If you never had a chance to play the first 2 Halo games, and couldn’t be bothered to go back and spend your time playing their single player campaigns, fear not. We’re here to bring you up to speed, with a little help from our friends.

Over at Yahoo Games, there are two terrific videos which summarize the stories of both of the first two installments. Not too long, and not too short, they offer the perfect balance to let you know what happened. You can view their Retrospective for Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2 here.

Once done with that, you can head over to 1up and read their Halo Primer, which gives you a bit more details on each of the game’s main characters and features. It’s a bit of a long read, but very interesting.

Watching these videos and reading the back-story will get you prepared to Finish the Fight in Halo 3. Personally, I watched all the cutscenes from the first two games that were included on the Legendary Edition bonus disc. Got me all caught up and ready to rock.