Reviewed: November 27, 2006
Reviewed by: Jeff Gedgaud

Publisher
Microsoft

Developer
Epic Games

Released: November 6, 2006
Genre: Action
Players: 1-8

9
9
9
9
9.0

System Requirements:

Gears of War is the in the mud with grime and dirt everywhere first person shooter following the exploits of ex prisoner Marcus Fenix who gets back in the fight. The story is great and is told as you shoot your way from one firefight to the next with all kinds of ugly aliens. You do get some fancy gear but the main emphasis here is on great gameplay and there is tons of fantastic fighting to be had in the thick of combat.

Gears of War has you fighting a horde of, what else, aliens that have invaded a planet called Sera that the humans have colonized due to the precious Imulsion that is used for ships or something. The story is kind of vague on some of the background but the nice thing is all you need to know is where the aliens are coming from and how much ammo you have.

You play the single player campaign as Marcus Fenix who was jailed for dereliction of duty when he tried to rescue his father during the first invasion by the Locust Horde or aliens. You start by heading out of the prison where you have been idly pumping iron and are given your first weapon as the Horde have invaded much of the planet by now.

The main objective of the entire campaign is to stop the invasion of the Locust Horde through the tunnels underneath the city. At first you’re supposed to plant a device that will map out the tunnel system and destroy what is believed to be the small system but before the device goes off it shows that tunnels are larger than your headquarters thought. After the device blows some of the tunnels up you find a computer with more information about the tunnel system so now you have more work ahead of you.

Marcus is a great character and a devoted soldier with the body of Atlas, most of the characters here are built like a brick s…, well you get the idea. They could not stand at attention and have their arms touch their sides if they tried but they can carry their heavy and fantastically detailed weapons quite easily.

There is a great array of weapons available to your character from the tiny and mostly useless handguns to the hefty laser pointer that brings the Hammer of Dawn, or a laser from a satellite down onto enemies in open areas. Ammo is usually plentiful but at times can be hard to find, especially while under fire.

Of course there is the much enjoyed but very chancy use of the chain saw on one weapon that is more for show than actual use in combat. It just takes too long to start using and you do have to get the character your trying to saw in half to hold still for the requisite time to actually start hacking him up. All the weapons have their use, even the handguns, like shooting propane tanks with the pistols so you don’t waste the real ammo.

Firing from cover is a neat effect and throwing the bolo grenades adds to your great looking but somewhat off target way of delivering hurt to your enemies. They have added all kinds of unique situational effects and moves that you will not tire of quickly in Gears of War.

The main scenes that have you battling the current group of aliens ends up being a bit of a puzzle in how to actually defeat them. The first part of the campaign just starts tossing more and more aliens at you but soon you actually have to think like a soldier. Not only do you get the lead of your squad and control them you have figure out how to defeat the boss or other characters currently preventing your mission completion.

There are some unique weapons you do this with but some of it involves fancy footwork under fire as well as using your teammates as more than targets. Flanking becomes another necessary skill and Gears of War also uses this against you to your great annoyance at times. The games AI is very good and they have done a great job of not only using cover and flanking but just making things look realistic like the running while crouched.

There is a good variety of weapons and the detail and textures of them look fantastic. The entire game looks great and plays very well if a bit over the top in gore. The gameplay is great with a lot of effort brought to the use of cover and how your character smacks and thuds into objects while taking cover.

The games textures and detail look very realistic and not futuristic to be sure. They have used a very good color scheme in the dirty and bombed out look everything has but you get the idea deep down that you are the last hope for this planet and the humans here just by looking around. All the characters have that dirty and forlorn look of refugees and the games scenes add to this quite well.

The effects like the Hammer of Dawn laser looks realistically great without adding things that are totally unbelievable to the game. Other effects like dust, smoke and night looks really good and have that realistic quality. There is a good use of effects like lighting and shadows for several scenes that take place at night and underground but there are some great effects like when you’re running crouched that give the game a bit of an edge of excitement and fast paced action as well.

The overall appearance is not just junk all over the place but junk from blown up buildings lying in the streets with plenty of cover for your advance. The game gives you plenty of cover in almost all the scenes but it does not look random but intentionally in place like from a building partially falling down.

The graphics are fantastic and are just great with a DirectX 10 system and do not look all that bad on a Direct X 9 like my ATI X1950 Pro graphics card. But this game will take some very good hardware to really take advantage of all the eye candy there is to offer.

There is a nice feel of war in Gears of War with explosions and rubble falling all around and you get to hear the little things that are sometimes missing in games like the thud of your back hitting that wall as you jump for cover. The game has included plenty of realistic sounds of combat as well as a really good sound track with plenty of theme music.

The music from the original sound track used in the console and PC version is by composer Kevin Riepl who worked on several Unreal projects as well. The audio is up to Hollywood production quality standards as well as many other parts of the game.

Bringing the Hammer of Dawn down on someone’s head is really cool looking in the campaign but to effectively use it against a real opponent is unique and fun to watch, not that I am that good. Using the same variety of weapons from the campaign you get to duke it out against others in team matches with several variations.

In Execution and Warzone you have your basic respawn type as well as having to wait for the match to restart before being able to play again. The Assassination is a neat game where your team has to keep the leader alive for the round or kill the opposing team’s leader. Annex is your usual capture the flag game while the King of the Hill really needs no explanation.

The multiplayer is great but you also have co-op play as well that adds even more fun to your missions. You can run through the regular campaign with another player in a co-op mode to complete levels. This plays the same as the regular campaign but you now have a human soldier playing on your side instead of the AI controlled ones. This gives quite an advantage especially if you have a voice microphone where you can really do some great damage using flanking and communication.

Gears of War has plenty going for the value and I cannot see running out of play time very soon. The campaign will take quite awhile to play and returning for more in the single player would be fun on the higher difficulties. The multiplayer offers even more close in combat and the coop modes allow for friends to complete the campaign together.