Halo: Spartan Assault a top-down shooter for Windows 8
By
Eddie Makuch, News Editor
Top-down action shooter launching on Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 in July for $7; Halo Initiation comic revealed.
Microsoft today announced Halo: Spartan Assault, an all-new single-player Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 top-down action shooter.
Developed by 343 Industries in conjunction with Vanguard Games (Gatling Gears, Greed Corp), Halo: Spartan Assault is described as "accessible" and made for fans and newcomers alike.
The game is set between the events of Halo 3 and Halo 4. It explores the first missions of the Spartan Ops program and provides greater clarity into the story of the Human-Covenant wars.
Gamers play as either Commander Sarah Palmer or Spartan Davis aboard the UNSC Infinity as they take on "never before seen" skirmishes against Covenant attackers.
Halo: Spartan Assault features 25 missions, weekly challenges, and leaderboards. The game also boasts 40 achievements and medals.
The game also ties in with Halo 4, allowing console players to score new achievements and emblems for their Halo 4 Spartan. "Additional integration features" will be made available after launch, Microsoft said.
Halo: Spartan Assault for Windows 8, tablets, and Surface devices will add support for the Wired Xbox 360 controller "shortly" after launch through a title update.
Lastly, Microsoft announced today a new partnership with Dark Horse Comics for a new three-part series called Halo: Initiation. It tells the story of how Commander Shepard Palmer became a Spartan-IV and ties in with Halo: Spartan Assault.
By
Eddie Makuch, News Editor
Eddie Makuch (Mack-ooh) is a News Editor at GameSpot. He works out of the company's Boston office in Somerville, Mass., and loves extra chunky peanut butter.
326 comments
they really went far off with this one
do they really expect this to work?
hey, any chance, am I the only one noticing how big gaming companies are excluding PC players bit by bit? I mean, Gears of War, Halo, a lot of upcoming games are PS3 or Xbox 360 exclusive
1 Like Windows 8 only? ...M$ has their head up their asses to far, they will probably sell 5 units of this. For the 5 people that use Windows 8 to play games. Oh how I love to see M$s' stupidity shine.
2 Like Too bad, Microsoft. I would've installed Windows 8 for Halo 3 of 4, but I don't think anyone will install it for this crappy little alien shooter type game.
2 Like Some PC gamers: We want HALO 3 and 4 on PC.
M$: No you want a telephone HALO exclusive for Win8
facepalm
1 Like didn't get vista to play halo 2, not getting windows 8 just to play this, M$ you fail at life.
1 Like Windows 8 only I take it? Nothing to do with it being a crap OS and Microsoft isn't trying to drum up sales hoping folks will buy Windoze 8 just to play the game then?
1 Like "Alright, and for only 5 dollars more I can unlock a bunch of other armor colors!? I would be stupid NOT to buy that!" - What Microsoft is hoping we all do when this comes out.
hope microsoft know that there are some who still waiting to play halo-3 and rest of the series on pc... as well as gears of war! given how money oriented they are, they can still earn few bucks by tweaking graphics a bit and creating pc versions to revive those legendary fps games!
@AvindrashivA or they can make next Halo (which they probably doing now), it would make much more sense.
Wow!! I am so excited for this! Its just what I always wanted Halo to be!!!\
Wait...no I'm not, and no it isn't.
In fact...is it something *anyone* wanted it to be?
2 Like It certainly isn't something I wanted or was expecting. However, I'm always open to something fresh and a bit different. I would be willing to give it a chance.
@KingofCabal @pcgamer194 Halo 4 was a masterpiece from start to end with awesome campaign great multiplayer and the very welcome Spartan ops series. Reach was an good game but i believe bungie was holding halo back they are a fairly mediocre studio that hit on greatness early on.
@pcgamer194 Halo 4 wasn't bad, surprisingly it was a great game and this... well, it's not the worst news from Microsoft over last few weeks, everything about what they doing now feels wrong.
@igorphoenix @pcgamer194 Ok for the record, I also like Halo 4. It is sharp and great fun. But I mean that we could see this happening to the franchise from miles away. A TOP DOWN shooter on MOBILE? On WIN 8 OS only? makes me feel low.
@pcgamer194 why not, I'm sure they do it with small team inside 343 while main team is working on Halo 5. For me fourth Halo was a huge surprise. After Bungie' departure from series, mediocre Anniversary from 343 and pretty bad trailers I wasn't expecting anything good. But the game was gorgeous.
2 Like Sarah Palmer? Don't they mean "Sarah Femshep?"
That said, even though I do have a Windows 8 Laptop, probably not getting this. I don't see any point in supporting MS anymore. It seems like Microsoft never behaves itself until its customers and rivals force it to. They've been abusing their monopoly power for too long.
5 Like Oooh microsoft, you and i both know april fools jokes are supposed to be made on the first of april.. not now.. You're so silly.
Seems like more and more people are being forced to move to windows 8 anyways... so I don't see what the big deal is. I just think it's weird that it's not on the xbox. Still... it looks like it might be interesting. Not sure if I want to upgrade from windows 7 to 8 quite yet, though.
5 Like The big deal is that people don't like Windows 8 and that they're being forced to move to it. Luckily, people who hold out for Windows 9 will probably get a stellar product.
You know how Microsoft is. Every other OS has to suck. ME, Vista, 8... does anyone even remember ME? Anyhow, I hope MS gets some more competition in the OS space. I'd like to see the proliferation of more open standards and some real options out there.
1 Like @arc_salvo @kpolicoff Dood that is dumb logic. Every OS has it's pluses and minuses. Me wasn't as bad as people make it out to be. It was built on Win 98 SE after all. Windows Vista wasn't bad either. People are just idiots.
11 Like Instead of being forced to buy a new OS or a console for an exclusive game,
I just pretend that the game never existed.
@Wistful_Gamer With such a small install base it pretty much doesn't and it certainly won't make up the costs unless it is done cheaply and not up to Halo standards.
1 Like @Toysoldier34 @Wistful_Gamer How about if you pay a dollar to hold one extra grenade...
I could see a lot of people buying the CRAP out of some micro.
1 Like This almost make me want a Windows phone. I really like Halo Wars and felt they did a good job with it. This looks really good. I like the idea of playing as other Spartans besides Chief.
For people who are intereested windows phone central has an interview with 343 and some exclusive gameplay
page: http://www.wpcentral.com/halo-spartan-assault-interview
gameplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6CBkmpiVFyc#t=0s
Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=A1m47pPB9lM
4 Like Core gamers might scoff at this... but it actually looks pretty cool for ppl with WP 8, or Win 8 tablets....
I have a Win 8 ultrabook and will definitely consider picking this up... this might actually get me to look at the Windows Store again :-P
2 Like Why the same version for phones? That probably means they had to dumb the whole game down unnecessarily for PC users.
@deathstream @okassar You must not play many games with a touch interface. While there are some great games out there, it certainly does limit a game when only having a single screen based on touch compared to all the input a keyboard and mouse has.
3 Like @deathstream @okassar Yes it does. I would hope that your phone isn't more powerful than your Win8 machine.
Top down shooter.... tbh it looks more like a d3 with guns which would actually be really cool if they did it well.
However I dont really see myself getting this game :(
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Halo: Spartan Assault
- Publisher(s): Microsoft
- Developer(s): 343 Industries
- Genre: Action
- Release:
- ESRB: T
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