Halo: Spartan Strike announced

It might be a while before we see Halo 5: Guardians, but there’s plenty going on in that universe for fans. The Master Chief Collection arrives in December, but there’ll be more Spartan action for those of you who prefer a more old-school twin stick experience, as Microsoft just announced Halo: Spartan Strike.

I kinda dug the first game in this top-down series, Spartan Assault. It wasn’t anything revolutionary at all, but it was a fun diversion. Control a Spartan, use their weapons, equip a skill and kill some Covenant. Easy-peasy, and reminiscent of some of the better games in the genre.

Spartan Strike will apparently have “refined controls” according to IGN, better aiming and a 25 week schedule of various challenges which will lead to unlockable rewards for Halo: The Master Chief Collection. The game is out first on PC and applicable Windows tablets and phones on December 12. Expect it to make a transition to console shortly afterwards, much like Spartan Assault did. I know that 343 Industries hasn’t made any announcement regarding that yet, but c’mon, It’s Halo. Xbox without Halo is like a traffic cop without an embarrassingly massive beer gut.

As I said before, I dug this game. In bite-sized chunks, it was a decent amount of fun and it felt better on Xbox One than it did on other devices. Of course I’m completely biased about this, because I lined the game up a couple of months ago when it was free with Games For Gold. So, so biased, right?