5 Hour Review: Gears of War

I think this game has defined and cleared up a lot of things of what I think a shooter should be. What some people might think as having things taken away from them, Epic is really giving back in an experience. An experience in the form of a more realistic sci-fi shooter.

I played through into the second chapter of the game before I got a message from a Perfect Dark Zero friend about playing co-op. Since he was ahead, he was able to go back to the exact point at where I had gotten to and we continued on from there. Thankfully the pace was just above where I like to play, so I'll enjoy going back on my own and taking my sweet ass time in single player to catch up.

Down and dirty? Gears of War is a mix of 007 GoldenEye, Ocarina of Time, and Halo 2 on Legendary.

But that really is dirty. There is just so much meat to the game. Great graphics..sorry, fantastic graphics, sound that begs to be turned up, and controls that, after about an hour of play, are so simple and intuitive.

What has come about is a game that someone sat down at and asked themselves what controls would be necessary to make the gamer at one with the environment. Do you need to lock on to enemies? Do you need a reticule? Do you need map navigation and enemy highlighting? Do you need purple flashing pickups? Do you need way points glowing on the ground? Do you need crates? What about patrolling enemies? Clearly defined levels?

No. You don't need any of that crap! It's wonderful!

When I was playing the game, it just felt so much more real to duck behind cover and shoot a gun over my shoulder without a reticule. Just point and shoot, adjust later. No buttons to lock on or switch enemies while firing. It's natural this way. You get ammunition every once in awhile, but the setting makes it seem natural. No crates to blow open, it's by a dead body that died last week. And the game is clever at disguising which way to go. It's a closed system, but debris and little puzzles make it fun to figure out where to go next. And there's never once in the game where you have to wait for enemies to go buy while you hide. There's no stealth in this game at all. It's loud. It's dark. It's bloody.

And the gameplay was so seamless with it's cutscenes and level titles, that I really wasn't even paying attention to realize I was in the third chapter. You get a car to go to a place that ends up being underground and your back outside. There's absolutely no load screens. That's a huge key to it. I swear if the guy I was playing with had not wanted to stop after a huge level, I'd have kept on playing.

This game is good. It's compelling. It loses the common ties to other gun related games and creates some new mechanics that everyone should at least consider putting in their games from now on.