Gareth Brown
03/10/2011
Straight to the Point:
Visceral, polished, and packed to the gills with features, this is the best shooter on the xbox.10 GPPs (Geek Pride Points)
The final part of the Gears trilogy, Epic’s shooter is one of the 360’s biggest hitters. Charting the story of the Coalition of Organised Government’s (COG – see what they did there?), battle to save the planet of Sera from the rampaging, subterranean Locust, and now a new foe, the Lambent, Gears has made a name for itself with stunning production values, an excellent multiplayer offering and a giant helping of blood and gore.
Things we like
- Soooooo pretty! – Gears 3 looks absolutely gorgeous. It’s also drenched in colour – a welcome change for a series that’s often criticised for being brown and grey. Epic must be wizards or something to crank this game out of six year old hardware
- Story – Ok, so it’s not going to win a booker prize, but there are plenty of twists and turns, and most of the trilogy’s questions will be answered by the end
- Pacing – There is simply no good point to stop playing. It’s epic battle after epic battle with some great story and exploration parts to fill the downtime.
- Enemies – The Locust are one of gaming’s best villains; brutal, smart and armed to the teeth. They’re now joined by the explosive Lambent, making for some exciting and ultra-violent three-way battles.
- Weapons – From the classic chainsaw lancer to the new burrowing digger grenade, there’s a way to visit bodily harm on your foes for every occasion.
- Multiplayer – As well as the brutally competitive versus offering, Gears 3 has a host of co-op options, including four player campaign co-op, Horde (which now has a neat tower defense element), and Beast, where you control the Locust as they attempt to massacre human survivors. You’ll be playing this for months
- Dedicated servers – It’s also the fairest multiplayer out there – none of that CoD running behind cover only to die then see yourself standing like a twat and getting shot up on the killcam nonsense.
- Bots – Gears’ versus is ruthless. It can be pretty daunting as a lot of players are HARDCORE. That’s why it’s great that you can play with bots to learn the maps and get the lay of the land. More games should do this.
Niggles
- Unlocks – There’s a lot of content to unlock in Gears 3, but you have to play a LOT to get to the good stuff. Not all of us are 15 year olds who can play six hours a day, Epic! We’re also pretty peeved that a big chunk of weapon skins are paid for only.
- Online community – People dropping out in Horde after two hours is pretty annoying as they’re not replaced. Finding yourself on level 22 looking down the barrels of five boomers with only one other player left feels like wasted effort.
- Difficulty – Gears 3 is stupidly easy on the default setting. Play on at least hardcore if you want to experience the game at its best.
- Story – You know we said “most of the trilogy’s questions will be answered by the end”? Well one of the biggest ones isn’t and it’s really bothering us!
Wish List
Campaign DLC would be lovely, but we also want a few double XP weekends so we can unlock our executions and character skins without completely giving up on the real world!
Conclusion
With Gears 3 marking the start of 2011’s insane gaming season, it’s set the bar ludicrously high. The best end to the trilogy we coulWish List Campaign DLC would be lovely, but we also want a few double XP weekends so we can unlock our executions and character skins without completely giving up on the real world!
