Halo 3: ODST

Halo 3: Recon is a First Person Shooter (FPS) video game. It was developed by Bungie, LLC. and published by Microsoft Game Studios and is set to be released of Fall 2009.

Recon is a campaign expansion and prologue to Halo 3 which will bridge a gap between Halo 2 and Halo 3 .

Overview

Although Bungie consistently stated that Halo 3 was the last game in the trilogy, they never ruled out the possibility of releasing new games set in the same story in the future. An interview by MTV with Don Mattrick (Senior Vice President of Microsoft's Xbox division) revealed that Bungie's game is at the very least Halo-related, and that it is not Bungie's collaborative efforts on Halo Wars or Halo: Chronicles, but a "new" game.

Although a proper announcement was meant for July 16th, 2008 at E3, it was canceled by Microsoft because they wanted to focus on games by first-party developers that were coming out in 2008 - criteria which the Bungie project did not fit. It was also stated by Microsoft that they did not want to further lengthen their press conference so as not to stretch the attention span of the attendees, and that they wished to give the new Halo project an event of its own to release details on it.

The most popular rumor that had surrounded this new title was that it was a squad-based shooter in the Halo universe with the player filling the role of a Marine Captain, but this is untrue as the player will be filling the role of an ODST Lance Corporal. .

Speculation about a supposed third-person shooter, giving the player control of Marines or ODST's instead of Spartans, circulated long before Bungie revealed their next project would be Halo-related. Originally, rumors held that this would by the Peter Jackson game, Halo: Chronicles. The presence of Christian Allen, a former Marine and Red Storm employee who worked on the Ghost Recon and Rainbow Six series and joined Bungie in early 2007, heightened speculation.

In actual fact, Bungie has confirmed that the game will be a first-person shooter, like the previous three Halo titles, and that Christian Allen is working on a completely different project within Bungie. Bungie also confirmed that the player will take the role of a surviving ODST, that the game is set in the ruins of New Mombassa, that it will be released in the US "Fall" of 2009, and that it is the last Halo project related to the Halo trilogy they are working on.

In another interview with a number of different gaming sources, they revealed key information about the game: Recon will be on a standalone disk, it will "include some new multiplayer maps, some of which will be a part of the Mythic Map Pack," and it will run on the Halo 3 engine. Bungie has also stated that it will be compatible with Halo 3 multiplayer, provided they have the Mythic Map Pack and Recon. Forge, Saved films, and Screenshots will be making a comeback.

Recon has been described as "returning players to familiar grounds on a vital top-secret mission. Recon's gripping story, co-operative campaign and new multiplayer content will have Halo fans 'Preparing to Drop' in Fall 2009".

The game is not expected to ship at the full-retail price of $60 as it believed that the game's campaign will only run three to six hours.

Plot

File:Our New Hero.JPG

The "protagonist" featured in the game.

The game is set during the events of Halo 2. A number of pods carrying ODST's appear in the sky over New Mombasa to clear out the remaining Covenant in the city. Prophet of Regret's ship opens a Slipspace portal in Earth's atmosphere, this results in an antimatter-matter annihilation accompanied by a physical shockwave and an EMP. The shockwave tears through Mombasa, badly damaging the city. When the EMP reaches the HEV Pods, it destroys their electronics, which prevents them from making a controlled descent, hence they are destroyed on impact with the ground. At leaast one ODST HEV Pod enters the airspace above Mombasa after the primary EMP has passed, but it passed through a secondary residual EMP that partially damaged its electronics. Despite this, it still managed to make a speudo-controlled descent, albeit a rough one; it makes contact in the side of a building. As night draws, the lone ODST, armed with an M7S, must fight through the hordes of Covenant forces, taking a more stealthy, tactical approach. His only help is the Superintendent A.I., the city of New Mombasa's caretaker, who gives the ODST helpful information of threats and dangers ahead. The player will be playing as the ODST, and it has been confirmed that Master Chief will not be in the game.

Trailers

Main article: Keep It Clean (Trailer)

First, different screens of areas of New and Old Mombasa come on screen, followed by HEV pods entering the atmosphere. Here you can see the Prophet of Regret's carrier on the right, then it moves behind buildings. The pods come into view as a large explosion (Caused by the Prophet of Regret's carrier entering Slipspace) appears, sending the pods off-course. Then, the Superintendent appears, and shows warning signs and then reboots. All the screens from earlier flash onto the screen, but heavily damaged from the blast. Then, a single HEV pod falls through the sky, when the Halo 3 Logo appears. The pod then crashes into the camera and goes black, followed by the words 'Prepare to Drop'.

The second part to the trailer, released on the 8th of October, followed on from this - the Superintendent reinitialized itself, attempting to assess the catastrophic devastation and tries to identify the object that survived. Later, after a Covenant Phantom dropship has passed by, the object opens to reveal a lone surviving Marine Shock Trooper to clamber out, wielding a new variant of the M7S Caseless Submachine Gun. The Marine narrowly avoids a Jiralhanae patrol, before encountering messages from the Superintendent, presumably leading him to safety.

Trivia

• The Unnamed Marine Shock Trooper's rank is Lance Corporal, therefore it's apparent that the player will not be filling the role of the speculated Marine Captain.
• The tagline for the game is Prepare to Drop referencing the way ODST's enter into the combat zone.
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• A teaser trailer for Halo 3: Recon was Keep It Clean released on September 25th, 2008 at 07:07:07 am PST, which coincided with the one year anniversary of Halo 3. The trailer was viewed through the many security cameras around New Mombasa. The time is an obvious reference to seven.
• This game has caused a slight rise in the popularity of the ODST helmet in Halo 3 multiplayer, due to the fact that the main character is an ODST.
• After the lone HEV pod drops and the Superintendent is scanning it the screen goes black and the words *SEARCH TERMINATED! ONI.SEC.PRCTL.1A appears. This indicates that the organization ONI who have done a lot of behind the scenes work in the Halo series terminated the Superintendent search.
• The Superintendent AI seems very self aware, such as switching on lights around the area for closer inspection, switching them off quickly when the Covenant approached, and seeing the Marine ODST as Human. The Superintendent also shows emotion, but these are normally shown through emoticons.

File:H Keep It Clean.jpg

Speculated Significant Date

• In a section of the video, what appears to be random letters and numbers contains the date "January 6, 2009" first thought to be a release date . But revealed at Tokyo Game Show the release date is the fall of 2009, this has caused many fans to believe that this is when new information will be released, referring to Bungie's previous hidden secrets in trailers, others claim that the date tells us the release date for the Mythic Map Pack.
• Martin O'Donnell has been confirmed to be composing the score for this game. Bungie also released the track played in the trailer named "Prepare to Drop" its track length is 1:17, a reference to John-117. The track is available here.
• On rare occasions on Bungie.net, the Bungie logo at the top of the page will pixelate and show the Superintendent for several seconds before reverting back to the Bungie logo.
• The cover story for the December '08 Game Informer issue is Halo 3: Recon.
• It has been stated by Bungie that there will be a way to unlock the Recon Armor Permutation in Halo 3: Recon. This method will require you to unlock the Vidmaster Challenge Achievements, as well as unammed methods having to do with the Mythic Map Pack, and with the Campaign Expantion.

Related Links

Internal Links

• Halo 3
• Keep It Clean (Trailer)
• Superintendent
• Unnamed Marine Shock Trooper

External Links

• Official Halo 3: Recon page at Bungie.net
• H3Recon.com - A Halo 3: Recon Blog