FPS General

343 Industries announced today that Halo 4 will receive the Castle Map Pack on April 8th, 2013.

This content update includes three brand new maps ranging from mid- to large-sized and that 'emphasize vehicular warfare and large battles over open spaces, where team strategy is key to successfully conquering the battlefield.'

A quick rundown of the maps reads:

• Daybreak places you amidst military facilities, against the backdrop of an idyllic mountain range.
• Outcast plunges you into the natural tunnels and arches of a secluded rebel outpost.
• Perdition takes players into the heart of an urban battleground, where tactical speed and situational awareness are essential to achieving victory.

Check out the trailer for Halo 4's Castle Map Pack above and stay tuned to FPS General for more on Halo 4 DLC in the future!

343 Industries struck gold with Spartan Ops, the episodic co-op mode that shipped with Halo 4. Spartan Ops was brand new to Halo, having never been featured in the series previously and we have really enjoyed our time with it. The only complaint we have is that once you finish, there really isn't any replay value beyond playing it with again with new teammates or to show a friend what it's all about.

Today, however, 343 announced that episode's 6 - 10 will be released starting next week, spanning across 5 weeks of DLC. 

Today Microsoft and 343 Industries announced the return of Spartan Ops: Season One, which includes five weeks of brand-new content – from 21st January through to 24th February – returning players to the episodic adventure that tells the continuing story of the UNSC Infinity. 

Reenlist with Fireteam Crimson as they search for Spartan Thorne on planet Requiem and come face-to-face with the threat of Jul ‘Mdama and his cult of Covenant separatists. The intensity of Season One builds to its thrilling conclusion in Episodes 6-10 as the battle moves beyond Requiem to a wide variety of locations featuring epic vehicular combat and on-foot encounters with Prometheans and Covenant forces.

This content includes new cinematic episodes to watch as well as accompanying Spartan Ops missions to play through with your squad. All of these missions and cinematics will be released free of charge to everyone with a copy of Halo 4.

OXM has the hands-on with Episode 6, so give it a look!

Bad news for the 20 people who play Halo 2 on PC, as 343 Industries has announced that they will be terminating the online service as of February 15th. Now, Halo 2 fans might be getting angry right about now about that '20 people' comment from one sentence ago, but that info comes straight from the horse's mouth. 

See:

To switch gears ever so slightly, we’re sad to report that the service end-date for Halo 2 PC Multiplayer will be February 15, 2013. We’ve been monitoring the population for months, and it’s been peaking consistently at approximately 20 players or less. Those that own this game can continue to enjoy Multiplayer over LAN after that date; however our network services will be turned off at that time.

We love you, Halo 2 PC, and you will live forever in our hearts.

You won't, however, live in our online multiplayer servers. That honor is reserved for younger games, like Halo 3 and Halo 4. Unfortunately, Halo 2 was the last game in the franchise to see a PC release so this is the end of the line for the very small Halo community on PC. 

So long, Halo 2, and thanks for all the headshots.

343 Industries has announced that the first map pack for Halo 4 will be released on December 10th, just a little under two weeks away. The DLC, entitled the 'Crimson Map Pack', will include three brand new multiplayer maps for players to enjoy. These maps include:

• Wreckage - A mid-sized map, Wreckage is littered with debris and ruins. The chaos of the environment creates an environment 'where the surrounding destruction creates complex paths perfect for throwing off your opponents, or testing the limits of your Warthog.'
• Harvest - This is a doomed agricultural planet where humankind first encountered the Convenant. Harvest is a small to mid-sized map.
• Shatter - This is a pretty large map, described as a 'playground for the Warthog and Mantis.' Taking place on a crystal mining facility and featured longer-range sightlines as well as close-quarters fighting in the facility itself.

If you're looking to play these new maps exclusively, a playlist will be created for players who pick up Crimson that rotates these DLC maps exclusively.

If that content doesn't satisfy your need for more Halo 4, how does a new game mode sound? 

Extraction is a 5 vs. 5 objective-based game type where opposing Spartan teams are tasked with extracting assets from various sites around the map. Once a team has found a site and is in position, they must plant their beacon and protect it from the opposing team while the extraction process occurs. If the defending team remains in control of the beacon, they receive one point, however if the opposing team overtakes the site before extraction is complete, the point goes to them. Once a site has been extracted, a new site becomes available. The first team to extract five points wins.

Stay tuned for more information on the Crimson Map Pack and Extraction mode!

Halo 4 has long been lauded as one of the biggest games of 2012, marking the first foray from 343 Industries into Halo territory since Bungie Studios departed for the sandy shores of Activision last year.

Well, the game is finally in the hands of the players, so how does 343 Industries stack up as a Halo developer? Can there ever truly be a successor to Bungie, the studio that created Halo from the ground up? The short answer is no; 343 Industries isn't the same as Bungie, but they don't have to be. Halo 4 stands its ground as an amazing Halo game on its merits alone, without calling for comparison to previous games in the franchise.

343 Industries is breathing fresh air into a franchise that didn't even know it needed to be revitalized, and for that we salute them.

Moving Forward

When Bungie Studios left Microsoft and Halo behind, we weren't sure how 343 Industries was going to be able to fill such big shoes. When Halo 4 was announced and the studio started discussing multiplayer, it became apparent that many of the features coming to Halo 4 were inspired by games like Call of Duty and Battlefield. For the first time, Halo was going to include things like custom loadouts, a default sprint button and a progressive system of unlocking and purchasing weapons in competitive multiplayer.

Was 343 Industries just converting Halo to nothing more than a Call of Duty clone? After so many years of standing on their own two feet, was this new studio ushering in an era of tasteless, vapid Halo games? If so, how would that carry over to the epic campaigns that we've come to expect in Halo games?

As development progressed, we were more and more excited by what we were seeing and the doubts receded to a place in the back of our minds.

Now that Halo 4 is finally here and we've spent a good many hours playing everything the game has to offer, all of our inhibitions have been completely vanquished. 343 Industries understands Halo. They understand the core of what makes a good Halo game, as well as where there are room for changes. The fundamentals are all here, and done with flawless precision.

Simply put, Halo 4 feels like a Halo game and that is exactly what we were worried about.

Keep reading for more on our first impressions with Halo 4.

The day that many of you have anticipated for a long time has finally arrived; Halo 4 is in stores now! Master Chief's next chapter officially begins this morning, as does the 343 Industries Era in Halo.

Halo 4 is quite an expansive offering, with a brilliant narrative in campaign mode, a healthy multiplayer offering with a ton of new game modes and options as well as Spartan Ops, an awesome way to extend your campaign experience with a group of players online. We'll have a full hands-on with the game later, but suffice it to say, for now, that 343 Industries has left their handprint on the Halo franchise in a big way. 

If you're one of the many Halo veterans who are worried how 343 Industries will stack up against Bungie Studios, rest assured that 343 has released a more than worthy addition to Halo canon, built upon the framework that Bungie laid down over the last decade. In Halo 4, 343 Industries is innovating and breathing fresh life into the series while staying true to the fundamentals that make Halo so good.

Have you gotten a chance to pick the game up yet? Are you on the fence, perhaps, deciding between Halo 4 and Black Ops 2?

If you're still undecided, we encourage you to check out our Halo 4 live stream marathon! Rainchild has been playing through the night but he's still going strong over at http://www.own3d.tv/Rainchild. You can also stream the action at the top of this page.

We'll have video coverage over on YouTube so make sure you are subscribed and ready to go when that content begins rolling out.

343 Industries has released a brand new trailer for Halo 4, showing off the episodic Spartan Ops multiplayer mode. Season One begins on November 6th, when Halo 4 hits shelves in most major regions.

But what is Spartan Ops?

Spartan Ops is a way to extend the campaign experience in Halo 4 while taking some friends along for the ride online. Along with a party of 4 Xbox Live users, players will be able to carry out some cooperative missions, built from the ground up for Spartan Ops. These missions will be continually updated post-launch, so brand new content is never too far away for you and your squad to undertake.

Think of Spartan Ops as a way to bridge the gap between singleplayer and online multiplayer. There are plenty of players who never bother to take their Halo experience online as well as folks who never crack open the singleplayer portion of the game. Spartan Ops is a way for players to get that storytelling experience with friends online, giving them a taste of what it's like playing with other players.

Check out the trailer above and visit http://www.fpsgeneral.com/games/halo-4 for more information on Halo 4.

We knew that Halo 4 was a big budget game, you don't have to look any further than the web series Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn to figure that out. What we didn't know, however, is that this is the most money Microsoft has ever poured into a single game, bar none.

The gang at Polygon is currently running a must-read story, taking us inside Microsoft's User Research center, where Halo 4 has been undergoing rigorous testing for years. In the course of their time spent at the Research Center, Microsoft Studios head Phil Spencer revealed that Halo 4 is indeed the most expensive game that Microsoft has ever released to date. He continued, saying that Halo, as a franchise, is 'most important entertainment product in the company.'

How confident is Phil that Halo 4 is the most expensive game Microsoft has ever published? When asked, he responded simply, "Absolutely. Nothing's even close."

The article has some fascinating insight into the play testing process that goes into a big budget game like Halo 4, something that we don't get to see inside of very often. 343 Industries and their testing crew watch as participants played through various portions of the game, commenting on where they are getting mixed up and where the level isn't flowing the way they intend it to. Halo's singleplayer levels are linear, meaning that there is a path that players should be taking to proceed through the mission.

The testing crew's job is to make sure that players know where to go and to balance the challenge of each mission, as they move from Point A to Point B. There is some great behind-the-scenes information here, something that die-hard Halo fans will enjoy reading.

Halo 4 is scheduled to launch on November 6th, 2012 on Xbox 360.

343 Industries has revealed some details on the 'War Games Map Pass', Halo 4's version of a DLC season pass. The Map Pass will be available as part of the special editions of Halo 4, or on its own for $25.00.

So, what is it?

Halo 4 is scheduled to receive 3 DLC map packs, one each in December, February and April. In addition to the map packs, players will receive two exclusive helmets in the War Games Map Pass; Scanner and Strider, as well as an exclusive in-game emblem.

The map packs, themselves, have also been detailed:

Crimson Map Pack (December release)
Maps: Wreckage, Harvest, Shatter
Description: Witness the chaos of a clash of civilizations in Wreckage, with its blend of claustrophobic spaces and dangerous exposures and venture into the human colony environs of Harvest, and explore a human foray on an alien moon in Shatter.

Majestic Map Pack (February release)
Maps: Landfall, Monolith, Skyline
Description: Landfall's emphasis is on infantry battles against a glittering ocean on a distant world, while Monolith exposes you to the naked vacuum of space – and the firepower of opposing teams, and Skyline's distinctly industrial feel provides new challenges in somewhat familiar, but occasionally confined spaces.

Castle Map Pack (April release)
Maps: Daybreak, Outcast, Perdition
Description: Daybreak is set in a military facility against the backdrop of an idyllic mountain range, while Outcast plunges you into the warrens, canyons and arches of an alien edifice, and Perdition takes players into the heart of an urban sprawl, with tactical speed and situational awareness its key features.

The War Games Map Pass can be purchased alongside your copy of Halo 4 on November 6th, 2012.