Mombasa is a pivotal setting in the highly popular "Halo" video game series. Mombasa appears as a major setting in "Halo 2", and the entirety of "" takes place in Mombasa. The science fiction games are set in the year 2552, and the city has been divided into "Old Mombasa" and "New Mombasa" (a prosperous section filled with futuristic skyscrapers and an iconic orbital elevator). It is the capital of the fictional East Africa Protectorate. The city comes under attack by humanity's alien adversaries, "The Covenant", who focus their planetary invasion in and around Mombasa in search of a massive, technologically advanced artifact buried nearby.