Gears of War Game Review

Son of a B*&%h!!! When does anything ever live up to the hype? Ive been hearing promises about this game since before the 360 launched and of course in the past few months the hype machine has been in overdrive. I honestly believe they undersold it. This game is freaking amazing!!! The graphics are bar none the greatest graphics to ever hit a console game system bar none and maybe even a pc. As powerful as i figured the 360 to be i still did not think it was able to pull this off, or if it did, there would be serious frame rate problems or other glitches. Nope, its a solid frame rate with no dips whether its single player or split screen campaign offline or any of the matches i played online. No matter what mode i played the graphics were the same along with the frame rate. This game is pop and stop heaven. I love the traditional fps games but i also enjoy the refreshing change this game offers. It takes about 30-45 minutes to get used to the game play but once you do it becomes second nature. It even has a unique reload system where you can be rewarding by reloading faster and even have more powerful shots if you time it perfectly.

I bought it mainly for multiplayer but the campaign is fantastic. I got in a few hours of solo play and also some split screen action. You always have at least one to three teammates with you and if they die you can revive them if you get to them in time. Same thing with co-op play except when on sections when you are forced to split up, if someone dies then you have to restart from the last checkpoint. There are two different difficulty levels casual and hardcore, and a third one that can be unlocked. I started off on hardcore and its no joke. Some parts are easy to help you get used to game play then some sections are hardcore. I can only imagine further in the game how hard it will be. Some are complaining about the storyline but really who cares. This is an action adventure game and the story is plenty adequate.

There are some awesome weapons starting with your default machine gun/chainsaw. In campaign and multiplayer if you get close enough to your enemy you can melee and chainsaw them in half. Its a great feeling but harder to get close enough to do that then you think. There are other machine guns, a sniper and the coolest weapon in the game called the Hammer of War. You basically aim on the ground and where you want the blast to be and once you pull the trigger a beam from a satellite above you shoots a powerful laser on the ground and you can move it back and forth for a short time instantly killing anything in your path. There are two types of bolo grenades, a smoke and explosion one. If you hold down the left trigger it shows exactly the path the grenades are going to bounce. One of the coolest things to do is blind fire. If you are behind cover and just pull the trigger you will stick you gun up and shoot without exposing your body. Its hard to be accurate but once you do it can be an effective way of playing. Your health also regenerates similar to Halo but the gauge heals a little faster when not fired upon.

Are there any negatives? Im sure if i nitpick i can find a few. I was thinking the 4 vs. 4 was going to be too few players but its perfect for this type of game. Maybe they could have made it 10 or 12 players max and it would be better? I havent played enough to make a good judgement on that yet but so far the maps feel balanced right for that many players. There are only 3 basic types of games. There are no capture the flag or territory matches which would have been cool. The game types they have are plenty fun though. There is Warzone which is straight deathmatch and first team to win 5 rounds win. There is Assassination mode which is one person is the leader and everyone tries to protect him and you win by killing the other persons leader. Thats a best of 5 round game. Last is Eradication which is like Warzone but you can revive your fallen teammates and its basically Last Man Standing.

All in all a definite must buy for any 360 fan and if you havent bought one yet i would definitely now choose this over a ps3 no contest. Also coming up for 360 soon is the also hyped up Bio-Shock and a little game called Halo 3 which are 360 exclusives. I can honestly say this game surpasses the hype.
Heres a video review from Gamespot