Activision, who already owns the fucking gaming universe, just got more powerful. They’ve struck a deal with Bungie to publish their post-Halo games for the next ten years. G’damn!

via kotaku:

According to the official press release, “Under the terms of the agreement, Activision will have exclusive, worldwide rights to publish and distribute all future Bungie games based on the new intellectual property on multiple platforms and devices. Bungie remains an independent company and will continue to own their intellectual property.” From the sound of it, Activision gets to publishing rights to one IP on multiple platforms. This agreement certainly does not mean that Bungie is part of Activision.

It’s pretty fucking impressive. The company that has Guitar Hero, World of Warcraft, and Call of Duty just got fanboy faves into the their stable. You can lead anything with a fucking fuckload of fucking cash to uh, developmental water. Or something. It’s a pretty dope deal for Activision too, since Infinity Ward is all but eviscerated, and who the fuck knows what’s going to happen with the Modern Warfare splinter of the Call of Duty franchise.

I may be crazy enough to call Halo 3: ODST the best installment in the Halo franchise yet. It seems particularly insane, since the game started off as DLC, then sprawled into a full release. All of this while not shaking the Halo 3 umbrella, because it wasn’t long enough, it wasn’t a full game, et cetera, blah blah. But I’m going to lay it on the line: ODST is shockingly superior in narrative and presentation to all the other Halo games. It left me with a sense of satisfaction that I haven’t gotten since the original Halo. And that’s what, eight years ago at this point? But I’m not bullshitting you.

Master Chief Sucks.

Oh my god fifteen million people just shit their pants. Fanboys are falling over and fainting and arming electronic messages of hate. But I love ODST so much more than the other Halo games because it finally put a human face to the epic, generic sprawling war that encompasses the Halo mythos. Master Chief is awesome because he can take an ass-kicking that would fell a tank, he does cool shit like hop out of spaceships, and he’s apparently schizophrenic and talks to computer AIs in his brain.

But can anyone relate to Master Chief?

I CAN, I TOTALLY READ THE SEVENTEEN BOOKS PLUS I FOLLOWED ALL THE VIRAL MARKETING, AND OH YEAH, I’M AN OVERWEIGHT GAYLORD FANBOY

Yeah well, let’s say that you’re someone who hasn’t read all the books, decoded all the messages, spent a million years on the Bungie message boards ruminating with fellow Halo fanatics. Is Master Chief anything more than the standard John McClean trope? No, not really.

I can’t tell you anything about the first three Halo games at this point. It’s been what, two years since the third installment came out? It’s forgettable slop. Yeah, I said it: forgettable slop. It’s a mushy Sci-Fi tale that borders on non-sensical for anyone who doesn’t want to sit down and hash everything out.

So what you’re saying is that the storyline sucks because you’re too stupid to understand it?

Actually, maybe.

But what I’m really trying to emphasize is that I haven’t connected with Master Chief and the primary storyline because it stars a sterile, unrelatable hero, with poor presentation.

So prior to playing ODST I thought that telling a lovable tale in the Halo universe was impossible.

Then I met Buck and Veronica.

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I haven’t played much ODST yet, but I figured I’d vomit up some impressions for those curious. Let me first begin by saying what you’ve already read everywhere else: as a single-player campaign, this isn’t worth sixty bucks. Maybe with all the online nonsense that I’m really not even going to touch, but if you’re looking for some single-player lovin’, seek elsewhere.

What’s awesome? The narrative. It’s only taken Bungie four Halo games, but they’ve finally made something compelling. The storytelling is much better than the previous games, and I already care more about these ODST scrubs than I do about the Ender’s Game rip-off known as Master Douche.

Blah? The graphics. C’mon Bungie. You look like you’re running last-gen stuff here. I’m not a graphics whore by any means, but you’re getting shredded by countless 360 games.

It’s a good game. Addictive even. I’m only taking a break to do some nightly reading and writing, or else I’d still be in there. It’s probably for the best though, since I’ve been told it’s only about five-hours or deliciousness. It’s a good, engrossing narrative so far, wrapped around the same tried-and-true gameplay. You may love it, but it’s refried beans to me at this point.

I’ll write something else up when I complete the game, which again, is about as long as one of my farts. (Which are probably longer than should be humanly possible, but extremely short in the grand scheme of even a mortal’s life.)

I love Halo. Even though I don’t think it’s blown me away since the first game. And yet, I can only feel general sympathy for people who love it so much they go out and buy this bundle. Only confirmed for a PAL release at the moment, frat boys across the world are hoping North America gets a release as well. I think they’ll be hooked up.

I like Halo. You may not like Halo. But I think any decent human being with a penchant for nerdery can agree the commercial below is amazing. It’s painful to watch, because it makes what I find to be a laughable universe into something utterly gorgeous. Watch this trailer, see District 9, and contemplate how awesome a Peter Jackson-produced Halo movie could have actually been. Check it out after the jump.

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