Microsoft"s new original series, "Every Street United", is coming very soon, but it won"t be the company"s only show to launch this year on the Xbox One. Fans of the Halo franchise are eagerly anticipating the new series being produced by Ridley Scott, and a couple of new details have emerged on what to expect.
Bonnie Ross, head of Microsoft"s 343 Industries, confirmed that the "mystery Spartan" with the blue visor that first appeared in artwork (above) for the next game, "Halo 5: Guardians", and who briefly appeared in a trailer for The Master Chief Collection at E3 2014 (below), is known as Agent Locke. As Polygon reports, Ross said that Locke"s story will be told in Scott"s upcoming "Halo Nightfall" series for the Xbox One, and the soldier will have "a key role" in the new game.
"We"re using Halo Nightfall to basically tell his back story and his origin story," Ross explained. "You don"t have to watch this, but knowing this will kind of tee you up for all the new things that are going on in Halo 5: Guardians."
Ross added that she was unsure exactly how many episodes will be included in Nightfall in total, but said that five would be released before the launch of the Halo 5 multiplayer beta at the end of the year, according to Engadget. The series is still in production, with filming continuing in Iceland, having recently finished in Ireland.
Nightfall won"t be Halo"s first venture into live-action episodic storytelling - the Forward Unto Dawn series performed a similar role in setting things up for Halo 4, and enjoyed over 59 million views on Machinima. Ross said that much had been learned from fans" feedback on that series, and that working with Ridley Scott had "kind of upped the bar" in their scope for Nightfall. "Hopefully, we get better each time," she said.
But fans hoping that Master Chief will make it to the big screen will be disappointed. Ross said: "Fans keep asking for a Halo movie, and we feel that with what we have on Xbox One, TV suits us better."
Microsoft is also working on a separate live-action series, Halo: The Television Show, which is expected to be shown on cable network Showtime in late 2015 - around the same time as Halo 5: Guardians is released - and which is being produced by Steven Spielberg.
Source: Polygon | images above via Microsoft; image used on front page via Gamezplay.org