Working for Dime is awesome on so many different levels. Besides getting to live in New York City and write about hoops all day, you also get the hook up on all sorts of sick events. I got VIP to the Fabolous concert my first day on the job. Yesterday, I got to chill out at the ultra-sleek Westin Times Square to give the new Halo 3: ODST a little test drive. What does this have to do with hoops? Not much, but what baller isn’t a gamer? And what gamer doesn’t like Halo?

In a room full of 52″ flat screens, the Halo crew ran me through the fifth installment of the legendary game that drops September 22. What they showed me was pretty impressive. The producers of the game went the extra mile to create a movie-like storyline. Unlike a lot of games whose narrative structures go in a linear order, ODST’s new Campaign mode takes the Pulp Fiction/Lost approach with its flash-forwards and multiple possible outcomes.

“The primary mission going into this game was give people a new way to experience the Halo Universe,” says Microsoft Game Studios Global Product Manager Ryan Crosby. “This time we told the story through the point of view of an Orbital Drop Shock Trooper. It’s interesting to take the Halo Universe and look at through the viewpoint of someone else.”

Also new with ODST is the new cooperative mode of play called Firefight, where a gamer can team up with up to three buddies online and play in a variety of Halo sets from past and present. Just playing it for a few minutes, I can tell you how addictive it is. This will definitely be a feature that will be a hit with Halo heads.

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