GEARS OF WAR 3 (XBOX 360)
As it stands now, the box 360 is a barren wasteland in 2011 as far as exclusives are concerned, with there being only one notable title announced for the entire year that will remain exclusive to Microsoft’s machine. This one is it.
Epic’s Gears of Wars series needs no introduction. Back in the day, it was the series that single handedly defined next gen gaming for everybody, with its visuals and its frantic shoot and take cover gameplay. The title was universally lauded, and went on to be associated with Microsoft’s Xbox 360, much in the same way that Halo became the face of the original Xbox.
When the sequel was released in 2008, it became incredibly divisive- whereas there was no doubt that it was ‘bigger’ than the original, it being better could certainly be contested. Its attempt at having an emotional connect with the player via a meaningful story was laughable, its gameplay was plagued by tons of glitches, and its multiplayer… dear lord, its multiplayer sucked. Gears 2 wasn’t necessarily a bad game, but it did enough to ruin the reputation and the high standing of the original game, a heart breaking development as anyone who’s played the 2006 masterpiece will attest to.
It was in this context that the third and final game in the planned trilogy was announced.
The debut trailer looks great, to be sure, and evidently, Epic has worked hard at perfecting the visual fidelity of their last game in the series, but will the game play good? Will it have all the issues that the second game in the franchise had? Will it too be a mess of glitches and bugs, will it too have a broken online mode?
Whereas the gameplay looks like a return to form, fast and frentic once again, there’s no way of knowing how good the multiplayer really will be. We can most likely expect some competent cover based mechanics. We can also probably expect a story we’ll all be indifferent to, characters that will inspire nothing but apathy. Most likely, we’re also looking at, at the very best, an unremarkable online mode. Nonetheless, there’s the chance that Epic have learned from the fiasco of Gears 2, and that Gears 3 will be the series’ return to glory, that it will do in 2011 what the original Gears did in 2006. In any case, we’re only a few months away from knowing.
