Today, 343 Studios detailed its new multiplayer map pack for Halo 4. The “Majestic Map Pack” will launch next week, on Monday, February 25. Instead of the sprawling vehicle-filled maps Halo players got with the last map pack, these new maps will be “small to medium sized.” The pack will also come with new multiplayer playlists and the new “Infinity Rumble” game type.

The “Landfall” map will be set in the ruins of Tribute’s capital city and encourages close-range combat while providing plenty of “jump routes.”

The “Monolith” map features man-cannons and “open sightlines” that 343 states “harkens back to more classic Halo arana-based maps.”

The “Skyline” map is a small rooftop arena that offers lots of cover, but also has “explosive fuel cells” that can be exploited.

What could possibly entice Bungie into giving up Halo, its baby and one of the most successful game series ever? This week the studio finally revealed what it has been working on for these past few years.

Destiny is the next title from the studio, which released a short video documentary filled with concept art, story teasers, and a very few second-long snippets of gameplay.

Destiny will be a first-person shooter and feature science fiction elements such as space ships, aliens, and future technology. It will take place on a post-apocalyptic Earth in which humans live in one city that was saved and is protected by a giant sphere called “The Traveler.”

Though the world-building stuff sounds similar to Halo, the gameplay will not put characters into the shoes of “The One.” Players will instead take on the role of a guardian of the human city. Three different character classes are available, the Titan, the Hunter, and the Warlock. Warlocks will use “magic” derived from the power of The Traveler.

The game will be always-online and feature multiplayer gameplay that shares qualities with MMO gaming and Borderlands-style co-op. Players will group up to take on dungeons such as derelict space ships and moon bases. Bungie expects players to be playing Destiny, or its sequels or updates, for at least the next ten years.

From the announcement at Bungie’s website:

In a matter of days, we’re going to give you your first glimpse into the vision and ambition that’s driving the creation of our brave new world. To make room for the resulting chatter, we’ve launched some official social media channels.

According to the new social feeds created for the game, the big reveal for Destiny will take place on February 17. The game now has Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ pages for fans to follow, and all of them contain the following message:

Follow @DestinyTheGame

Destiny The Game
@DestinyTheGame

You can be the first to see the reveal of #Destiny right here on Feb. 17 (T-Minus 5 days).

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In addition, a new Destiny sub-forum has now appeared on the Bungie forums. Currently, members of the forum are deciphering a Destiny-related alternate reality game (ARG) that Bungie began this week.

Details on Destiny are sparse at this point, but leaked images last year teased that the game will be an ambitious science fiction game with spaceships.

Clueless Gamer, Conan’s insanely delightful game review show, takes on Halo 4 in the latest episode. Of course, the game doesn’t get much of the attention as Conan is too busy invested in Cortana, Master Chief’s AI companion. He does get in a few good jabs, however, including a particularly insightful comment on how games focus too much story at the expense of gameplay.

Personally, Clueless Gamer is wasted on Conan’s late night show. The latest episode only further proves this point. In fact, just get him into focus groups and game testing from now on. I’d love to play a game that was built around his expectations of what a good game is.

Today 343 and Microsoft announced that the first Halo 4 map pack, Crimson, will be launching on December 10. The DLC will cose 800 Microsoft Points and contains three new maps: Wreckage, Harvest, and Shatter. Those who purchased the Halo 4 map pass or purchased the Limited Edition version of the game will be able to download the DLC as soon as it is available. Two more map packs will be released in February and April.

Wreckage is a medium-sized, asymmetrical map created for objective gameplay. It’s styled as a crash site, with debris littering the landscape.

Harvest is a small to medium sized map created for Capture the Flag gameplay. Its name comes from Halo backstory as the planet where humans made first contact with the Covenant.

Shatter is a large, symmetrical map made for tooling around on vehicles. The UNSC mining facility it is set in allows up to 16 players to compete in Infinity Slayer.

Shatter was also created with a new multiplayer mode, Extraction, in mind. The new mode features two teams of 5 players racing to plant a beacon and protect it for a certain amount of time. Extraction will show up in Halo 4 matchmaking alongside the Crimson map pack on December 10.

This week’s episode will feature a bit of mystery, as a mysterious artifact is brought aboard a UNSC ship. From the video description:

The mysterious artifact recovered from Requiem takes control of vital systems on board the UNSC Infinity, forcing the Spartans of Crimson and Majestic back down to the planet to look for a way to free the ship.

Hmm. A mysterious artifact brought aboard a spaceship? The scientists are enamored of it? It takes control of the ship? Besides that one episode of every space-faring sci-fi series ever, this story sounds suspiciously similar to the background story of the original Dead Space. Perhaps 343 is taking the Halo series in the survival-horror direction. We’ll all find out on Monday, when episode 2 of Spartan Ops is released.

For those who haven’t been following the series, Forward Unto Dawn is a live-action web series that follows the life of cadet Thomas Lasky at the UNSC military academy. The series, as promised, ties-in to the beginning of the Halo 4 story, which begins in less than one week. The previous episodes of the series, including the short character vignettes that proceeded it, can be found here.

When we last left Lasky and his remaining squad mates, they had escaped the ruined academy and made off with a warthog for the pelican landing zone. As Lasky learns to drive the vehicle, the cadets put their training to use against Jackals hiding in the forest. Master Chief mans the guns, but we all know what happens when you let the UNSC soldiers drive in the games. It’s clear from cannon that Master Chief survives to participate in the original Halo trilogy, but if the cadets hope to survive they’ll have to become soldiers – because they’re being hunted.

Today, the trailer for the first “season” of Spartan Ops has been released. For those who haven’t heard, Halo 3: ODST‘s and Halo: Reach‘s Firefight mode has been renamed to Spartan Ops. The renamed mode still features up to four player co-op as players battle waves of Covenant and Promethean enemies. This time though, Spartan Ops will be tied-in to campaign and takes place six months after the events in the Halo 4 campaign. 343 has announced that the mode will be an “ongoing, episodic cooperative experience.”

Each week, an episode of an ongoing animated series will be released along with five accompanying missions. These expansions are free with the purchase of the game, and the trailer below shows that the first season of Spartan Ops will include 10 animated episodes and 50 missions.

For those who haven’t been keeping up with the series, Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn is a live-action Halo web series that follows the cadets of Hastati squad at the UNSC’s Corbulo Military Academy. The series will tie-in to the story of Halo 4 and airs in weekly installments every Friday on Halo Waypoint and Machinima Prime. All three of the previous episodes and the short character vignettes that proceded them can be found here. Also, check out my interview with the series’ executive producers, which reveals some behind-the-scenes info on the production.

At the end of the episode three, the academy came under attack from unknown alien forces. Today’s episode sees Hastati squad running for their lives through the halls of the academy. When they get pinned in near the armory, panic sets in and hiding becomes the only option. When an Elite finally finds them, hope seems lost – until a savior arrives.

A lot, it turns out. The Halo universe has grown far beyond the video games, and now has a backstory that spans books and other media. The new Halo live-action web series Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn is proof of that. There is plenty of material from which to continue the story of Master Chief.

It also appears that Microsoft has made the right choice in selecting 343 Industries to continue the Halo franchise. Last month, Halo 4 Executive Producer Kiki Wolfkill explained how 343 is both staying true to the Halo formula and forging ahead with new ideas and gameplay options. From the quality seen in all of the previews, Halo 4 could end up being one of the best Halo games in the series.

For those who haven’t kept up with the numerous trailers and developer documentary shorts, today’s launch trailer focuses more on the gameplay and setting of Halo 4. It serves as the gameplay launch trailer companion to the more story-heavy semi-live-action launch trailer released last week. It also helps introduce gamers to the Prometheans, the Forerunners who (presumably) built the Halos and once battled the flood.