Gears of War 4 is an action/cover shooter released on October 11, 2016 for the Xbox One and PC. Replacing developers Epic Games is The Coalition, a new first-party Microsoft studio. It still offers the same gameplay that fans have come to love and adore: lots of bullets, blood and gore, and the infamous Lancer chainsaw assault rifle. There are some things to cuss out and hate too, depending on your tolerance for rage. These are the thoughts of my first playthrough of the fifth game of the series (I try not to count Judgement, but for this I have to). There is a minor SPOILER WARNING in affect!
CAMPAIGN
Insane difficulty is unlocked straight of the gate, which is nice relief. In other Gears games you had to beat the entire campaign on Hardcore, the difficulty just before Insane, to unlock it. The developers must have heard from the community that this feature should be removed, because everyone plays the campaign once for the achievements and then heads straight to multiplayer like in Call of Duty. Slow down there Dizzy, we will get there soon enough. I played on Insane with a friend the whole way through, and I suggest doing the same. Other difficulties will knock you down if you take too much damage, and allies easily pick you up. Insane curb stomps your enthusiasm to play and builds rage instead, as you die instantly instead of going down. Better get good at mashing that cover/roll button.
Good: Hardest difficulty is unlocked from the start.
There were some vibrant and action-packed, muscle-bursting sequences in the game that had me wowed, like chasing and downing a plane with unlimited ammo and a Tron speed-bike. Having all of that ammo makes me question where they put it, I mean, some of the ammo is HUGE (yes, Boomshot, how are you?) and it fits in their pouches. I was unaware that Tim Allen gave them all an upgrade with his Santa-sack.
Questionable: Where did all that ammo come from?
You play as Marcus Phoenix’s son, JD Phoenix, J for James after Marcus’ father and D for Dominic after his friend Dom who died in Gears 3. He was driving too fast and hit a stationary fuel truck and was blown forward in time into the flashbacks of GOW4. That’s called fanservice for all you COGs who have no idea of the sweet Bromance Marcus and Dom had. JD is accompanied by Del Walker, the Tokken character, and the overly-casual-for-war female Kait Diaz with a beanie. For the seriousness of the game, the trio actually had some moments of dialogue that made me laugh. Devs needed to replace Baird’s wit I suppose.
The story is as clichéd after you spend some time fighting the DeeBee’s, a collection of Hive-minded robots designed by Damon Baird, controlled by some Sarah Palin-looking lady. The Swarm, Locust after some rehab and human decomposition, wreak havoc, kill people, and steal your dad. Then you get him back and get revenge by destroying the leader yadda yadda yadda. The last fight was a little rushed though, let alone easy. Sorry about your mom Kait, wish I knew her for more than 10 minutes. Oscar still survived though. Carmine, eh, well, he wasn’t crushed to death. Maybe he is still alive out there, somewhere… Anyone care for some sequel?
Bad: Ending felt a little forced and was too easy.
MULTIPLAYER
Whenever someone mentions the Gears of War multiplayer, it’s like flipping a switch to a road of no-so-distant memories of agony. The formula is the same, kill your opponents to aid in the progression of the objective, then mercilessly beat down the last player you can find before the game ends.
The gnasher shotgun is still the ultimate weapon, I see. Some nights I toss and I turn about the lancer being the cover weapon because people use the gnasher in firefights more than they breathe in one single day. And what is with the sliding into cover? Last time I checked I had to build momentum and stop to slide, but here you just look at cover and are pulled in by its magic gravitational pull even when standing still. People exploit this so much online. It’s like two friends trying ice skating for the first time, when they let go of the wall, all of their happiness and confidence seep away into the ice, and then once one works up the confidence again, their hands are held by a stack of milk crates, and they are now bragging to the other who is still on the wall.
Customization has really been a frequent theme in video games. Halo 5: Guardians had too much to bother with, Destiny has so many items to break down, and now Gears 4 has a card system that acts as a collection of characters, skins, emblems, and boosts. It is pointless to save everything you get, as there is no achievement for it, plus, you can use the points from the cards you don’t use to save for the packs that you can redeem with the currency, scrap, for.
Bad: You don’t need that much customization, people can live without some of it. Takes up space.
Horde is a thing too, if you are into that. With it, 5 classes to play as. Half of the time you won’t have to worry about what class you pick, because half of the people you play with will disregard their class duties and screw the whole team over too. If you and your misguided team make it to every tenth round, the bosses that you can get are entirely random. Don’t wait for the bosses to get close your emplacements, or you’re going to have a bad time.
Always good to find a spot to hunker down in Horde, enemies get tougher and appear in greater numbers as the rounds progress.
Good: Bosses are not predictable and will cause a panic and force your team to coordinate and sometimes relocate.
FINAL THOUGHTS
The season pass is not worth what it is. You aren’t paying for exclusive early access to the new maps as much as you’re paying for the airdrops. The maps become free to all after a few months, so it is best to wait. Be careful not to buy any packs either, most of the time the drops are terrible, and it is more rewarding to play for them. Try not to play the life out of this game, because it is fun, but gets boring super fast because of how repetitious the find cover-shoot-roll is. Multiplayer is good for games with friends, and seems to enhance the goofiness and laughter that is had. The campaign could have had a better ending, but I think it was a setup to another Gears title in the future.
Questionable: I’ve never understood the reason behind every multiplayer map being symmetrical.
Overall: 4/5 and “Oh no! They (supposedly) killed Carmine! You..!”
