Halo: Reach
PLATFORM: Xbox 360
DEVELOPED BY: Bungie
PUBLISHED BY: Microsoft
RELEASE DATE: September 14, 2010

And then there was Reach…

After three world-renown games and two spinoff titles, the world of Halo was set to end with not a sequel but a prequel in Halo: Reach. The new game takes place a short time before the events of the very first game, Halo: Combat Evolved, when some lad named Master Chief was not the only remaining Spartan super-soldier.

The first three games were never praised for their story so much as the wondrous worlds, creatures, and futuristic campaigns and technologies they presented. Oh, and let us not forget the fact that they’re basically a godfather to modern day online console multiplayer gaming as it’s popular today. In Halo 3: ODST — which was set just before the start of Halo 3 — story was focused on a little more carefully, and now with Reach, they’ve brought the story full-circle by returning to the start.

A movie adaptation of the massively popular Microsoft video game franchise, Halo, has been talked about for a good five or so years now. At one point it was rolling forward steadily with Neil Blomkamp (before anyone had a clue who he was) attached to direct and Peter Jackson set to produce. At the time, things weren’t quite what they are now and a rising budget forced backers Universal and Fox to pull out and everything to fall apart around the project.

Little did they know at the time, that soon it would be much easier to do big budget effects with less cost. And in a cruel twist of ironic fate, it was Jackson and Blomkamp who left Halo and went on to make a little movie called District 9 on a minor $30 million budget, which received critical praise, over $210 million at the box office, and even a Best Picture nomination at the Academy Awards. Knowing this knowledge, we probably would already have at least one Halo movie, and judging by how popular the games are, more would be on the way.

Halo: Reach is a little less than a month away, and I couldn’t be more excited. It is looking like developer Bungie is really going to go out with a bang with their last Halo game.

Released today is a new trailer entitled ‘A Spartan Will Rise.” In the trailer you meet all six members of Team Noble, the group of Spartans from the game.

Good concept for a trailer that gets you better acquainted with the cast, but what is up with the voice over? Very Lord of the Rings which I excused when it was used for Gears of War 2 a few years ago, but come on! You have to be able to come up with a different voice over than an elfish sounding lady. Anyway, elf rip off aside, it’s a decent trailer and only goes to help build excitement for the new Halo game.

You can see the new trailer below now!

Now that the Halo: Reach Beta is long over, game developer Bungie has decided to tease their upcoming Xbox 360 game with a little achievement leak.

According to Bungie’s blog, there will be 49 achievements in Reach, assigned to five different groups with the following break down: 23 to the campaign, 6 to training, 9 to player experience, 4 to multiplayer, and 7 to be linked with the games co-op Firefight mode.

Also released is this awesome group of images for all 49 achievements. I hope I can get them all! See the image here at right (click for full view).

Six specific achievements have been outlined.

The teams behind Halo are no strangers to creating some very cool live-action short movies to promote upcoming game titles. District 9 director Neil Blomkamp made one for Halo 3 that sparked hopes that a movie version of the popular game would finally happen. Then another one was made when Halo 3: ODST was on the way. Both of these videos can be seen here if you’ve never watched them before.

Now a new clip has been released for the upcoming Halo: Reach, which is supposedly to be the last game in the Halo universe that will be made (by Bungie anyway!). The video is very short, only running a little over a minute long, but it is still very much worth watching. It gives us a peek at the creation of a Spartan soldier, which is what our beloved Master Chief was in those first three games.

Put on your helmet, pick up your weapon of choice, and leap over to the other side to check out the new live-action promo for Halo: Reach!