“Beautiful Destruction” is what Epic Games called their masterpiece, Gears of War. This game starts players off on an earth like planet called Sierra. Not much story is given as you are thrown right into the action as your friend Dom breaks you out of prison. Your enemy: Locust. They’ve come out of the ground and are bent on taking over Sierra. Locust come in all shapes and sizes, from small monkey like creatures, to massive spider like monsters. As Marcus, Dom, and the rest of your squad progress through the game you encounter all the typical FPS missions and the end of the game leaves you with a cliffhanger. And lastly, the ability to play 2 player Co-op over Xbox Live improved the singleplayer experience tremendously.
Gears of War has sold almost 5 million copies to date and was Microsoft’s lone true AAA of an otherwise quiet late ‘06/early ’07. But do sales reflect quality?
With similar pick-up-and-play, first person shooter gameplay as the Halo games, this game caught on quickly with Xbox 360 owners. With one advantage over its competition…graphics.
Gears of War raised the bar for console game graphics, even now, a year later; few games can compete with this games sheer beauty. A gritty FPS with colour might be the best way to describe it. Gears pulls away from the typical grey looking shooter games but keeps, and improves upon said grittiness. Great textures and extremely life-like character models really pull you into this game, and the blood and gore stick you to it. Weapons such as the Lancer which has the ability to chainsaw an enemy in half, and the Hammer of Dawn with its ability to vaporize definitely enticed the horror/gore loving crowd.
But top of the line Campaign mode, with superb graphics and gameplay isn’t the reason those 5,000,000 bought this game. Per-round gameplay and 10 original maps with 3 different gametypes are just some of the reasons this game beat out Halo 2 for most played game on Xbox Live. Gamers could either head to Player Matches and play with friends, or take a stab at Ranked and play against the world. Intense battles and replay worthy kills are what kept people up until 4 am playing this gem.
But Gears of War definitely does have some faults. A short campaign and really not much a story gave the actual singleplayer experience an O.K. feeling. While anyone, good connection or not, is allowed to host a game in the Online Multiplayer which sometimes lead to extreme lag in a game and at times frustrated the hell out of many. Also, online updates from Epic with the hopes of making the game better turned out to negatively affect the game. From differences in Host Advantage and the flip-flopping of how much power certain weapons had were enough for some to just lose interest. And on a final negative note, the game lobby in online matches was good for today’s standards, but with most online multiplayer games post-2004, Epic should have copied Halo 2’s style of game lobby and matchmaking. Speaking of, Gears of War didn’t even have matchmaking. It would hold this worst-matchmaking-system title for 12 months until a certain Duty Called.
Alas, we’ve reached the best part of the review. Achievements. With a good per level and per difficulty set up, the achievements for the singleplayer campaign were a blast and getting them all was something I thoroughly enjoyed. But the Multiplayer achievements are what knocked a few points off of this game. “Get 100 kills with X weapon” seemed to be a requirement for most achievements, which lead players to play certain games only going for the same weapon over and over again, regardless of how good or bad they did that game, just to get the achievement.
Whatever your opinion of the final score, keep in mind that aside from the Halo games, I have not put this many hundreds of hours into any game. But unfortunately for you Marcus, there’s no review category for Longevity.
Huzaifah from eXputer "With a new Gears of War game possible, I'll go ahead and say that the original trilogy was the peak of the series and should get remastered."
^ this
and judgement as well
Why not Remaster them and release them as Marcus Fenix Collection for PC and Series
I would buy it. I sh1t on microsoft alot but their gears of War series I loved. Some great gameplay and if they would keep up the multiplayer I'd play that too.
1-3 are incredible with each one being bigger and better than the last. I don’t know what it is, but 4 was super underwhelming to me and 5 was slightly better than 4, but I didn’t feel the same epic feeling I had when going through 1-3. I hope 6 brings that epicness back, but yea like a full remake of 1-3 with current-gen visuals would be *chef’s kiss*.
I was actually devastated with Gears 1 Remaster on Xbox and PC. From when the OG released in 2006 right up until Gears 2 released a few years later. Me and a small group of friends would play it almost daily.
When the remaster arrived. It was annoying that they changed the way you could find a create games. The PC version was dead on arrival as it didn't release on steam just the crappy windows store so about 7 people (including me) bought it. I think I managed to find about 5 games in the first week of release. After that it was just a ghost town.
Not sure about Xbox version. Didn't actually try it until I got a series s in late 2022. It was completely dead online.
A new game would be best. I don't understand why gamers want to rebuy old games over something new.
It an excuse to revisit something you loved a long time, and it’s prettier and shinier!
Yeah, new game is always better in my book but remake/remaster is definitely a good runner-up.
Agreed. The old games are there anyway.
I went back and played them all again in anticipation of Gears 5 with a friend and they hold up really well. In fact, they were more fun than the recent ones in some ways.
The Xbox 360 was a fantastic console in its day with some truly classic titles, but what are the seven best games for the console?
I'll go with,
Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, Culdcept Saga, Shadow Complex, Ace Combat 6 with the flight stick,A Kingdom for Keflings, A World of Keflings.
Bonus Kinect Games: Happy Action Theater and Sesame Street.
*Skyrim was so bad on PS3 that it almost deserves to be #1*
Ah yes, Shadow Complex! Good indies back in the day. Summer of Arcade. I enjoyed Trials Evolution as well.
Was this made by a.i.? No human being would put Shadowrun, Fable III, and Splinter Cell: Conviction into a list of the 7 best Xbox 360 games.
Would love to play Ace Combat6 on PlayStation, but Xbox decided to buy exclusivity and keep it off a competing platform.
The only mainline game I never played except for one level at a friends place. Game sold less than any other in the series if I remember correctly.
360 had Namco hitters AC6 and RR6... both quality titles. You should at least bust out the 360 for AC6 if you can score the flight stick. Its great.
When the current gen XBOX offering is so lacking people need to refer to games released two generations back....
It's a nostalgia peice same reason we get thousands of YouTube videos on sega genisis. Something people have fond memories for but the era is long gone.
It's xboxs golden year imo it was their genisis years the time where they stuck it to the market leaders Sony.
They stuck nothing. Sony screwed themselves giving Xbox an opening. They would have gotten the usual smack down if the PS3 had launched at $399 and was easier to develop for.
Shaz from GL writes: “In an interview, Cliff Bleszinski says that he’d be interested in helping develop a Gears of War reboot akin to God of War. Unnecessary? I think so.”
I completely disagree. Outdated in what way? There is literally no other cover based TPS multiplayer game like it and the core gameplay is so good that people still play Gears 1 today. I can't think of any games that has shotgun battles like Gears. The real issue is that there is simply no new audience for it, because the learning curve is so steep. It just needs to market itself better and the work needs to be done on the campaign side. Better to just split up the single player and multiplayer as two different projects and releases.
Also, this who "reboot" discussion isn't considering the fact that God of war doesn't have multiplayer as a significant portion of the game. Single player only games have a lot more freedom to change. With Gears you have to consider that there's an entire community still playing every day, so you can't just change the core gameplay balance. On top of that they can't dedicate as many resources to single player as God of war, because the budget has to be split with multiplayer.
There is no other one like it because there is no demand for that style of game, kinda obvious really. If there was an interest in gears style games the market would be flooded with them.
Gears of War 1 and 2 were bad combat wise.... Story wise too. I beat both of them because of the hype and gave up after that.
I agree. It needs done kind of overhaul, but I don't think a God of War style would suit this game.
I gotta be honest I don't know what it needs, but it needs something ... And 5 wasn't it
Maybe it's a reboot more in the sense of a more emotional storyline or something like God of War, and some small tweaks in terms of gameplay.
Do you have a genuine reason to come to that conclusion, other than it not being a PlayStation studio?
The Coalition probably have the best and most knowledge team on Unreal Engine 5 outside of Epic. I'd have thought if anyone "had the talent", it would be them.
Because they did not do a fantastic job when they took over the ip.
In fact, the majority of ips under Microsoft shows complete signs of cheap development with bigger marketing budgets.
More make up on dated engines can work… but can not be mistaken for innovative.
No innovation equals no ability to push a franchise into anything new.
Take the “open world” introduction in the last gears…
Empty vast traveling areas to get to pre determined “random” encounter areas is a cheap developing approach.. not innovation to build any trust into.
Even if they were the best in the world at UE5 that would only mean that they might make a great looking game. It takes a lot more than that to make a great game.
"Do you have a genuine reason to come to that conclusion, other than it not being a PlayStation studio?"
History and current output.
A reimagining that continues the lore, and story of established characters is absolutely a great way to continue a series that needs a refresh. I agree that any long standing franchise that has run it's course definitely needs a "God of War" style reboot, because GOW did it right. I might have my issues with the last two games but they did right by the series regardless.
There's no helping Gears of Woke. Microsoft killed this franchise when they forced the woke culture into the story.
God of War did the same, just in a more subtle sly way.... They could of probably made a few cuts and bam, PG rated movie right there. God of Rainbows and Daisies.
Dang, so many dislikes lol, willing to elaborate, just didnt want to throw out a bunch of spoilers. If anyone wants to discuss as to why, im always open to discussions. Just shoot me a DM.
How is it woke? Because the lead is a female?
Is Horizon woke also?
There's no helping you. Anti-woke culture killed your brain when they force fed you the idea that diversity is the worst thing ever.
Lol....good to see that you agree as do I with the fact Microsoft went woke as Disney with the Gear franchise. Microsoft tried to save the franchise by taking the formula that was working with the strong Bro leads and going to the woke weakass female formula that no one cared about.
Diversity isn't a strength. Look at the world. That's the reason it's in the state it is.
Forced diversity is the reason people don't like diversity, you should just hire who is best for what, not have to tick boxes first then worry about talent next.
@ra3030
Every company has gone woke, even successful ones. Those don't fit your narrative though. Yeah no, the only two things Microsoft and Disney have in common is that they're woke /s
Totally not that they're risk averse companies that don't wanna innovate in fear of it being a waste of time. They've got bottomless pockets and limited time. So they spend their time trying to crack codes, find patterns, create money making templates out of whatever property they're working on. It needs to be as mass produceable as possible. Disney and Microsoft, bringing sweat shop factory made quality to gaming storefronts and theaters near you.
@binary
Right because the world was so much better segregated... and there's a million other reasons I'd put ahead of diversity as to why the world is the way it is, but way to show how much diversity is on your brain by how dangerous you think it is. It's literally the cause of everything to you.
@gaming
Actually forced diversity is the only reason people like diversity. If you don't force people to do it, they won't do it. The only people who end up liking it due to having met new people with different perspectives only ever got to because they were kind of forced to. That's literally part of the reason diversity is being advocated for, because it promotes innovation. Having dozens of people with too similar of viewpoints can lead them to being too likeminded and unable to think of different solutions, or even different problems that weren't even recognized. There's more than one way to be a useful hire, and having a genuinely unique perspective is one of them.
I thought they were doing a soft reboot with gears4 but then it turned out to be the exact same as all the others.
A more horror oriented and tight corridor renewal would work for that franchise....also...why they got guns? They're alien like...they should have other types of weapons entirely.
dang why do most of the different species in god of war use swords, axes, and bows? They should have other types of weapons entirely.
They don't... Okay you obviously haven't played god of war. What a way of owning yourself man! Lol
The draugr are pretty much the only ones...and besides we're comparing established mythology with made up bug aliens
Wasn't accurate in all of its flaws, but good job anyways.