Red Faction SyFy TV movie debuts June 4

On May 31, gamers will get their hands on the next installment in the Red Faction series, Armageddon, on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. On June 4, they will be able to get a dose of backstory on the game, courtesy of the SyFy network TV movie based on the popular game franchise.

Titled Red Faction: Origins, the SyFy TV movie will star Robert Patrick (Terminator 2) as Red Faction: Guerilla hero Alec Mason, a former commando leader who helped lead the Red Faction to victory more than a decade prior. However, his triumph didn't come without a cost, as the conflict saw his wife killed and his daughter (Tamzin Merchant) kidnapped.

The film opens with Mason's sole living son, Jake (Brian J. Smith), now an officer in the Red Faction militia, finding out that his sister (Merchant) is not only alive but a member of an anti-Red Faction force sparking a new civil war on Mars. The movie's story concerns the family's reunion against a bloody backdrop of far-future internecine conflict.

As for the story of Red Faction: Armageddon, the game is set even further in the future, when the surface of Mars becomes unfit for human habitation. Alec Mason's grandson Darius is the protagonist of the third-person shooter and must do battle with foes ranging from crazed cultists to glowing aliens. The game will have less of an open-world approach, but it will have a greater range of weaponry than its predecessor. There will also be a bigger emphasis on destruction, with virtually everything in the game's environments capable of being demolished.