'Halo Wars' giveaway and more 'Halo' news

To celebrate the launch of Game Hunters and the arrival of Microsoft's Halo Wars, we are giving away five copies of the feature-packed Limited Edition of the game. For a chance to win, go to halowars.usatoday.com.

In addition to the release today of Halo Wars, there's more Halo developments. Click below to read more.

Later this month comes the final issue of Marvel Comics' Halo: Uprising series. Out March 18, Halo Uprising #4 finishes the tale of Master Chief's activities between the video games Halo 2 and Halo 3. And Marvel has announced two new Halo comic series for this year; the working titles are Halo: Hell Jumpers about Orbital Drop Shock Troopers and Spartan Black, about a team of Spartans.

The ODST comic, expected out this summer, is meant to provide some background about the troopers described as "kind of the Navy Seals of the Halo universe," by Halo franchise development director Frank O'Connor. That's because they are the focus of the game Halo 3: ODST, a first-person shooter game due this fall. The story takes place just after Halo 2 and before Halo 3.

The game, O'Connor says, "is significantly more than an add-on. It's a lot of game. You play the game through the point of view of an ODST. They are dropped into combat from orbit. They have a rivalry with the Spartans that is well known to the fans of the fiction. We finally let you into their boots as it were. …It's kind of a detective story in a way. But it is much more action-packed than that."

As for the franchise's main character, O'Connor says, "I doubt we have seen the last of Master Chief."

By Mike Snider