Despite loudly complaining about how disinterested I was

over the weekend I purchased the Ultimate Edition of Gears Of War 4. I needed something to play and, after realising that my old Horde team was getting back together, punched in the numbers that let me buy things on the internet. No, I'm not going to tell you what they are.

Gears Of War 4 is a tricky one. The writing is jarringly inconsistent, at some points genuinely funny while at other times frustratingly bland and repetitive. I don't know why Kait was delegated the role of Captain Fucking Obvious, but hearing her yell "We need to take down that chopper!" for the 15th time in as many minutes quickly begins to grate. Despite that, there are moments in Gears 4 which are humorous, rewarding, and even self aware. "We just need to head down this street" mutters Marcus. "And I'm sure that'll go without a hitch" replies a sulky JD.

I remember praising Gears 2 for the way it managed to portray a larger world despite the linear storytelling of the game itself. You would stumble upon stranded, or see soldiers running around parallel streets and fighting in the distance. Similarly in Gears 3, walking around your ship and talking to other survivors, walking through the stranded settlement to argue with Ice T; Regardless of the size of your team, the world felt inhabited, and lush. The Coalition seems not to have grasped how valuable this is when world-building, as the majority of Gears 4 feels completely lifeless. 25 years have passed since the end of the war, and humanity is supposed to have rebuilt. There's even a brief trip through a new settlement, discussions regarding the pressure on women to conceive and bear children - all of which implies social progress and a larger, expanded universe. This is undermined by the settlement itself being completely empty, and further exaggerated by your only opponents being robots and drones. Their polite warnings aren't quite extreme enough to be amusing, and as a result they feel as hollow as the town they inhabit. Endless streets and buildings completely devoid of human life, and no amount of chatter between our main cast can fill the void of emptiness left by those pristine virtual assets. It's like running around an empty multiplayer map. Yes, Gears Of War 4 looks pretty. But no, it doesn't feel alive.

Eventually you'll meet the swarm, and I've reached the point where I don't really care how they justify their re-existence because I want to fight something that isn't a robot now, please. There's some interesting new weapons thrown in, and some appropriately blobby new monsters to fight. Personally I found the prologue some of the most interesting storytelling in the whole adventure, as you're finally able to take part in some of the key battles from the books and previous games. In many ways the greatest hits of the franchise; pre-emergence Aspho Fields where Commando Dom and Hoffman storm an enemy beach-head, and then on to E-day, the first sightings of the locust from the eyes of Minh and his squad, among other, later battles which do a great job of showing off just how technically proficient the Coalition can be.

In the same style as it's previous iterations, the over-arching narrative is a mess. There are multiple points in the story in which you can't help but feel that hundreds of lives and dozens of hours could be saved if only the core cast would sit down and talk about what's happening instead of mindlessly grunting at one another. Around the middle-point in the game they bridge this gap in such a ridiculous way that, had I not already abandoned any hope of rational storytelling, it would have made me drop my controller in disgust. On a smaller scale, there's an unsettling amount of bouncing between alpha-gore-lust and melodramatic emotional loss (Because it wouldn't be a Gears game unless one of the characters was desperately searching for a lost loved-one). The younger generation seems completely unfazed by the giant monsters spawning out of the ground, despite having never seen them before in their lives, and continue goofing around. However, Marcus has the occasional horrific flashback, which adds some colour and depth. You'll also be pleased to see some old favourites turn up, and there are subtle nods to previous games throughout. The underlying conclusion however, is that as with the rest of the game, Gears 4 is relying on it's predecessors far too much, and ultimately falling short.

I appreciate this review probably seems pretty harsh. I guess I arrived at Gears 4 with low expectations, and in terms of it's storytelling, it met them. That's not a good thing.

I haven't got into the multiplayer at all yet, though I intend to spend quite a few more hours in horde mode. I like their class-based perk system, though they've taken out the melee/shotgun combo which seems like the sort of thing which would make the online crowd completely lose their shit. It also seems strange that, from the huge library of enemies they could throw at you to fight, they have only picked the few from their own game. The older locust are in the campaign, so the assets are ready to rumble. They also removed the sawn-off, which is a shame. "Two steps forward, one step back" seems to be their entire design brief.

Anyway...

Thanks For Reading

Love Sweep

Glad you decided to pick the game up. I remember reading your other blog about how lukewarm your feelings were leading up to it. I guess I'm not as much of a lore guy when it comes to Gears, but I do appreciate it when games do environmental storytelling well and add context to the world that you're in. The fan service and moments of self-awareness were enough for me to think, "Alright, Coalition, you guys know what you're doing."

Melee/shotgun combo and sawed-off, duder? Those are two of the most hated features in the multiplayer community haha.

Personally I think the writing and voice-over is stronger in this game than in the past but only because there seems to be more thought that goes into the main cutscenes which stand out more in terms of dialogue between characters. As for in-game the writing tends to fall in right at home with what we've seen in the past which runs from tired snappy retorts to like you said, capt. obvious type shit. I'm enjoying the story more than I expected (currently finishing up Act 3) because in the trilogy you always saw the Stranded from the outside but this game seems to show an inside look of the Stranded life and just why the COG are big enough shitheads that you can understand why people leave. As for the "Swarm" it seems like (minor spoilers) they are showing you how the Locust first were when they were born and feral but I have yet to see how they came back or what those pouncer things are.

So even though the enemies in the game are not the most inspired I feel like the gameplay is hands down better than it's ever been. Enemy AI has been boosted significantly. They are aggressive and they will flank when given the chance. There's enough enemy variation that you're forced to keep moving instead of normally staying plopped in one spot forever. The new weapons, although they fit old archetypes, add new twists in how you shoot them although I think their value will shine more in multiplayer. The Swarm has been fun to fight such as the Juvies because they give you great practice on blindfiring the gnasher. They juke you often in unexpected ways forcing you to stick to blindfiring instead of wasting time aiming close range.

So yeah I came into this game with zero expectations other than I'm a Gears fan (more for that multiplayer) through and through so I had to play this regardless (I fucking got that Gears 4 Xbox Slim bundle for fuck's sake even though I'm only playing on PC) but reading this somehow came out in the voice of Old Man Marcus which I guess is fitting for you, Sweep

Thinking about doing a write-up on this game. Haven't done one since Gears 3

While I did write the thread about how much I love act 2, and I stand by that, the ending is........... so.......... bad? unfulfilled? not an ending?

I do agree I wish Kait had more non yelling about shooting the thing trying to kill you/angry about missing mom dialogue, or was just able to establish herself more on her own terms like when Marcus tells JD "you got a nice GF" there had been nothing to establish that was a thing other than this is a video game. And god I never want to hear "suppressing" uttered again after hearing the locust swarm dudes yell it ever fight.

Still the overkill is maybe my favorite weapon of 2016

Also I hated the stinger

@sweep: "No, I'm not going to tell you what they are."

You aren't going to tell us what the things you bought on the internet are? I'm supposed to believe that you ONLY purchased Gears of War 4? Pleeeeeeeeeease. I wasn't born yesterday.

Also, solid write-up. I was never a massive fan of the Gears franchise or anything, but I found the games to be enjoyable. As someone who doesn't really care about stories in games (unless they can really grab me) and hates cutscenes even more, I'm more interested in the gameplay. That even sounds like it's just more of the same, which...I don't know, I never get as much fun from blowing away a ton of robots as I do blowing away a ton of gross, gore-filled monstrosities.

So is this also a place that we can spoil things; talk about stuff in depth in terms of campaign? I ask, but I am not really going to go into detail myself and spoil anything, I am just curious in case I wanted to at some point. I just wanted to say that I just finished the game, and though I liked it fine, to me, the best parts really were just each time the old was brought into the game, and for it, the game ends where it gets good. I thought there was some good bits of dialogue between the new characters (and sometimes when an old character is alongside them); it makes fun of itself and games in general that aren't unique, but the characters don't really stand out as that great, where I care as much for them as I do the original Gears characters. The dialogue, it is more often than not kind of plain and predictable aside from when they joke about gaming tropes, attributing to why I don't care for the characters as much right now (as in, I hope they're more fleshed out in the sequel). The new characters don't really have... character.

The game took me eight hours, so I'm guessing depending on which difficulty you play on, it'll be an eight to ten hour experience. The ending wasn't exactly terrible, although playing a handful of games that were twice as long or more this year, it ending when it could have kept going for some time is a bit disappointing, and it does make me pretty sick of these kinds of endings, where it's totally set up as a 'to be continued' type of thing through story execution, because I honestly don't want to wait to get more. It'd be better to have a bit more closure. This year, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided did just about the same thing. I'm going to go through the game on Insane at some point and see if I like it more. I didn't dislike the game, but this was honestly the least exciting Gears game, maybe more so than Judgment in terms of gameplay (though story was more interesting I suppose). Oh, and aside from weaponry, there was no mechanic that I used once aside from the tutorial, like the roadie run over cover, and executing enemies from behind cover. I played it like Gears has always played.

It's too bad about Anya.

I deliberately refrained from posting anything specific, if people want to talk about endgame stuff they should mark it as a spoiler, as you have done :)

I don't think the new characters are anything special or particularly memorable. They're not objectively bad or anything. They're just kind of... there. The banter is tiring though, as it's often out of sync with what they're trying to accomplish. JD and Kait, for example, get really excited about reloading / finding grenades or are willing to make a ton of sarcastic quips while they're trying to sprint towards their kidnapped and possibly dying parents. Again, that's not bad or game breaking, but it comes off pretty damned lazy.

The plot is pretty bad. The deus ex machina (or machina ex machina, I guess :p ) that happens at the end of the game is so stupid and forced that the characters have to stop and acknowledge that they were morons for not thinking of it earlier. Almost all of their problems would have been solved if Baird showed up with invincible mechas. And there's no good reason that he didn't. Marcus called him and told him to hold off on coming for... reasons? In the earlier Gears games, it was always a little contrived that 4 dudes were able to do so much damage to the Locust Horde but they at least bothered to try to establish that while they were important players, they were part of a larger force. Here, 4 people manage to completely obliterate the new COG forces that are allegedly keeping humanity safe... what utility could the DBs possibly serve if 4 people can wreck countless dropships full of them?

The game is a lot of fun and Horde seems great. But man, that was a stupid campaign.

So I just pushed through the campaign. Kind of less bummed by the abrupt ending and more so by the lack of information going into the trilogy/tetralogy/pentalogy, etc. Looked beautiful, but the entire campaign seemed like it was stretched thin.

Also, Oscar kills a Carrier with a knife through the inside at the end of the credits. Could I have done that? Logic kept on telling me to press buttons to see, but nothing happened unless I was saved.

New characters are good, too. JD might be too much of a Nathan Drake clone, and Kait looks like a YouTuber, but I didn't mind playing them.

I just finished the campaign and while the ending felt abrupt, I really enjoyed the overall package. There was something nice about the story having a mostly investigative bent as opposed to all out war. It felt like a prequel to a game that didn't exist. That may sound like a bad thing but I appreciated the difference in tone from the other gears games. Heck, I even liked the characters and their conversations between fights, they were entertaining.

As Colourful_Hippie mentioned above, I feel like this is their best playing game thanks in part to the ai, who are far more aggressive than they have ever been. The thing that impressed me the most was the level design. There were more opportunities to flank and move around the battlefield and not be hunkered down all the time, the game seemed to actively discourage it. My one complaint were the weapons. While I liked the new guns they introduced, I ran out of ammo for them all the time. To make matters worse, the game doesn't refill ammo for them from boxes so I ended up switching to the Lancer and Shotgun for most of the game as they carried the most ammo and could be refilled regularly. That single shot rifle you get early on also disappears for most of the game after being in the first two acts (Not to mentioned the robot enemies which show up for one more battle with the locust).

Really looking forward to gears 5. Kinda feels like they justified this second trilogy.

Just finished the campaign and thoroughly enjoyed it. There were a couple of rough spots but overall I thought it was really good. I especially liked that they weren't afraid to have some quiet sections here and there either.

The ending. I gotta admit, blew me away. I can't remember all the GoW3 collectable info as it was so long ago but the implied reveal (I think...) literally made me yell "what the fuck!".

I am really interested in where they're going.

Had posted this elsewhere, but it belongs here.

I'm near the end of Act 4 and am pretty disappointed in the Campaign so far. I really like Kait, and it's nice to see Marcus again. And that's about the extent of what I have liked about the campaign thusfar. Some people got kidnapped and I have spent the entire game chasing them down. That's the story. I was really hoping for more world development, and in the first few chapters it seemed like they were heading in that direction. But nothing has happened since the middle of Act 1. I was so happy to arrive at the outsider village, to meet new characters and see how they live in the Gears world. But I didn't get any of that. I got a few names and a look at some buildings.

In terms of gameplay, I haven't enjoyed fighting any of the new enemies introduced so far. Gears 1-3 definitely had enemies I loathed (Berserkers, the electric centipedes in 3), but this game is just packed with enemies that give very small windows of opportunity and take way, way too many shots to take down. I was really wanting to love this game, but given what I have played so far, I had a better time with Judgment.

Reading your thoughts, I found myself nodding in agreement with everything you said.

That ending alone had me totally okay with a new series of Gears games. For a series typically referred to as dumb,I find it pretty funny how invested I now feel in the overall lore and story to this universe. I kind of figured that the Queen stuff at the end of 3 would be left forgotten about so I very much liked seeing 4 hint at possible answers in the future.

Can I ask what may be a really dumb question about the ending?

The Locust Queen... that's going to have been Kait's grandmother, right? I'd have to go back and look, but I assume that symbol on her charm is associated with the Queen?

Yes, that's what is implied. It's also why they hooked Kaits mother up to the slime matrix instead of podding her with the rest of the humans.

Just finished the campaign last night and thoroughly enjoyed it. Act 5 is basically a chance to be OP as hell and it was executed really well. I also had no problem with the ending. From the way Jeff spoke about it I was expecting a "finish the fight" level cliffhanger but there was a resolution to the story they told, and the locust charm reveal was a fantastic note to end on.

Above anything else, if your playing on PC, holy shit does Unreal Engine 4 shine here, this is a sexy sexy game.

I'm at the beginning of Act IV and I'm coming to terms with the fact that this is yet another Gears story that really is too focused on a tiny handful of characters for me to be really interested in it. The gameplay is good on Hardcore (although still bullet spongey) and I like the Pouncers since they really don't allow you to post up behind cover for the whole fight.

It seems severely insane that JD, Kait, and Del would forgo telling the COG about the Swarm in favor of jumping into their underground house to try and save two people. The Swarm represent the potential for another E-day level loss of life, and the characters are just downright unrelatably unconcerned with how irresponsible it is to save their parents. They should really be trying to help people who aren't captured already and underground. Also, I know robot queen lady wants to kill JD but why not just say "HEY THERE ARE NEW LOCUST" when they're chilling at Marcus' weird castle instead of growling at her and blowing up like ten helicopters? Having these ex-Gears who are clearly disillusioned with the establishment of the COG attempting to work with them to fight the Swarm seems like much more of an interesting game then the road-trippy revenge story we got.

I haven't finished 4 yet but I'm assuming it ends with the promise of a lot more Swarm showing up, which leads into the Dark Middle Chapter Gears 5 where there's another E-day and a we play through that, and then Gears 6 is when all hope is lost except for there's another bomb or something and Marcus' dad and we win. It seems sad to squander the opportunity to tell a different story with this trilogy that deals with the way Sera works in more detail, but it seems we're on track for a retelling of the original trilogy with slight differences.

Absolutely, that was one of the most frustrating things, and that level of irrational stupidity continues throughout. Like in Act 5 when Kait would rather go on a suicide mission than just, y'know, walk 30 minutes down the road to call for help? And then when the old dudes show up and I think it's Cole who says "So, the Locust are back, huh? Y'know, I kinda missed them." and Marcus replies "I know what you mean".

Sorry, what? You missed the wave of horrific tortuous monsters who killed everyone you know and love and reduced humanity to a fraction of it's former size, forcing you to spend an entire life fighting for your existence with extensive widespread PTS, in the ruins of your old civilization? Didn't Marcus have nightmare flashbacks about everyone dying in the previous act? Yeah, that nostalgia seems totally reasonably. Sure.

I think I'd be cool if Gears went either completely "Woo yeah, chainsaws! Let's do this!" or "Aw no, our families are dead, sad times", but constantly bouncing between the two isn't just ludonarrative dissonance, it's fucking insanity.

Well put. It seems like there's a contingent of writers on the Gears team who are trying to push a more serious story but they're getting beaten down either by focus testing or someone higher up the chain to keep it light.

@quid_pro_bono: Definitely. The books are all written by Karen Traviss, who was asked to write Gears 3 as well, which I guess is why Gears 3 was the first to have coherent character development and meaningfully sad story beats. I might be seeing it through rose-tinted glasses, but there was definitely less inconsistency. With this new game, while you can still see her influence over the characters and backstory, you can also tell there's some obvious clashing with the game designers.

I think Red Letter Media's take on the whole game is spot on. They explain why the very premise that was shackled onto the games was inept and misses the point of Gears. They nail why the main charter is mis-cast in his role of hero. They nail why the first 2/3 of the games had the worst enemies of any Gears game.

I think more and more I agree with Rich & Jack on WHY some current games are making huge missteps. I really loved the first game, I think that was when the vision was most pure of what they wanted to make. The story was dumb, but it was a 'cohesively dumb' universe with its own internal logic. Now, I think nobody really gives a damn expect to check off boxes: We have made our contractual obligated game, it included the contractually obligated features and parts that a design collective gave use, and now we will support it with out contractually obligated DLC for the contractually obligated time. This game was NOBODY'S baby, this was a foster child that people will take care of because they have been designated to do so.

#BringVanquishToPC

@monkeyking1969: "Commando starring Chris Pratt" is pretty hilarious.

What less funny is three executive-producers in Hollywood just wrote down, "Commando starring Chris Pratt ... Great idea? OR Greatest idea?"

FInished it today. Thoroughly enjoyed the campaign. Ending was abrupt but I kinda liked that for some reason. Especially since the whole Act V was awesome to play.

I think it did a decent job of being another Gears game and it unfortunately was simultaneously nothing more than another Gears game. Didn't feel as negatively about the storytelling aspect, or at least in the grand scheme of videogame storytelling I wasn't as "disgusted" by how fast and loose they play with certain events. If anything it at least keeps the story moving at a decent clip. The ending was abrupt and the entire thing is a prolonged setup for the next game, but it kind of did it's job of introducing these new characters, bringing back some old ones and ever so slightly bridging the gap between then and now.

I just wish they would have evolved this game in some way. The cover shooting was revolutionary in 200-whenever the original game came out. In 2016 hanging the entire gameplay on being able to stick to cover and awkwardly "roadie run" from A to B is no longer the high bar it used to be. It's barely even an ankle high bar. You are basically sticking to walls and pumping sandbags full of clips. Some of the "boss" enemies are exasperating to put down. Vaulting over cover is like their way of dipping a toe into a cold swimming pool. Sometimes you just have to commit.

I just finished it and I didn't feel any real weight behind most of the story. Things just kind of happen. As soon as I finished I looked up whether Karen Traviss was involved, and nope, she wasn't. It would have been strange if she had been since everything felt so run of the mill, but knowing that explains it.

She brought so much to Gears 3 from working on the novels. I had a lot of fun playing it but as someone who loves the story I'm pretty bummed out. I think I had higher expectations than you though.

I know this is a somewhat old post but Cole is literally insane. Does noone remember that part in the 3rd game where he loses touch with reality and plays football (sorry thrashball) with a fucking bomb? (and i'm guessing Marcus is either bored or just wants to sound tough to his friend)

Gears has always bounced between stupidity and grimdark horror, it is what it is. I made this comparison in another thread but the series always reminded of 80s-90s Paul Vorhoeven movies. (the good ones) I dont know if Gears is going for satire (probably not) but as someone who loves that specific brand of pulpy action movie i'm glad Gears is still Gears.

Just finished the game. I know a lot of people said the game starts off strong and then once it switches to the Locust (let's be real that's what they are) it kind of falls flat for them. To me it's not the switch in enemies. It's that once you stop fighting robots and start fighting Locusts you abandon the beatiful, colorful, vibrant outside scenery and trade it for some caves and it's just dull. I think that was Chapter III? It was a bit of a drag. I think everything past that is pretty good though. All in all a real fun campaign and a gorgeous, well performing game. That first area really doesn't do this game justice in the looks department, for whatever reason.

Character wise this cast just doesn't hold a candle to Delta Squad. I don't care what anyone says. Marcus, Dom, Baird (screw you he's awesome), and Cole are super rad and fun. JD is just Nathan Drake clone #34830437 and Kait is borderline insufferable. Del is funny, and Oscar is just whatever. It says a lot that the funniest line in the game comes from Marcus (Tomatoes!!!).

Story just seems like setup. You don't get a sense of what the Locust are after. I guess just resuming the fight? Nice bit of intrigue from the ending though.

@kishinfoulux: Yeah I have a fondness for delta squad too (including Baird) people like to call them meatheads but in a world (movies, social media) where every character is the king of snark and sarcasm I welcome the broness of those guys. (it even worked in 3, even if they did butch Anya up a bit) I dont find the new cast annoying though. Just a bit dull.

I'm in Act V now, so I'm hoping this campaign finishes strong. Except for a few great moments (motorcycle), this campaign has been BORING. I don't care about what's happening (except for hearing Marcus yell one-liners). I HATE the horde mode sections. They just seem so needless. It just feels like we're going from empty combat zone to empty combat zone. I don't believe that this world is alive. It feels like you're walking through a bunch of multiplayer maps.