Okay everybody, the long long wait is now over. It’s been 5 years since Master Chief graced our screens with his spartan presence but he returns to be a glorious hero once again. His return is also being noted as the ‘Biggest Entertainment Event of 2012’ looking to take The Avenger’s title. It doesn’t come as much of a surprise to die hard Halo fans like myself, as Master Chief is a huge icon in the gaming world, everybody wants to be him and play as him, we are all aching to step into his armour once again, to experience a whole new story. It’s exciting stuff i tell you.
Halo 4 is the first chapter of a brand-new saga in the genre-defining, $3 billion franchise that has shaped entertainment history and sold a staggering 46 million games worldwide. Hailed by NBC News as “breathtaking, heart-breaking and awe-inspiring, Halo 4 has garnered universal acclaim as one of the top-rated video games of 2012, according to Metacritic. In a year jam-packed with record-breaking Hollywood movies and games, it is also expected to break all previous day-one entertainment sales records in 2012, cementing its status as the must-have blockbuster of the year.
Excitement for the return of the Master Chief has swept the globe. In London, a massive illuminated glyph soared over the River Thames, a symbol of the new threat that has awakened. The glyph, which measures 50 feet in diameter and weighs 3.2 tons, was illuminated by 113,096 LED lights and represents one of the largest objects ever to be flown by helicopter as a lighting art performance. On Oct. 30, the European country of Liechtenstein was reimagined into a real-life replica of the Halo universe, marking the first time a brand has taken over an entire country for an entertainment launch. For one day only, Xbox 360 transformed some of the country’s most iconic landmarks, including a 13th-century castle and a working mine, to create a mysterious alternate universe in the heart of Europe — all inspired by Halo.
Around the world, midnight madness swept more than 10,000 stores in more than 40 countries, as hundreds of thousands of fans lined up around city blocks to count down to the game’s release. At marquee launch events in Seattle, Paris, London, Berlin, Tokyo, Singapore, Hong Kong, Dubai, Sydney and other major cities, throngs of fans, celebrities and athletes flocked to be among the first to play the game and participate in other launch activities, such as meeting the creators of the game, viewing private screenings of the live-action digital series “Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn,” and taking photos with the Master Chief.
“Halo 4 marks a rebirth and a new beginning for one of the most beloved and iconic franchises in the modern history of entertainment,” said Phil Spencer, corporate vice president of Microsoft Studios. “Over the past decade, the ‘Halo’ franchise has become a bona fide pop culture phenomenon, and Halo 4 promises to take the franchise to a new level and set the stage for the next decade of Halo.”
With the launch of Halo 4 coinciding with Election Day, Microsoft Corp. is amplifying its get-out-the-vote campaign, which kicked off earlier this year in collaboration with Rock the Vote, to encourage “Halo” and Xbox LIVE fans to exercise their civic duty before jumping into the game. The campaign began with voter recruitment efforts at major consumer events as well as a voter registration program on Xbox LIVE and expanded to major launch events and more than 100 college campuses nationwide
