The Coalition studio head Rod Fergusson recently appeared on the Game Informer Show (transcribed by GameSpot) to talk about the upcoming Gears of War 4 multiplayer beta and to discuss other features in the game.
When it comes to the multiplayer beta, Fergusson revealed that it’s a “technical” build. Interestingly, he also mentions that it’s an alpha build of the multiplayer.
“What you’re going to play is basically an alpha build of our multiplayer. That means there’s going to be issues, but it’s an actual beta. It’s not a fake demo; it’s not a highly polished thing in the sense that it’s set up as a marketing demo. It’s actually, ‘Hey, we have brand new technology on our servers and we have brand new features on our client and we want that to be tested at scale and we want your help.'”
Don’t expect this to be a beta for the sake of marketing though. “Honest to god, it’s a technical beta,” according to Fergusson. So feedback for the beta will likely make it to the full game.
Fergusson also noted that split-screen co-op is a go for Gears of War 4. “Any way you can play Gears of War you can play split-screen.” The frame drops to 30 FPS though, though it was earlier noted that the game’s campaign would run at 1080p resolution and 30 FPS as is (multiplayer is aiming for 60 FPS).
Though games like Halo 5: Guardians dropped it, Fergusson explained that split-screen co-op has always been the plan for Gears of War 4. “We can never get rid of that.”
Stay tuned for more information on the multiplayer beta for Gears of War 4 which begins on April 18th.
