It seems like Patrick hasn't been hit by the COLE TRAIN BABY! WOO

I was actually kinda shocked when Patrick said that the Gears of War characters were throwaway in today's Bombcast. I always though the large-than-life personalities were big part of why Gears of War was so good. Now, don't get me wrong, the Gears of War story/characters aren't going to win any awards, but I think Epic did a fine job of creating relatable and likeable characters. Sure, they all look like linebackers and are goofy as all hell sometimes, but I always thought they were interesting enough to create a real sense character investment. I'm not comparing them to The Walking Dead's cast, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't have some sort emotional attachment to Delta Squad. To label them as throwaway seemed kinda harsh to me.

Maybe it's just me though. Do most people think that the Gears of War story/characters are lame? Am I alone in loving the Cole Train?

The Cole Train runs on Whole Grain, baby.

...You're not alone, The Gears trilogy is pretty great, the story & characters aren't terrible. I can't say it's left me wanting more, but I enjoyed it.

The Cole Train is a fantastic character, especially after Gears 3 where they managed to make him more than just "COLE TRAIN BABY!"

Actually, Gears 2 Cole Train is still my favorite Cole Train. but Gears 2 is my favorite Gears, so there you go.

I kinda like Baird too. Or at least something feels off when he's not around, because no one is complaining.

I like them. They fit in that universe. The bit in Gears 2 where Cole starts yelling in the microphone is amazing.

Cole Train is fun but the rest of them are pretty shitty. Especially Baird.

Fuck Baird.

@Milkman said:

Cole Train is fun but the rest of them are pretty shitty. Especially Baird.

Fuck Baird.

Baird is the best character cause he don't give a shit bout' nuthin!! Unlike that lamo Dom and his constant depression....

Can't wait to see what they do with Baird and Cole in Judgment.

@Milkman: Well enjoy Judgement!

I like the Gears characters, but I'm not going to pretend they're deep or well-rounded either. I like them for the dumb action movie cliches that they are. Which is probably why the first game is still my favorite. Trying to make they story and characters "emotionally resonant" or whatever in the sequels was just horrible. Dom's wife dying was some of the most laughable drama I've ever seen. It blew my mind that game critics kept talking up that scene like it was something special.

The characters aren't deep is the thing. But neither are the characters in action movies, that's the thing.

Cole Train is by far the best character in the series, to me. Love him and the stadium bit in 3 was pretty awesome.

I dunno, I played all the Gears games and found the characters cartoonish and easily forgettable. This may be partially due to the fact that I found the gameplay painfully boring as well. I can't think of a game in this generation with a story that I felt less invested in. All that being said, the Cole flashback sequence was pretty cool.

Yeah I really liked the Gears characters, even the support guys like Dizzy, Carmine Bros, Jace etc. were likable.

Throwaway was harsh, but at least he didn't call the characters garbage, or dog shit.

@zombie2011 said:

Yeah I really liked the Gears characters, even the support guys like Dizzy, Carmine Bros, Jace etc. were likable.

Throwaway was harsh, but at least he didn't call the characters garbage, or dog shit.

Oh dude yes. I forgot about the Carmines. They were so helpless and hilarious. Man, you're right, the side characters are cool too. I especially liked Kim from the first game as well.

I love the characters but, I think we are in the minority on that one. Most seem to think the characters and story are a joke. I'm always pretty baffled when I hear people talking about laughing at the Maria scene in Gears 2. I think many just don't want to look past the giant space marine trope.

I do have to admit, though, reading the Karen Traviss novels is probably a big part of why I like them so much. She did so much to flesh both them and the world out. I was excited when it was announced she'd be writing Gears 3, which ended up being my favorite game story back in 2011.

WHO WANTS TOAST!?!?

Cole Train...as in COAL?

Agreed, throwaway is a harsh word for those characters. But that doesn't mean they're anything resembling "well-rounded".

I like those characters, Patrick dont know shit unless it got dinosaurs. then they are the best characters ever

I GOT SERIOUSLY 2.0 cause im crazy

Love the Gears games , but hate the characters and story .

Eh, I'm not in love with the characters or the storytelling of those games in any way.

I especially hate Baird. Why is he always the first one to go down in a fight?

I didn't find them to be "throw away" either.

I'll love Cole Train forever. Him essentially cutting a wrestling promo on the Queen in gears 2 had me actually damn near in tears laughing.

I love the Gears characters. No, they're not especially deep or complex, but they have just enough personality to stand out amongst one another and they're backed up by some greatvoiceactors, too.

I think he's just measuring them by their depth or something. Sometimes, simple and goofy is a pretty effective combination for good characters.

Also seriously, I fucking adored Marcus after this scene:

BAIRD IS MY FAVOURITE.

I really like the Gears series, I don't put them on some lofty pedestal or anything, but I own all of them and think the story and its characters are okay.

Marcus and Cole are great, give me another game with those guys

Honestly I think Cole Train is the only character that is likable and worth remembering. The rest are all pretty damn similar for the most part.

Gears has an amazing world, good characters and even some genuinely poignant character moments. The problem is that it's all buried under that constant dudebro attitude.

I've always considered them very likeable dudes. Yea, their writing is paper thin but it's done smartly and works for the kind of narrative they put together.

I even thought about tearing up around the sad part in number 3... Which for me is saying something.

@Yummylee:

I also feel like the guy makes a pretty damn good point. Which is another reason I like the games. Not everyone is a hero, even when they're acting like one.

The way Marcus is so single mindedly obsessed with taking care of Dom by Gears 3 seriously made me care about him a lot more. The entire section back in Doms hometown was some deeply poignant material in a game full of space marines and glowing zombie monsters.

@Bane122: I really like the characters in Gears. I take it a lot more seriously than a lot of people do.

I still fucking died laughing at the Mad World scene in Gears 3, though. They fucked that one up royal.

@Little_Socrates said:

I still fucking died laughing at the Mad World scene in Gears 3, though. They fucked that one up royal.

I think that's the only time I've literally dropped the controller and walked away from a game completely. I think I was laughing too. Ah well, at least the multiplayer was fun.

@Yummylee said:

Also seriously, I fucking adored Marcus after this scene:

Marcus was just great in that game, especially at the very end. You get this victorious, happy moment (with a bit of "fuck yeah"thrown in), and then you get to Marcus, whose damn near broken at that point. DiMaggio just did an excellent job

I think there is a cultural disconnect between the USA and Britain when it comes to gears of war. It was just so dude bro, I couldn't take it seriously.

I hear Arthur Gies on rebel fm talking about how Dom's death was tragic and emotional and earned, and I just think What the fuck are you talking about. That scene was stilted, corny, cheesy and made me laugh.

Gears of Wars characters are throwaway. They are interchangable. Swap the skins and everything is still the same.

The story in each of the games is stupider than the stupidest 80s action movie. I mean I didn't even know the name of the planet the game takes place on until I read the first game's manual.

Some more highlights:

Gears 1: "We're in a cave! We need to setup a big bomb <minutes late> now for some reason we're on a train!"

Gears 1: "Wait why didn't we notice these swarms upon swarms of crazed humanoid aliens that are actually the local inhabitants ages ago? We built entire cities across this planet and never once bumped into them until a few years ago? That makes perfect sense!!"

Gears 2: "Mariaaaaaa!!!" "Mariaaaaaa!!!" "Mariaaaaaa!!!" "Oh there you are, and you're a dirty grub! ... <shoots Maria> ... back to cover based shooting!!" "Waaahhh Mariiaaaaa!!"

Gears 2: "We have to sink the city! It's the only way to save everyone! Just like that time we set off the biggest bomb we've ever made underground in the first game and it did fuck all. But this will be different. Oh wait, it didn't work. Oh well, let's go live on a boat."

Gears 3: "We need to get somewhere to ... sigh ... seriously, we're doing this again. Grrr war is hard, look how serious we are about the storyline this time!!"

Gears 3: "Hey Marcus, I'm your dad and I'm not dead. Oh and the queen of the locust looks like a human, plus we seem to know each other. No time for any explanation, blow everything up! We won!"

For the record: I loved multiplayer in Gears 1 and 3, and actually think the campaigns of those two were pretty fun (Gears 2 was kinda ass in my opinion). AND Cole Train's story in Gears 3, for as crazy as it was, was the most real part of that entire series. I mean who the fuck is Marcus really? And Dom? Baird and Cole had more personality, but were still kinda paper-thin. I like these games, but the storylines are FULL of holes.

I agree with Patrick. I am not into Gears for the story. I find Cole amusing but not exactly funny. I though the attempts at a quality story in Gears 2 were downright awful. In 3 it was better but not good by any metric. The games have some of the best cover shooting around, that is why I like them.

@Demoskinos said:

I'll love Cole Train forever. Him essentially cutting a wrestling promo on the Queen in gears 2 had me actually damn near in tears laughing.

Probably the best moment in that trilogy.

If you don't find any of that funny then it's easy to see why not liking most if not all of the characters is possible.

Fuck Baird. I want a fuck Baird shirt, I hate Baird. Baird.

Disagreed, really like alot of the characters in the Gears of War games

Cole Train and Baird "Fucking Genius" Baird were fun characters. No surprise Patrick doesn't like them.

@MikkaQ said:

@Little_Socrates said:

I still fucking died laughing at the Mad World scene in Gears 3, though. They fucked that one up royal.

I think that's the only time I've literally dropped the controller and walked away from a game completely. I think I was laughing too. Ah well, at least the multiplayer was fun.

I stopped playing the game for a week after that scene. It was beyond ham-fisted. It was honey-ham fisted.

It's because Patrick is a fucking hipster. I thought this was pretty clear about a year ago.

throw away for sure

@Rmack said:

@MikkaQ said:

@Little_Socrates said:

I still fucking died laughing at the Mad World scene in Gears 3, though. They fucked that one up royal.

I think that's the only time I've literally dropped the controller and walked away from a game completely. I think I was laughing too. Ah well, at least the multiplayer was fun.

I stopped playing the game for a week after that scene. It was beyond ham-fisted. It was honey-ham fisted.

D'awww, I actually liked that scene. It was definitely very corny, but I dunno, for me Mad World can make any scene feel emotional. Plus it had that whole ''beautiful chaos'' motif going on as you watch the fiery explosion erupt in slo-motion. I didn't cry or anything, but I'll admit I was moved.

True I disagreed with Patrick's statements. I thought the story and characters in the Gears franchise were some of the best of this generation. I actually went out of my way to read the books that go over the story before Gears 1 and after Gears 2 and such. And I never read expanded fiction books.

@Yummylee said:

@Rmack said:

@MikkaQ said:

@Little_Socrates said:

I still fucking died laughing at the Mad World scene in Gears 3, though. They fucked that one up royal.

I think that's the only time I've literally dropped the controller and walked away from a game completely. I think I was laughing too. Ah well, at least the multiplayer was fun.

I stopped playing the game for a week after that scene. It was beyond ham-fisted. It was honey-ham fisted.

D'awww, I actually liked that scene. It was definitely very corny, but I dunno, for me Mad World can make any scene feel emotional. Plus it had that whole ''beautiful chaos'' motif going on as you watch the fiery explosion erupt in slo-motion. I didn't cry or anything, but I'll admit I was moved.

I just felt like someone at Epic felt like they had finally delivered on the promise of that first Gears Mad World trailer. Like, everyone had been taking their series as totally bro and non-emotional fluff. It felt like someone got fed up with it, and when they saw that scene, they were screaming, "See? SEE? WE ARE MAD WORLD! THIS IS MAD WORLD! WE DID IT!" and it was still so corny that I just lost it. Like, as someone who thought Gears 1 & 2 were pretty awesome, and has some respect for some of the political ideology in Gears, but always felt the Mad World bit was kind of ridiculous, that just destroyed me.

I'm actually just glad I wasn't alone for finding that scene kind of hilarious, 'cause this is the first time I've had anyone even agree that it wasn't very well done. You're probably in the majority, Yummy. (Yummy? Lee? Always Yummylee?)

I liked the Gears Characters for the same reason I liked the Army Of Two guys, they don't call it ma-CHEESE-mo for nothing. they are good action heroes with plenty of shit-talking and one liners (with the obvious exception of Dom, poor dude). though none of that saves them from being throw-away. it's what I think of as the Jason Statham effect. I know all this crazy shit hes done, but I couldn't match a scene to the movie it's from.

Baird is the best.