By: Jon Liu
Gears of War takes place on a planet called Sera, which has been overrun by alien creatures called Locusts. You control Marcus Fenix, a former soldier in the war and your mission is to stop the Locust and ultimately destroy their existence.
With what amounts to the typical "kill all the aliens" topic of most sci-fi shooters, Gears of War is able to rise above the typical genre and deliver a game that is most of all fun.
Gears of War is a must-have title for the Xbox 360. With replay value being boosted by difficulties, co-operative play and multiplayer games, picking up Gears of War is a no-brainer.
General Gameplay
There are a great many things that earn Gears the high quickie score, all of which most gamers should be familiar with. First, controls for the game are unique. With these unique controls though, comes a higher learning curve, so be prepared. Chances are you’ll pick them up quickly, because you’ll be eager to jump into the most impressive aspect of Gears of War right away: the graphical leap it has made over the rest of the games currently out on the Xbox 360
Billed as the paintball style videogame, Gears of War offers a third person view with the ability to easily take cover behind most anything in the game. Approach a wall and press A and you instantly hug the wall and ready yourself for the fight. While under cover you can view around or over or even blind fire. All of these tactics must be put to good use to destroy the Locust.
Tech Specs
The power of the 360 has been tapped! Graphically, Gears of War is almost perfect; character models and graphic design are uncanny and the level of detail in each aspect of the game is incredibly high. The game also makes great use of normal and bump-mapping as well as particle effects. Full-Scene Anti-Aliasing has been turned on, although only at x2 FSAA as opposed to x4, which may have been a smart trade-off to make this game run as smoothly as it does. The developers at Epic realized that part of being “high definition” is having a solid framerate, and Gears of War easily proves that both with framerate and non-existent v-sync screen tearing. If you’re a graphical nuts this game will satisfy you beyond anything else you’ve experienced to date, at least on a video game platform.
The levels of Gears are expansive and graphical pop-in is minimal at best. The color palette is somewhat muted, and while some may take issue with this, Gears of War calls for such a palette to be used, especially when splattered blood stands in stark contrast to the muted environments. Sound-design is incredibly impressive, each of the weapons sound as unique as they sound brutal and nasty. One in particular that is sure to make you leap for joy the first time you hear it is the chainsaw, it’s just blood-curdlingly horrid. Character sounds are fantastic as well, with ambient noises coming across perfectly, whether you are out in the open or you are running through a hallway shooting. The scored music, while beautiful on its own, increases in intensity as different elements of the game kick in.
Game Rage
Gears of War is a different game altogether than most shooters that have come before it. The over the shoulder view combined with the roady run and cover system take some getting used to. The learning curve is high but easily overcome with practice. From a single player aspect, you might find yourself taking cover in places unintended or being shot from places unseen, but your controller should stay in your hand.
From a multi-player aspect Gears of War may induce some gaming rage. As with most games there are glitches that have been exploited by gamers. While you are typically unable to roady run and shoot at the same time, cheaters have figured out a way to do it and exploit this and other glitches to ruin an otherwise pleasant online experience. The host in a multi-player game will also have an advantage. This results in many a rage induced almost-chucking of controller. The key here is to play with people on your Friends list who simply want to have fun.
Butt Groove
The single player experience offers multiple levels of difficulty. Trying to get through insane by yourself should take you quite a bit of time. Playing online with Friends is a blast and can be done night after night after night. Be prepared to fluff your couch pillows after playing Gears of War.
Bedtime Rating
Gears of War is a game for mature audiences. Mild language and scary looking aliens abound. You will want to play Gears of War after your children are asleep. If you are looking for a game for your children, make sure they are old enough for the alien themes and mildly offensive language.
Multiplayer
Gears of War lacks the multiplayer variance of other games, but in all honesty, it does not matter. There are ten unique maps and three forms of competitive multiplayer, all of which are based around Team Deathmatch. Warzone, which is straight team deathmatch; Execution, which is Warzone with the added element of having to “finish the enemy off” or else they will come back to life; and Assassination, where one person from each team is the leader and the goal of the team is to take out the opposing team’s leader. Not much variance, but again, it doesn’t necessarily need it. This game exudes a level of enjoyment in multiplayer that gamers may never have experienced before, and it’s more than simply killing the other person, now you can do it in style and have everyone in the room howling with laughter. Annex has recently also been added as a game play mode where both teams fight to control an area on the map and respawns are active.
One problem with the multiplayer aspect of this game was the ranked match system. It’s not easy to get into a ranked match, receiving error messages stating that the host is no longer available. Also, when you finally play a full match, you get booted back to the main menu when it’s completed. This makes it frustrating and tough to
want to play ranked matches.
Gears of War also offers cooperative campaign play. Co-op consists of one person controlling Marcus and one controlling Dom, Marcus’ squadmate. Dom is with you during all of your single player campaign as computer AI, and co-op lets anyone drop in or out of the computer controlled Dom at any time, letting your buddy stop in as long as he wants to, or as long as you want him to be there.
Achievements
The achievements are pretty balanced between the single and multiplayer modes. The problem with the multiplayer achievements is that the majority of them must be earned in ranked play. Given the problems associated with ranked play and the lack of games without cheaters, gaining the multiplayer achievements can be a chore. If you want 1000 points out of Gears of War be prepared for a long amount of game play and a fair amount of frustration.
Category Rankings
General Gameplay
Tech Specs
Game Rage
Butt Groove
Bedtime Rating:
11 p.m.
Multiplayer
Achievements
Overall Couch Count: 4.5 out of 5
Linear Mode
