Halo Wars

After three epic adventures in the boots of Master Chief, gamers have a new adventure ahead of them this week, where strategy involves a bit more than ducking behind cover and tossing grenades.

Exploring a new side of the Halo universe, Halo Wars puts players in control of a group of special forces in the United Nations Space Command as they go into numerous battles with everyone’s favorite religious alien zealots, the Covenant.

Microsoft Games and Ensemble Studios released the demo of Halo Wars on Xbox Live today, with an all-too-quick sample of what we can expect when the game debuts March 3 on the Xbox 360.

Set 20 years before the events of the first Halo, Halo Wars kicks off as the UNSC forces clash with the Covenant, who start out the game looking for an artifact on the planet of Harvest.