decent 1st person shooter controller - with a HAND held, rather than thumb driven right analogue, with a trigger and some buttons on it.

    Oh well. No sale just yet...

  • Xerx3s #13 5 years ago

    I have a usb keyboard but I can never be arsed to hook it up. Hence the msn is rather useless. But I might pick up one of those pad boards one day.

  • Vice.Destroyer #14 5 years ago

    I like the idea of those chat pads, but the spectre of rip-off britain looms large again. Why can Play-asia sell it for £14.99 and the UK sell it for a full £10 more? Please, I don't want any explanations that run along the lines of "it's more expensive to live and work and exist in britain than anywhere else".

    I am being shafted. I know it. And I shall import over the interweb and save myself £10 (exc. p&p)

  • pyrat6 #15 5 years ago

    Blimey - and I thought nintendo were trying to fuck up gaming witht the wavy-thing. This is just a shameless cash-in. One for the dumb fanboys I think.

    I 'eagerly await' the Halo T-shirt, coffee mug, spunk rag etc .

    I just hope they've some effort on the game.

  • Xerx3s #16 5 years ago

    I like the idea of those chat pads, but the spectre of rip-off britain looms large again. Why can Play-asia sell it for £14.99 and the UK sell it for a full £10 more? Please, I don't want any explanations that run along the lines of "it's more expensive to live and work and exist in britain than anywhere else".

    Those tax excuses are very poor. And then there is the shipping excuse. As if the things don't get shipped to the US. No the truth is that Europe has always been and will always be a very lucrative market to set products at high prices. People earn a lot of cash & people are used to pay a lot of cash.
    This however is a bit hard too accept so that's where the excuses come from.

  • Xerx3s #17 5 years ago

    Pyrat: So did you never buy anything related to the entertainment industry? No toys whatsoever? Gosh, your life must be dull.

  • Ryze #18 5 years ago

    Well... they should have thought about making a more reliable console in the first place.

    I want one! Now fix the damn thing.

    If they want some decent money, then they need to release a decent FPS controller.


    As far as Spawn's concerned - I fell asleep twice trying to watch it.

    Then gave up. So never watched enough to even remember.

    He's black, right? Does he even make it to the end of the film?

    Only I was watching Apocalypse Now recently and it brought that time old Hollywood cliché back into my mind. Hilarious.

  • NewYork #19 5 years ago

    Was halfway through reading the article when I thought "this must be the guy who reported from the Sony Leipzig thing," and sure enough it was :)

    Funny stuff. :)

  • urban #20 5 years ago

    haha it's so hideous

  • bioreit #21 5 years ago

    @Vice.Destroyer

    If you're going to compare Play Asia to a UK price, compare it to a UK online retailer. As I said before, on Gameplay, it's £19.99 - with free p&p.

    @ Those who balk at the price for 'just' a keyboard - you also get another headset, plus you maintain the convenience of a wireless keyboard minus the annoyingness of having to change batteries (something I didn't think was that bad until the keyboard died on me mid-rant last week!)

  • Madafunkola #22 5 years ago

    What would interest me would be integration of the chat pad into games. Imagine an RPG where you have 26+ slots for spells and items at your LITERAL FINGERTIPS! It would make some PC games "port-able". I was a big fan of City of Heroes before my PC died, but it would be hard to cram the controls of such a game onto the current generation of console controllers. Or perhaps 26+ commands for your team-mate bots in GRAW3 / Squadron of fighter jets in Ace Combat 73? Very difficult rhythm based typing test game?... Anyone buying this yet?...

  • Vice.Destroyer #23 5 years ago

    @Madafunkola

    Sorry dude, not convinced. I have been weaned on console games and I am that strange breed of gamer that thinks it is foreign to play using a mouse and keyboard. I am not knocking it.

    But that is why I only play on my console.

  • Vice.Destroyer #24 5 years ago

    @bioreit

    Erm, at the risk of sounding pedantic, even with p&p, it is £17.47.

    The point is, that the older and stingier I get, the more annoyed I become at having to look internationally for a bargain. I actually want to support my local game/dvd/electronics retailers. But not when I can get it cheaper from across the water.

  • bioreit #25 5 years ago

    @Vice.Destroyer

    I'm the biggest pedant I know, hence me pointing out that you said:

    "Why can Play-asia sell it for £14.99 and the UK sell it for a full £10 more? Please, I don't want any explanations that run along the lines of "it's more expensive to live and work and exist in britain than anywhere else".

    I am being shafted. I know it. And I shall import over the interweb and save myself £10 (exc. p&p)"

    so the fact that you can get it for £17.47 from Play-Asia, "even with p&p" means you would only save £2.52. A bit different to your assertion that retailers in "UK sell it for a full £10 more".

    Not having a go, just pointing out that the extent of your initial monetary objection needs a bit of re-adjustment.

    Oh and a non-living-expense excuse: we pay 17.5% VAT? Or how about the peripherals are probably made a wee bit closer to Play-Asia's warehouse than your local Woolworths, so shipping costs are lower?
    Edited by bioreit at 02/09/07 @ 00:18

  • Vice.Destroyer #26 5 years ago

    @bioreit

    I suppose that it depends how you read the comment. I thought the fact that I pointed out that I would save £10 (exc p&p) was enough for eagle-eyed readers to know that I wasn't saying that you can get it for £14.99. Only that the RRP here is £10 more than in Hong Kong. Or even Canada (a little further from the accessories sweat shop in Canada). Which is a little more than 17.5%.

    But I will take the point that if Gameplay are selling it for £19.99, that the convenience of having a UK guarantee outweighs the saving of £2+

  • bioreit #27 5 years ago

    Oh, I see. It was about the rrp. Ok, in that case, it's because the prices are in dollars and thy just convert that price into pounds using the latest exchange rate conversions.

    It's swing and roundabouts really, because if you wanted to get R6:Vegas, for example, then Play-Asia charge £24.77 plus p&p, whereas you can get it off Play.com for £17.99 with free delivery. But Gears of War is £22.29 on Play-Asia as opposed to £29.99 from Game.co.uk.

    Seems that Play-Asia just maintain the US RRP and rely on currency conversion for much of their discounting, whereas Play.com, Gameplay and other UK online retailers base their deductions on their location in off-shore tax havens.

    I guess the lesson here is as always - shop around!

  • Vice.Destroyer #28 5 years ago

    Everyone take note. If people could argue their points as intelligently as bioreit and make me feel like an idiot for not thinking before posting, maybe, just maybe these posts will be essential reading again.

    (Thanks for the explanation, bioreit)

  • pyrat6 #29 5 years ago

    "Pyrat: So did you never buy anything related to the entertainment industry? No toys whatsoever? Gosh, your life must be dull."

    Not at all - I spend lots on media in many forms. And have a stupid amount of toys. I can live without the shameless rip-offs though. 'ooh loook ... a halo themed pair of underpants. Fantastic!'. It's turning gamers into 12 year old girls who will buy any tat that has robbie williams (or whoever the latest cunt is) painted on it.

    (oh and as for toys - my collection of quirky controllers is well into double figures. I can't quite equate 'buying toys' with having a 'dull' life. Quite the opposite.)

    Edited by pyrat6 at 02/09/07 @ 16:03

  • THATinkjar #30 5 years ago

    I'm looking forward to this, but I wish they were doing the pad in black. Oh well. I suppose it'll go well with the white battery packs I'm using. Colour coordination FTW!

  • JohnnyM Verified , Eurogamer.net #31 5 years ago

    As I just said in the gallery thread...

    I've had a Messenger Kit plugged into my pad all weekend, and I've actually found it pretty useful. I sit too far from the TV to bother with a USB keyboard, and also can't be arsed with a wireless one cluttering up the sofa, so it's a neat solution.

    Crucially, I've kept it in when not really using it and completely forgot it was there, so it certainly doesn't ruin the feel of the pad, and has actually proved handy when people have dropped me messages I normally wouldn't have been bothered replying to.

    It's a little fiddly to use at first, largely because of trying to figure out where all the symbols are, but I guess I'll get used to it. And it's also backlit, which is essential if you're playing with the lights out.

    Whether you think it's worth £25 (I have a free sample) is another matter entirely... Guess it depends how much use you think you'll get out of it.

  • bioreit #32 5 years ago

    You're welcome Vice.Destroyer! And I have been known to let rip on some people, but usually only when they deserve it. You can pretty much bet that if I say something that appears like it's a knee-jerk, fanboy comment, it's probably because I'm in a playful mood, not because I believe what I said.

    I'm always willing to carry on an argument as long as it stays civil and logical - which reminds me, trooper6, if you're out there, I AM responding to your last PM, just that every time I sit down to type, something else seems to happen. Lately, it is catching and removing the huge garden spiders in my house on behalf of my two female housemates.

  • Ryze #33 5 years ago

    @Vice.Destroyer, bioreit

    Nice discussion. Well argued. Informative.

  • Darren #34 5 years ago

    I took my second Xbox 360 which I bought new in May this year back to GAME last Thursday as it lasted all of TWO months before it died on me. The replacement lasted less than an HOUR - I managed to get one game of Madden 08 on it before it gave me three red lights... manufacture date was Oct 06. Now I look after my stuff and my repaired launch 360, which lasted all of 17 months, appears to be working fine but I don't hold out much hope of it seeing in the next generation somehow.

    It amazes me how Microsoft can build such an utterly wonderful games console so very, very badly...