Halo: Spartan Strike Announced

Earlier today, Eurogamer reported that Microsoft had announced Halo: Spartan Strike. According to the source, Spartan Strike will be the follow-up game to last year's Spartan Assault. Given the massive popularity of the Halo franchise, this should serve as a pretty strong foundation for Microsoft to start building their marketing on for Halo 5: Guardians. There's also the Master Chief Collection to consider, as well as the Halo: Nightfall TV series.

Apparently, Spartan Strike will not feature any microtransactions, unlike its predecessor. The inital $5.99 entry fee will get you everything currently available in the game. This doesn't say anything about possible downloadable content, but we're betting that you'll probably have to pay for that. Given that you're able to completely avoid what are sometimes game-breaking microtransactions, we're happy that Microsoft has decided to take this route.

The title will be available on Windows phones, PCs and tablets. If you buy it for the phone, you get all three versions automatically. Steam is obviously separate, but you'll get the experience of chasing achievements, if that means anything to you. Players can expect around 30 missions to fight through, which seems pretty substantial given the admission price.

Spartan Strike takes place during the events of Halo 2, which is considered by many to be a low point in the main story arc. However, it was by no means a bad game. It was above average, actually. All things considered, we're looking very forward to visiting the past when Spartan Strike hits veritable store shelves on December 12 later this year.