Microsoft Game Studios today announced that Halo 2 for Xbox, the most-anticipated video game of the year, has gone gold and will ship simultaneously over three days to 27 countries in eight languages. Halo 2 will be available on November 9 throughout North and South America, Asia, Australia and New Zealand. The sequel to the award-winning Halo: Combat Evolved, will be available in France, Belgium and Switzerland on November 10, as well as in Japan and the rest of Europe on November 11. Halo 2 is being localized in eight languages including English, Japanese, Korean, Chinese (traditional), Spanish, French, German and Italian.

In Halo 2, the action picks up where the first game ended. Master Chief, with the help of a small group of marines, has destroyed the religious artifact and artificial world known as Halo, and is making his way back to Earth. Upon arrival, he and the last surviving Earth forces will mount a titanic final struggle against the marauding Covenant armada.

Pushing the Xbox hardware to its very limits, Halo 2 will expand on everything that made the original game great, plus add a wealth of technological and gameplay advances. Significantly improved graphics, enhanced artificial intelligence (AI), an advanced real-time lighting engine and destructible interactive environments are just a small part of Halo 2's evolution of design and technology. Every improvement in Halo 2 is designed to take gameplay to a new level — and in the end, to tell a more compelling story.

Utilizing Xbox Live to redefine online play, Halo 2 will deliver superior online multiplayer capabilities. Whether playing with a clan on a new multiplayer map, boarding a friend’s Warthog, dogfighting in Banshees or checking player stats, Halo 2 will bring the social experience to a higher level via Xbox Live.