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Read more about Halo 3 ODST Game Guide
Prima commands the Helljumpers to offer the only official game guide for Halo 3: ODST.
September 22nd, Roseville CA.
The Official Game Guide to Halo 3: ODST has finally dropped, and takes you directly into the action as the Battle for New Mombasa rages on. Playing as key members of the ODST “Helljumpers” squad assigned to a classified mission within the hellscape of a major evacuated city under constant Convenant bombardment, it becomes imperative to learn precisely where you are, what enemies you face, the crucial weapons for all manner of foe takedowns; essentially how to survive the mean streets of New Mombasa. This is where the Prima Game Guide comes in.
Written over a period of months with the help and support of Bungie, this 320 page book is packed with tips, hints, and takedowns; tactical knowledge that’s not only been battle-tested, but approved by veteran testers from both Microsoft and Bungie. Quite simply; if this guide doesn’t have a tactical plan in it, the plan isn’t worth knowing about. With the game featuring a complex Campaign mode, an all-new Firefight game, and all 24 Halo 3 Multiplayer maps, the guide tackles all these aspects methodically, and with extreme attention to detail. Here’s how it all breaks down:
The guide begins with a section on Basic Training. This reveals biographies for each member of the ODST squad you’re fighting with, before a primer with general tactical knowledge, notes on the brand-new Heads-Up Display features, mapping, combat information, and aspects of the infamous Legendary mode. At the end of this chapter, you’ll be ready to drop.
Chapter 2 focuses in on Armaments and Equipment. Every available piece of UNSC and Covenant machinery, whether a weapon, turret, grenades, vehicle, or other equipment type, is inspected thoroughly; followed by the item’s strengths and weaknesses. Need to know how a Suppressed Magnum fares against a Hunter? Or what type of grenade works best against a Shield Jackal? Then peruse this chapter, and use it to update your knowledge as soon as you encounter a new piece of equipment in the game.
Facing the Covenant threat can be difficult. However, Know Your Enemy (Chapter 3) brings every single killing tactic to the table, and reveals how to cut down every Grunt, Jackal, Brute, Drone, Hunter, and the all-new Engineer that you’ll face in both Campaign and Firefight modes. Exploits are revealed, and most importantly, a massive chart showing the effectiveness of each weapon compared to every other weapon, for all enemies, on all difficulty levels, shows just how committed we are to obsessive details.
The Campaign section of this guide is an enjoyable romp through New Mombasa, on a search for the Superintendent. Every Mission is revealed along with a fully-labeled map of the combat zone, along with well-practiced strategies for every Chokepoint you encounter throughout the Mission. Specific Cooperative and Legendary tactics are showcased constantly, allowing you to learn precisely how to deal with every battle, search, and slaughter effortlessly and easily, no matter what the difficulty. There’s also a Tour of New Mombasa, mapping out the maze of Districts and flagging the landmarks in each one, allowing quick and easy navigation.
Firefight Missions are both tense and incredibly addictive, and even more fun to play once you’ve read up on all ten Firefight maps, tailoring tactics to each of them. Aside from the fully-annotated maps, each Mission receives a variety of advice on the best two weapons to use through the various Sets and Rounds. Enemy incursion points are tagged, along with specific plans for each Map: Invaluable advice abounds.
As Halo 3: ODST is packaged with all 24 Halo 3 Multiplayer maps, it is only right to provide complete tactical knowledge of every single one of these areas. Working with the veterans of Clan PMS, masses of tactical knowledge is imparted, from weapon spawn times to ambush spots, topographical techniques to game mode advice. Key knowledge from the three new maps – Citadel, Heretic, and Longshore – are also provided.
Finally, whether you need to know the Skull or Score Multipliers or Game Unlockables, the Appendices chapter at the back of this weighty tome has everything you need. Check off and gain advice on the trickier Achievements (including the Vidmaster Challenges), or calculate how many points your Firefight Medals are worth; all in one place.
Don’t forget to check Xbox Live for video strategies, dropping constantly throughout the upcoming weeks!
Covenant assault forces continue to receive strategic overview, as war footage reveals the impressive Wraith tank, the building-killing Locust, and the hit-and-run specialized air unit known as the Banshee. Additional knowledge regarding the Vampire and fabled Scarab is also imparted.
For more information including free previews of the guide and awesome contests, check out the Prima Official Halo Wars Page.
Our author, Fernando Bueno, got the chance of lifetime, to sit down and interview Todd McFarlane:
Not everyone gets to live their dream and make a living of all things leisure-time like sports, comics, movies, and so on. One person has, however. Todd McFarlane, Spawn creator, founder of Image Comics and McFarlane toys, was kind enough to grant me an interview recently. We talked about his involvement in creating the Halo collectible action figures, his approach to work, and his view on video games.
Fernando Bueno: Thanks for taking time out of your busy schedule to speak with me, Todd.
Todd McFarlane: No problem.
FB: So tell us, how did you end up here?
TM: Well, I broke into the comic book industry out of college and sort of hit the ground running there. I worked my way up the ladder, working on some big characters like Batman, Spider-Man, and Hulk. From there I started my own comic company, Image Comics, at which point I pulled this comic character named Spawn out of my portfolio that I had since high school and made him sorta the flagship title of my studio. From there, I started to push Spawn up the mountain, if you will.
I decided that I needed to get into other things like TV, movies, toys, and video games. Sometimes I used other companies, and in the case of the toys, I couldn’t find any that would understand what I was trying to do artistically, so I started my own toy company. As time went by with the toy company, I decided that I couldn’t have all my eggs in one basket so I decided to make toys of other stuff. I mean, what happens if people don’t like Spawn after a while? So from there I was able to dive into doing all the sports figures, because, well, I’m a big sports geek. I went to college on a baseball scholarship, y’know. Anyhow, as we began growing the toy company, we started doing sports and comic book [characters], and [taking on] movie licenses, music licenses, and TV licenses. In fact, I think our first video game license might have been Metal Gear Solid 2 a few years ago. That did pretty well for us.
FB: McFarlane Toys has covered a lot of ground!
TM: To me it’s all pop culture. It’s moving the radar across the nation and trying to tap into that.
Hi everybody, the PG Digital Ninja bringing you the Prima Games Site Wide News for the week. This week we’ve featured:
Site Wide Discount on all eGuides – that’s over 500 to choose from!
New Fan Site Program Launched Today – become a fellow fan, and get free traffic and content, as well as being one of the cool kids…
Halo Wars and the Halo Universe San Diego Comic Con Panel Announced – free shwag will be available and check back for more info on our awesome Comic Con booth, tournaments and giveaways.
And we’re doing a little site maintenance as well, so if something isn’t quite right, we’re working on it to make it more awesome.
I wrote the original guide for Halo. Looking back on it, seven years later, makes me frown. For the time it was good stuff. Fully labeled maps, excellent weapon vs. enemy tables, and some decent tactics. But ah…if I knew then what I know now.
That’s as may be, but we’re talking games and comics. And wouldn’t you know it, the Halo GN coincidentally passed through my hands recently. I had heard of this video game cross-over, four story collection before but hadn’t sought it out.
Why? I asked myself. Cross-over material is historically bad. Rushed to launch with the primary media, pieced together by fast-but-not-good hacks, and pushed upon us like so many Batman & Robin plastic Taco Bell promotional drink cups (which, I found out on Saturday, last a mere 11 years before shattering in your hand when you squeeze them…).
Reading the introduction I found my first glimmer of hope. It was revealed that Bungie felt the same way I did. They didn’t rush out a comic to match the game’s release date. Instead they bucked the advice of every marketing professional and decided that instead of “timely” they’d settle for “quality.” Considering the faithful devotion of Halo fanatics this wasn’t really a big, nail-biting risk to take. And while the intro does spend a bit of time patting themselves on the back for this decision it’s exactly what I want my cross-over material makers to do, so good on you, let me add my hand to the latissimus whacking.
Crap, I just blew the surprise.
The comics, though I just gave it away, were good. Surprisingly good. Four distinct stories created by different author/artist teams that include some luminary figures (nah, don’t worry, you don’t need to know who they are, just take my word for it: Luminary). And the key to their goodness is simple. They had very little or nothing to do with the main characters or storylines of the Halo games.
The main media for Halo is video games. That is where the grand stories are told and the big revelations are made. Which is as it should be. Created in the pixel palaces and unfolded on the small screens of millions of fans, Master Chief’s epic tale should have its brightest moments upon the discs where he was born. To do otherwise is to rob players of the connection they feel when controlling the movements of the hero.
Instead, the comics are depth charges. With an entire universe, vast cultures, myriad races, and millenia of history to explore in the ficticious bounds of the Halo mythos there are more stories then we as a race can tell. From the very beginning Bungie knew that Halo would be a vast reality. With too many layers to squeeze into the narrow beam of video game cutscenes. Too many layers to expose each of them completely.
But with the right equipment (like, say, a short comic story) small holes could be drilled deep, allowing us to peer into the depths and realize that below the surface there lay an entire universe of possibility. The graphic novel does just that. We see minor, often unnamed characters who live out dramas just beyond the edges of the story we saw in the three games. As though their experiences were played out a few feet to the left of the TV screens that featured Master Chief blasting his way into legend.