Halo 4: Infinity + Reclaimer

I'm persisting in continuing my playthrough of Halo 4 long after I finished the campaign. There seem to be rumours/news that the 'Halo' shown at E3 isn't actually Halo 5 but another installment in a larger saga. We'll see how that turns out, but it'll depend opn when I eventually get my grubby mits on an Xbox One.

Infinity

As implied in the title, this mission is about John and Cortana going after the UNSC Infinity which has crashed on Requiem. As usual I'll slot in my updates here. 

New Characters

Didact

   










Otherwise known as Ur-Didact or 'Shadow-of-Sundered-Star' this figure was the leader of the Prometheans, a key element of the Forerunner military. The Didact was first mentioned in the terminals in Halo 3 and has his backstory further delved into in the Greg Bear novels, of which I've only read the first. Hidden in the bowels of Reqiuem this opponent of the Flood and the ancient humans has tricked John into resurrecting him from his Cryptum and has taken command of the Promethean Knights to take his revenge on his ancient enemy.

Thomas Lasky

 








Lasky first appeared as a cadet in the live-action series 'Forward Unto Dawn' which I posted on my blog and is now available on Blu-Ray and DVD. Now having risen through the ranks he is second-in-command of the Infinity and running ground operations on Requiem. He is pleased to see that the Chief has survived and to have an opporunity to meet him again.

New Vehicles

Cryptum

 







A Cryptum is a place of solitude where a disgraced Warrior of the Forerunners will spend an extended length of time, even centuries, in hibernation. When Didact was awoken from his Cryptum he was able to use it as a ship to travel around Requiem, it had powerful scanners and incredible speed, though it was vulnerable to heavy weapons fire such as a MAC blast.

UNSC Infinity

This massive vessel is over five and a half thousand metres long and bristling with experimental engines, weapons and even carrying it's own escort fleet of frigates into battle. As well as a warship it is designed for scientific exploration with the latest equipment and teams of highly trained researchers to investigate the wealth of technological resources uncovered by the war.

Mantis

A new addition to the UNSC's arsenal of ground vehicles the Mantis is an exoskeleton capable of being operated by a single occupant to devstating effect. Equipped with a chain gun and a missile launcher. The vehicle can also launch physical attacks on any ground forces unfortunate enough to approach it.

New Weapons

Scattershot

  






A Promethean shotgun-type weapon. I have to say this was my least-favourite weapon because it looked and functioned exactly like a shotgun, particularly when reloading it. I know it has to be balanced because of multiplayer etc. but I thought for an alien weapon it was just a bit too human.

Railgun

Another addition to the UNSC's store of weapons the railgun accelerates a projectile to devastating speed. While requiring a short time to charge it is deadly against infantry and light vehicles when fired.

Scythe Anti-Aircraft Gun

Placed on the outside of the Infinity's hull this weapon could function both in atmosphere and space firing at a rapid rate to drive away enemies. John activated these weapons to repel Covenant forces from the downed Infinity.

Lance Guided Missile Launcher

Used to defend various facilities and warships, these missiles when activated by John repelled incoming Phantoms approaching the Infinity. There was also an Onager MAC turret mounted on the hull, which was used to repel the Didact's Cryptum.

Story

Following the Didact across Requiem, John and Cortana find forces from the Infinity who are being overrun by pursuing Covenant and the native Prometheans, who have begun acting as allies against humanity. Eventually Chief meets up with Lasky and a detachment of Marines and Spartan-IVs who are pinned down on the surface. Fighting their way back to the Infinity Chief takes a Mantis to the hull and reactivates the defenses, repelling the invaders andf giving the UNSC Crew a chance to regroup and escape the surface.


Reclaimer

As the Infinity lifts off, a company of it's forces are commited to taking out the powerful Forerunner cannons preventing their movement.


New Characters

Andrew Del Rio

Commanding officer of the Infinity, he has a reputation for ensuring that hjis ships come back from battle in one piece. Tasked with leading the converted warship on a science expedition to locate the remaining Halo rings and study them to ensure they will no longer activate he and his crew were lead to Requiem.

Sarah Palmer

Sarah Palmer is commanding officer of all the Spartans aboard Infinity deploying Fireteams to key situations across Requiem. She is a skilled combatant able to work independently as well as lead her force of super-soldiers

SPARTAN-IVs

The new generation of Spartans, enhahnced from adult volunteers instead of 'conscripted' children are the powerhouse of Infinity's forces. Chief assisted a force of Spartans in his mission. One gripe I did have was that all Spartas wore 'Recruit' armour, which made the look like ODSTs rather than something more definitive like the 'Warrior' armour seen above.

Librarian

 







Wife of the Didact and in the end opposer of his plans to bring harm to humanity she was able to leave something of her essence behind on Requiem, this part of her recognized John as a reclaimer and aided him, also revealing the full extend of Didact's plan.

New Vehicles

Mammoth

 









A suitable massive vehicle, eclipsing even the Elephant vehicle of Halo 3. A mobile command centre able to transport a whole company of soldiers around the battlefield and able to deploy support vehicles from it's lower deck. The vehicle even has it's own mini-MAC cannon capable of delivering massive damage.

Lich

A heavier Covenant dropship with powerful armaments and capable of travelling in space. Equipped with a powerful plasma beam, similar to that of a Scarab this larger vehicle could deploy a significant force quickly into a warzone and support them with heavy firepower.

New Weapons

Particle Cannon

  







Powerful Forerunner weapons, capable of doing immense damage even to starships, only heavy weapons fire could incapacitate them.

Story

Chief, Cortana and Del Rio butt heads about what to do, with Del Rio arguing that they should leave Requiem, and Chief arguing that they should press their advantage against Didact. John joins Gypsy company and they head out and combat Covenant forces and Prometheans on the way to the particle cannons. Entering a Forerunner structure the Librarian informs John of the Composer a weapon used to turn humans into digital form, making them Promethean Knights. She also informed him of her plan to accelerate the evolution of humanity and triggered changes in John, including immunity to the composer. Returning to the ship, with the gravity well disabled, Del Rio makes ready to leave but Cortana shows her rampancy. Refusing to hand her over for examination Chief leaves the ship, opting to stay behind on the planet and stop Didact.

More Halo soon!

Halo 4: Requiem + Forerunner

OK so finally continuing with my progress in Halo 4, I have now completed all Spartan Ops chapters so have 'fully' completed the game. I've been meaning to continue posting for a while, but what with E3 the blog has been somewhat saturated with Halo content recently so I thought I'd give this post a bit of breathing room.

As in the title this post covers the second and third playable missions of the game.

Requiem

After the planet opens following the mysterious scan the wreckage of Forward Unto Dawn is sucked into the void along with several of the Storm Covenant fleet unlucky enough to be in it's gravitational field. John fails to reach an escape pod in time and falls through the portal into the planet's interior. Requiem is a Dyson Sphere with an hollow core and a planetary surface on the inside of the crust.

New Enemies

Sangheili Zealot

OK so not a new type at all, but the redesign of the Zealot, especially with the 'eyes' on top of the helmet is pretty darn cool!!

New Weapons

SAW

 







AKA M739 Light Machine Gun this is a nifty new addition to the UNSC's arsenal a drum-magazine fe machine gun with a rapid fire-rate and a huge ammo reserve capable of taking down powerful enemies with sustained fire.

Shade Turret

The Typew-55 Anti-Infantry Stationary Gun is the lastest incarnation of the Covenant turrets seen throughout the Halo series.

Story

After recovering from their fall Chief and Cortana battle their way through the wreckage of several ships to try and find a Cartographer to explain where they are and if there is another way off the planet. Cortana tells Chief that she is nearing Rampancy, having been in service far longer than the expected 7 years of an AI. Chief plans to steal a ship and get back to Dr. Halsey who may be able to help Cortana. As they explore the Forerunner structures they find a reference to 'reclaimers' following the information they deduce that UNSC 'Infinity' has also found Requiem. Thye try to track down it's signal but are suddenly attacked by strange beings.

Forerunner

Chief jumps into a portal opened by Cortana and resumes his search for Infinity and a way off the planet.

New Enemies

Promethean Knight

 










Seemingly powerful Forerunner AI constructs similar to Sentinels, they have a far darker history to be revealed. They carry powerful weapons and have the ability to teleport at will and deploy Watchers from their backs for defense and support. They are dangerous alone and deadly in a group.

Promethan Crawler

Dog-like Forerunner AIs these foes carry Forerunner weaponry in their 'mouths' and are capable of scaling walls and leaping to great heights to swarm a foe from all sides. They always deploy in packs using different tactics to wear down an enemy.

Promethean Watcher

Flying Forerunner AIs these enemies can swarm an opponent but typically they are deployed to support Knights, with Knights able to carry them within their armour. As support they are most deadly, able to project hard light shields over Knights, catch and return thrown grenades and even resurrect fallen Knights.

New Weapons

Pulse Grenade

 






I wasn't overly impressed with these weapons, sticky grenades and even frags are more effective weapons, while the pulse it emits is deadly it isn't too hard to avoid, even when launched from Promethean weapons. The grenade emits a powerful area of effect which weakens enemies and then detonates, sometimes incinerating it's victims.

Boltshot

This weapon is typically carried by Watchers and sometimes by Crawlers, in human hands it can function as a rapid-fire pistol, shooting bolts of hard-light (the standard Promethean amunition) at an enemy. It is a multifunction weapon and can also fire a spread of bolts in one, creating a shotgun effect.

Suppressor

This weapon is typically carried by Crawlers and sometimes by Knights. It is essentially an Assault Rifle with a large clip and a rapid rate of fire. It's pretty cool how Forerunner weapons assemble themselves out of components in your hand as you pick them up.

Lightrifle

A long range weapon carried by Knights, able to fire bolts in a three shot spread or, when focused, a single more powerful bolt of hard light, functioning as a mix of the UNSC's DMR and Battle Rifle.

There were other Forerunner weapons in this level, but I'll save them for a later post.

Story

Master Chief  and Cortana venture deeper into the planet Requiem, making brief contact with the UNSC Infinity. All along they are forced to battle the Promethean forces that have designated them a threat and Storm forces that have followed them through. Cortana directs the Chief to a set of pylons which appear to be able to establish firm contact with the UNSC vessel, which they need to do urgently as the vessel risks being puled into the portal they fell through. Chief makes it to the terminal in time - but it is not what he expected...

More Halo  soon!!

Halo: Spartan Assault

Yes, this is the one game I missed out - technically it was released before E3 so doesn't come under their umbrella and thus was worth mentioning on it's own.

The story takes place between Halo 3 and Halo 4 and features Sarah Palmer (a minor player in 4's campaign, but a major player in 'Spartan Ops') as well as a mysterious 'Spartan Davis' as playable characters.

The game is a top down shooter for Windows phones tablets and devices running Windows 8. I still run Windows 7 so unless there's a port for iOS sometime in the future you won't be hearing much about it from me for a while. Nonetheless it's exciting to see 343 branch out to more media, also announced is a new comic series 'Initiation' featuring characters from this game.

That's about it - I'll leave you with the trailer which features gameplay and samples of cinematics, done in the same style as Halo 4's terminals.

Next Up: Movies

E3 2013: Game Updates

More E3, this time looking at updated information, new trailers and excitement for games that we already knew about before the Expo. I'll post links to the trailers and other videos of the games I found most interesting.


Destiny

Bungie's new shooter is top of my list of things to see, with a cool new Sci-Fi setting and a host of new alien races, weapons and vehicles it is sure to be popping up on this blog soon after release, as I'm going to plum for the 360 version rather than wait for the Xbox One edition, assuming the multiplayer elements are consistent on both platforms . Here's the latest trailer

Destiny is an open world shooter that incorporates elements of multiplayer matchmaking and MMO style games to pair you with friends to play missions or with members of the community. Rather than MMO where you can see everyone else you will be linked up with a Fireteam of other players to complete your mission, maybe linking up with a larger group. This interview and demo, highlights some of these features in action.

Batman: Arkham Origins

We've already had an announcement for this new game in the series (controversially not made by Rocksteady, creators of the original Arkham games) detailing the life of an early years Batman, facing down a bunch of killers competing for the price on his head on Christmas Eve. Being released for the 360 this is definitely on my wish list! This interview delves further into the gameplay and story of the game.

Quantum Break

We had the announcement for this time-shifting game back at the Xbox One reveal and it's been designed for the new generation, this new trailer looks at a moment in the game and it's high-res glory, but little information about how you play in a time-frozen event has been revealed as of yet.

Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

Another 360 game on my wish list - well all Assassin's Creed titles ultimately are always going to be on my list as they have yet to disappoint. I'm currently dipping my toe into ACIII so I'm looking forward to the next title when it comes out. Multiplayer details have been revealed as well as this a new CG trailer.

Deadpool

Not sure if this is on my list but the quirky Marvel hero deserves a mention here in his own game with new details revealed at E3.

Lost Planet 3

A franchise I haven't really followed, but it's new and Sci-Fi and deserves a mention here.

and lastly...

Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare

Don't know if it's strictly SF, but who doesn't love Plants vs Zombies and to see them head direct to consoles with a new 3D game as well as a sequel on PC and mobile devices is great news!!

Those are the games that caught my eye and that's a wrap for this year's E3 - I wonder what they'll be announcing next year. One thing I'd hoped for was to see what's next for Mass Effect or if there's a new SF franchise from Bioware - but with them busy announcing Dragon Age 3 I guess it's understandable that they're not.

Next Up: One more game that I missed out...

E3 2013: New Titles

Well E3 has come and gone and as usual I'm playing catchup, but I had a monster of a comic book post to do and wanted to finish that first and hey, a week later isn't too bad anyway!!

I'm going to split my coverage of E3 into two parts, this first post will look at debut announcements made at the conference, while the next post will look at the new information given for already announced games. With the new consoles out of the bag there were plenty of new games - here are some of the Sci-Fi ones that caught my eye.

First up this one that I saw as I sat down to watch the live feed, it quickly got me out of my seat with excitement!!

I hadn't seen this coming - I knew a Halo announcement was possible, but I'd expected it for the Xbox One announcement event and it hadn't arrived so I figured we maybe had another year to wait. The trailer caught me by surprise looking like a completely new IP. Looks like John is having to cope on his own while going up against a pretty monstrous Forerunner (Precursor?) enemy. It's due in 2014 but of course requires shelling out for the new Xbox One so it may be a while before you read about it on this blog - but nothing new there!

Titanfall

At first it looks like a standard mech-warrior game, but Titanfall does seem to have some depth and variety to it. One interesting comment made was that testsers spent most of their time playing as pilots, not as mechs. The technology allowing for boosts, double jumps and smoothe wallrunning looks like it'll make the game more dynamic than others that have gone before, and let's face it mechs are always fun right?!!

Mirror's Edge 2

While Halo usually steals the show for my excitement, this came a pretty close second!! A lot of us thought the franchise was dead and there had been no word on a sequel to the ground-breaking game for some time so I'd given up hope. But (presumably on the new consoles) Faith is back to her free-running, rifle stealing self! With other games (including Titanfall) including free-running elements in their gameplay it'll be interesting to see if this franchise can still hold it's ground - I , for one, am hopeful.

Star Wars: Battlefront

Oh yeah! a tiny teaser for the first Star Wars game since the closure of Lucasarts. Not owning a PlayStation I've never played the franchise so far, but it's one fans have been calling for and it was good news to see that Star Wars still has a future in gaming. Obviously the teaser is set on Hoth, recreating the battle in Empire but hopefully we'll see some new storyline in there too.

Mad Max 

Another entry for the new consoles, not much revealed on this one, set in the world of the classic post-apocalyptic films.


OK, that's all I can think of - I'm sure I've missed one or two - post a comment to let me know!!
 

Halo 4: Dawn

It's finally time!! I've finished writing about Mass Effect and now I'm on to Halo!! To be fair it wasn't all my fault - I've been meaning to blog about it for a while, but the recent Xbox One announcement threw my planned blogging pattern out of synch a little bit!

So yes my plan is to blog through Halo 4, each post will cover two missions unless I find I can cram more in as I go on. I will discuss any new enemies, weapons and vehicles that we come across (and there are plenty!!) as well as giving an overview of the storyline as I'm fairly sure any Halo fans will have played the game so won't need to worry about spoilers at this stage. As for my current progress I'm nearly finished playing 'Spartan Ops' a multiplayer campaign (though I've largely played it solo) set after the events of the single player story. The missions are simpler and shorter but have a decent story to them too.

I will try to be as throrough as I can, but one major downside to the new game is the lack of 'Theatre' mode. This was helpful in Halo: Reach as I was able to take snapshots of various thigs I couldn't find pictures of online, so apologies if there is anything missing here.

Prologue

The first 'mission' is actually a cinematic, rendered in amazing lifelike CG - it pretty much speaks for itself so I'll just post it here.

Dawn

The first level of the Campaign finds John still adrift on the Forward Unto Dawn nearly five years after destroying Instalation 00 and the Flood as well as the remains of the loyalist Covenant fleet. Detecting threats Cortana wakes John to find the ship not-so-abandoned.

New Enemies

Storm Covenant

The old Covenant is dead, most of the Prophets died aboard High Charity and the Brute loyalists were defeated by the Arbiter's forces which allied with humanity. But lacking a purpose a new rebel 'covenant' was formed, following the old ways and seeking Forerunner technology and rejecting the Arbiter's leadership. While generally less equipped then their predecessors, higher ranking Storm members have access to advanced technologies. Member species still include Unggoy (grunts) Kig-Yar (jackals) and Mgalekgolo (hunters) but Jiralhanae (brutes) Yanme'e (drones) and Huragok (engineers) are no longer present.

Covenant Rangers

Rangers, equipped for extra-vehicular activity, have long been part of the Covenant forces, but this is the first time Unggoy and Kig-Yar rangers have been encountered in-game.

Kig-Yar Heavy

Just to note that it seems a new species of Kig-Ya is in this game, being more reptilian than bird-like or maybe it is an overall redesign. These Jackal heavies have stronger shields and body armour than the rank and file.

New Weapons

Storm Rifle

 






A modified version of the standard plasma rifle issued to Covenant forces, this is the Standard weapon carried by Sangheili loyal to the new Covenant.

Hyperion Missile

Part of the armament of Forward Unto Dawn, this is a powerful ship-to-ship weapon capable of destroying a small cruiser.

New vehicles

CRS-Class Cruiser

Essentially a much smaller version of the standard CCS-Cruiser used by the Covenant, a large force of these smaller vessels, supporting some Assault Carriers and larger craft are the bulk of the Storm's fleet.

Story

Awoken from cryo-sleep Chief is pushed into action by Cortana, who detects a presence nearby. As they expore the ruined ship they are scanned by an unknown force. John runs into a Covenant, surprised at their hostility, looking for more information they head to the observation deack to see a host of cruisers flocking around the wreck. Covenant forces board and John fights through them to the outer hull of the ship where he manually launches a missile at an approaching cruiser unfortunate enough to have it's shields down. But after this action John is sucked into the Forerunner planet Requiem by an unknown entity...but I'll get to that!!

More Halo soon! Next up Dawn of the Jedi!

Mass Effect: He who laughs best

As part of free comic book day this special Mass Effect story was released to comic book stores worldwide. This is the first time I've picked up a FCBD copy (there have been Star Wars editions before now) because being UK based it obviously costs a lot for my local comic company to order them and then distribute them for free.

New Characters

General Invectus

Species: Turian
Sex: Male
Occupation: Turian General











Invectus was tasked with inaugurating the Normandy SR-1, a joint human-turian effort, that would become the famous flagship of Commander Shepard. Invectus's presence as the sole representative of the turian race was heralded as a sign of trust between the two races.

Story

The main character of the story is Jeff "Joker" Moreau. A qualified pilot with impressive records, he is held back from his dream of flying a ship because of his physical condition (brittle bone disease). Tasked with being Invectus's shuttle pilot he brags about how he should pilot the ship and is shot down by Invectus, who also judges him as a cripple. With no resort left Joker steals the Normandy, due to take it's time trials near Arcturus Station. Joker outruns and evades fighter pursuit, still managing to complete the course in record time. Impressed by his talents as a pilot, Invectus recommends him for the job of Normandy pilot.

A nifty little backstory that was fun to have as part of free comic book day.

Next up: Halo!

Halo: The Television Series

Before going back to my usual run of well out-of-date game and comic book reviews there's one more piece of news from the Xbox One event - a Halo TV series, directed by none other than Steven Spielberg himself!! No news on the story yet but if Forward Unto Dawn is anything to go by, this should be awesome.

It will be airing on Xbox One's new TV service so I don't know when I'll be able to get my hands on it but it's very exciting news nonetheless.

Watch the announcement video below for a bit more info.

Xbox One

It's finally been revealed!! The new Xbox console is the Xbox One (no one predicted that name, I'm just glad it isn't the 720!!!) with the motto that it is the new all in ONE entertainment system, going beyond just a games console.

The design looks a little clunky on first look and I will miss the curves of my 360 when I eventually shell out for this beast but I think Microsoft are sending a definite message that this is designed to sit alongside your Freeview box, Blu-Ray player and (as Microsoft would hope) replace them as the ultimate entertainment system.

And it does seem set to do that, from beinbgf turned on with a voice command ("Xbox on") to having a personalised home screen to being able to seamlessly jump between gaming and other functions, even operating on split-screen so you can IMDB that guy who was in the thing with your movie still playing on the main screen. New features include Skype calls, which have been long awaited by fans such as myself, and will also work with the split-screen function, meaning you can video chat with your friends while gaming.

The biggest boost is the ability to be able to watch live TV by hooking up your reciever to the Xbox One (I'll be interested to see if my Freesat box is compatible) and watch your TV simply by saying 'watch TV' and you can also access and search the TV guide from your xbox with voice and motion commands.

I'm interested in how the new Kinect works, because it only has one camera visible but they boast that it has much better functionality then the previous generation and seemed to be pretty slick in the tech demo at the press conference. We'll see how it pans out - the controller is also supposed to be the 'best ever' but from the outside it hasn't changed dramatically.

Obviously gaming capabilities have been boosted with improved graphics and processing power - Forza 5 was use to demonstrate the realism of picture achievable on the new console. There will also be a new achievment system, improved matchmaking and social capabilities. And the ability to replay your gameplay and take screenshots of all games you play - a very big draw for me - expect to see loads of screenshots popping up on this blog when I get my hands on it!!

No word on the price tag yet but some retailers have put up a preliminary listing of £399 - we'll see what finally emerges nearer to Christmas. Well that's it for now - whatever the final price is I'll be waiting till it drops down first so you won't hear any Xbox One news from me for a while yet - but it does look to be a very exciting console!!

Lastly I was hoping for lots of game announcements but it looks like Xbox are holding their breath till E3 for that - one game was announced 'Quantum Break' which seems to feature time-shitfing/travelling gameplay. Watch the teaser below!

Xbox Event

Yes it's finally here! The new generation Xbox console, following on the heels of the Playstation 4, will be announced tomorrow and you can watch the whole thing live on Xbox Live, Gametrailers and numerous other websites.

It's airing about 6pm in the UK so I'll probably only catch the tail end of it but I'm excited to see what the future holds for Xbox gamers even if it'll be a while before I can afford to buy the shiny new console (assuming it's shiny that is!!).

I'm hopeing for some fun new features - PS4s on the fly video capability and allowing another player to remotely take over your game to get you past a hard boss are pretty revolutionary features and I'm hoping that Xbox can top them with something awesome. 

Anyway, hopefully there'll be a swath of new game announcements, trailers and other tidbits for me to spill over onto this blog.

Blogga's Wall - February - April 2013

So a bit of a catchup post again - here's what went up on the wall over the past few months.

1) Star Wars: The Essential Reader's Companion

An avid collector of the Essential Guides this was high on my birthday list and it didn't dissapoint. A chronological summarisation of Star Wars literature with editor's notes and fantastic illustrations highlighting the key moments in the stories. For me it's great to show my wife where Star Wars stuff we're reading fits into the big picture, check out the timeline placement of certain stories and also read succinct summaries of all the prequel-era stuff I never bothered to read!!! If you want to quickly refresh your knowledge or introduce friends to the EU then this is the book for you!!

2) Star Wars Legacy: Prisoner of the Floating World #1

The return of Legacy is awesome!! The comic book series set 100 years after even the latest novels is what got me into Star Wars comics in the first place and a chance to continue that story is well worth jumping on board. I have to be honest in admitting I miss the old series and style but I'm certainly willing to give Ania Solo and her friends a chance and spent more time in this era. You'll have a review when the story arc finishes in a few month's time so I won't say more at this stage.

3) Chocky

One of a large pile of John Wyndham novels given to me by my pastor when he left for France, I enjoyed this novel about a boy with a not-so-imaginary friend. I didn't find it as enjoyable as 'Triffids' or some of the other books I've read and I don't know if the father's hapless attitude was symptomatic of the time (smoking in front of kids and ignoring serious psychological disorders - very pre-health and safety!!) or just annoying writing but it was fun to the end.

4) Assassin's Creed III

With the fourth installment due later in the year I thought I'd better lay my hands and this game as soon as the price came down a bit and thankfully it did. I'm still plodding my way through Halo's Spartan Ops but I've had a few forrays into this game and found it just as gripping as the rest of the series even in it's early chapters.

Thanks for reading - up next: Doctor Who!

Mass Effect 3: The End

It's finally time!! The last post covering Mass Effect 3!!! It's been a while since I finished, enough time for me to finish the campaign of Halo 4 in fact, but it's still great to look back on this epic adventure as Shepard finally takes the fight bacvk to Earth.


With Cerberus out of the picture it's time for an all-out assault on Earth, not only to free the planet but to activate the Crucible, which requires the Citadel as it's key component, now orbiting the planet with the heaviest force of Reapers guarding it. Anderson outlines the plan, the allied forces are split into three fleets:-

The Sword - which will engage the Reapers directly and occupy their forces
The Shield - which will hold back and protect the Crucible until it is ready to activate
The Hammer - which will punch through to the ground and attempt to infiltrate the Citadel from the city of London.

All forces are committed and a fierce battle begins.

Upon landing Shepard is asked to meet up with the rest of Hammer forces, but on the way they find Hammer troops being picked out of the sky by Reaper anti-air so Shepasrd is diverted to take it out.

The Hades Cannon is a massive Reaper device, the size of a Destroyer-class Reaper. It is capable of damaging large targets and picking nimble targets such as shuttle out of the sky. Shepard used the power of the M-920 Cain to take it out. 








Shepard pushes through to the Forward Base where he meets up with Anderson and also Wrex who is rallying his forces, while Javik is reflecting on the first war with the Reapers and how close his people came. There is also a communications station where Shepard spoke to all his former comrades scattered throughout the warzone, thanking them for all they have done to keep the fight alive. After a moment of peace with Liara Shepard heads through to the briefing.

London is a complete warzone, but their goal lies ahead - the conduit which will transport ground forces up to the Citadel where they can secure it. 






A Reaper destroyer lands ahead of the conduit. Shepard manages to defend and activate some Thanix missiles ahead of the Reaper and uses them to take it out with a precisely timed shot.  With the destroyer out of the way it's time for an all out push to the Citadel.

Just when it couldn't get any worse - Harbinger shows up!!







Despite the valiant efforts, most of the Hammer force is wiped out and Shepard's crew have to retreat to the Normandy leaving him to fight on alone, injured, to the Citadel. After wandering through the now empty station he meets up with Anderson only to find them both ambushed by the Illusive Man, now a slave of the Reapers, he kills Anderson before Shepard convinces him of the truth and he kills himself (much as Saren did) leaving Shepard free to finish the process.

Now under his control, the Crucible docks with the Citadel, completing the device. 








Shepard  now confronts the Catalyst and has a hard choice to make.

The Catalyst (taking the form of the boy that haunts Shepard's dreams) is the intelligence that the Leviathans created, which in turn created the Reapers.









The Catalyst confirms that the Reapers 'harvest' organic life due to the constant conflict between organic and synthetic life that threatens to eradicate both kinds. Because of this the Reapers were created to harvest sentient life at it's peak before the conflict grew and then start again every 50,000 years with the organic life becoming integrated into a new Reaper. 

It gives Shepard the power to choose the Galaxy's fate, destroy the Reapers (and all other synthetic life with them) or take control of them as the Illusive Man wanted to, with Shepard becoming the new Catalyst. Shepard, unhappy with these choices, uncovers a third - synthesis with organic and synthetic life merging into one and bringing unity and peace to the galaxy.

Shepard starts the process, at the cost of his own life, but he brings a new era of peace to the galaxy. The Reapers now merged with organic life offer their knowledge and help the races of the galaxy rebuild and look to the future. I'll leave you with this vid which shows the ending, slightly different from mine (ignore the female Shepard and dead Miranda!!) but which covers the future fought for by Shepard and the conclusionm of the game

I hope you've enjoyed hearing about my adventures in Mass Effect - there's a new comic series starting in a few month's time, the Citadel DLC I may get and BioWare have strongly hinted that they are not done with the universe even if they are finished with Shepard's story so I doubt this will be my last ever post on the subject!!