Microsoft offers trip to Xbox 360 launch event on Origen website

The much-hyped "Origen Xbox 360" count-down has finally hit zero - revealing that the site is actually a contest offering consumers a chance to win trips to an Xbox 360 launch event in the United States in November.

The viral marketing campaign, which had been rumoured to be anything from the announcement of Halo 3 to the launch of a chain of Xbox 360 stores in major cities around the world, finally revealed its purpose at midday today.

However, anyone hoping for a major product or service announcement was disappointed - with the incredibly impenetrable website, laden with load delays and Flash animations of rabbits taking hallucinogenic drugs, turning out to be a relatively simple contest.

The real meat of any product announcements Microsoft has to make is likely to come over the coming week, with the X05 showcase event taking place in Amsterdam in the middle of next week - and Halo 3 widely rumoured to be the big announcement of the event.

Indeed, the first issue of forthcoming UK magazine Xbox World 360 has a front cover featuring the Master Chief and proudly pronouncing that Halo 3 is covered inside - although what they've actually seen of the game is as-yet unknown.

So that's the Origen countdown entirely defused then, and the wait goes on for any really major announcements on the Xbox 360 front - although hopefully when they do come, they won't be presented in the form of over-hyped websites which look like they've been created by art college students whose brains have turned to mush thanks to a constant diet of cannabis, ironic t-shirts with Boba Fett on them and re-runs of Bagpuss on television.

You can enter the Origen competition at OrigenXbox360.com - but it's not our fault if it gives you a burning desire to go out and punch the first bunny rabbit (or web designer) you see...