Product Description

Gears of War® is the first game developed by Epic Games exclusively for Microsoft Game Studios and Xbox 360™. Gears of War thrusts you into a deep and harrowing story of humankind's epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1153 in Video Games
• Brand: Microsoft
• Model: 882224054034
• Released on: 2006-11-21
• ESRB Rating: Mature
• Platform: Xbox 360
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: .50" h x 5.50" w x 7.50" l, .22 pounds

Features

• Gears of War's engaging, cinematic story plays out like a Hollywood blockbuster
• Unreal Engine 3 technology brings out the smallest details in the largest of battles
• To survive you must suppress your enemy, take cover, and use weapons and teammates to outlast the Locust Horde
• Xbox Live gameplay offers individualized matchmaking, player statistics, customized games, and more
• A.I. teammates are indiscernible from human players in this third-person shooter

Amazon.com Product Description
Gears of War, an Xbox 360 exclusive game that blends tactical action with survival horror, thrusts gamers into a deep and harrowing tale of humankind's epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet. The storyline plays out like a Hollywood blockbuster -- lead character Marcus Fenix pits advanced human technology against the overwhelming Locust Horde. Built around a revolutionary third-person tactical combat system and breathtaking, high-definition visuals from the Unreal Engine 3, Gears of War immerses you in a horrifying tale of war and survival.

Gears of War is harrowing tale that pits humankind against the Locust Horde.

Marcus Fenix and his team battle nightmarish creatures. View larger.

In Gears of War, you must take cover to survive. View larger.

Gears of War presents a focused and well-paced cinematic experience. View larger.

The gameplay is focused on a fire team co-op so advanced that your A.I. teammates are indiscernible from human players. Voice recognition and real-time lip synching heighten the absorbing experience. The Unreal Engine 3 technology brings out the smallest details in the largest of battles. With GOW you're sure to experience a rich, dynamic world where characters spring to life. Speaking of life, the battlefield is a lethal place. To survive, you must suppress your enemy with blindfire, take cover in interactive environments, and use weapons and teammates to outwit your dreaded, inhuman foes. And with a title like GOW, it would be shame if you couldn't get online and challenge live gamers. With the next-generation of Xbox Live, you'll be able to experience individualized matchmaking, view player statistics, earn player achievements, customize games, and build personalized gamer profiles.

Gears of War shined bright at Microsoft's pre-E3 press briefing, but a deeper demo at Microsoft's E3 booth revealed many of the game's mechanics. GOW is built with both the hardcore and casual gamer in mind. But, instead of selecting a difficulty level at the start of the game, GOW offers a choice at the beginning of each level. In the vein of choose your own adventure, you can select between a difficult or easy path. And it's not just a simple choice of battling tougher enemies; each path (explained by a comrade) represents additional content that is crucial to the storyline. After easing your way into the experience of the gameplay with the simpler paths, you can go back and test your skills on the more difficult routes and never feel like you've played through the areas before.

Standing around in the open is likely to get you killed in GOW. You must use cover to survive. With a context sensitive A button function, you won't have to sweat memorizing cumbersome button combos. The A button will:

• Slam you into cover. As you approach cover in GOW simply tap the A button to slide and make immediate use of cover.
• Vault you over the cover. Once you're in cover, pressing up and A will vault you over your cover to engage the opponent or next cover opportunity.
• Evade enemy fire. When you're forced to be out in the open, tapping the A button will engage a roll maneuver to evade enemy fire.
• Activate a "Swat Turn." When taking cover on the side of a doorway, pressing the A button will spin your character from one side of the doorway to the other, helping avoid fire.

Ripping a magazine free and replacing it in the midst of bloody combat is no easy task. GOW simulates this difficult action by forcing you to perfect your reloading skills. To be effective in combat you'll need to allot for time to successfully reload your weapon. Do it well and the battle is yours; do it poorly and you may actually jam your gun. Time it perfectly and you'll earn a bonus with a temporary damage boost. Though GOW clearly showcases a sci-fi experience, its roots are in tactical, realistic combat scenarios. Therefore, running and gunning makes for seriously erratic shooting. Think about what you're doing. Unless wasting ammo is your goal, you better stop, aim, shoot, and then move on. Otherwise, the Locust Horde might swarm you and take your life.

Gears of War presents a focused and well-paced cinematic experience, and nothing ruins that faster than a time-consuming exploration of every switch or button to find the elusive trigger to open a door. This game introduces a "point of interest" button that comes up on the screen so you can immediately interact with the necessary item to move forward in your gameplay. GOW certainly offers drool-worthy graphics, but the mechanics have also received equal attention. Keep your eyes and ears on high alert for a release date, as Microsoft hasn't let the cat out of the bag on when gamers will be able to tackle this great-looking and great-playing title.

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Customer Reviews

A Must Have for the Mature Gamer
Gears of War is a high energy, well detailed sci fi shooter set in a dismal future. You are a muscular, well trained soldier wearing pounds of gear, armor and weapons - and it'll barely be enough to keep you alive.

This game is compared frequently to Halo, but if Halo is the lighthearted ease of Star Wars, Gears of War is the non-stop assault and clinging to life of Alien. You're not jumping around like a kangaroo here, blasting at foes. You are heavily laden, crouching behind anything you can find to shield you, trying your best to stay alive for five more minutes. You have to work strategically with your fellow soldiers to climb forward every inch.

The graphics in Gears of War are very impressive. The game is done in a palatte of browns, greys and reds. The dismal skies above, the swarms of black birds, the dented and dingy equipment - this is a world on the verge of despair. Enemies don't stand out with brightly colored costumes. You have to really pay attention to know where they are and to take them out.

The sounds really help drive home the urgency of your mission. Voices cry out on all sides for help. The hammering of the machine guns and rapid fire weapons ring in your ears. The soundtrack is pounding and epic. If anything this is all TOO pounding - after playing this for weeks, I really can get a headache :) I'd turn it down, but then I wouldn't be able to tell where the enemies were sniping me from sometimes.

The storyline really helps involve you in what is going on. It's like being at the center of a high power action movie. There are decisions you can make along the way to help guide the story. I really enjoy the "fight for every inch of soil" way it has you feel like you are involved in a real challenge. It might seem TOO challenging for some new gamers. Stick with it - it's well worth it.

I do wish, with all of their emphasis on taking cover and being cautious - that you could CROUCH. I understand not being able to jump - you're wearing hundreds of pounds of gear! However, you can crouch behind cover. Why can't you crouch when you're not near cover, to lower your profile a bit? I think that would help out in some situations.

Still, that's a minor complaint for a fantastic game. If you're a mature gamer (there's a fair amount of blood here) that enjoys shooters, definitely pick this one up!

Gears of War is THE Xbox 360 Killer App....
Let me start with this. Gears of War is the best looking console game ever. Period. End of story. The amount of detail in this game is mind numbing, but more on that later. Lets start


Gears of War is the highly anticipated shooter exclusive to the Xbox 360. You won't find this game anywhere else. This game has been hyped for years, and now that it has finally been released, most people agree it has actually surpassed the hype.

Gears of War follows the story of the humans battle against the Locust Horde. The Locust Horde have, for some reason, come to planet Sera (home of the humans in this game) to take over. It's your job to stop them. To do that, you assume the role of COG soldier Marcus Fenix. When you start the campaign mode, you find that the story begins with fellow COG soldiers breaking Marcus out from prison. Marcus did something wrong, but his battle tested skills are somehow needed. From there the story takes off, carrying you through 5 "acts" and 30 chapters. This is just the way the game is broken down.

When you start the campaign mode, you can select from 3 difficulties. Casual, which the game should take you no more than 8-10 hours to complete. Then there is the Hard mode. Hard mode is a challenge, and can easily add 4-5 hours to the game, making the campaign about 12-14 hours long. Finally, we have the mode "Insanity". Think of Halo's legendary mode. You may not even be able to do this mode on your own.

Which is why Gears features a co op mode, simialr to Halo. Co op allows you to play through Gears with a friend. You can do this over Xbox Live, through system link, or through split screen. It is most fun over Xbox Live. You simply host a campaign "server" and start playing the game. Somone can join, take the role of a computer controlled soldier, and play alongside you, which can be great fun. If they have to go, when they leave, the computer will automatically assume the role of the soldier again, so it doesn't ruin the experience. Of course, you can always invite somone on your friends list to come play through campaign with you.

Aside from the excellent campaign mode, Gears features a robust multiplayer mode. Up to 8 players are split into two teams of 4 people. Doesn't sound like much, but this game is all about cover, flanking, and working with your teammates. The game ships with 10 multiplayer maps: Canals, Clocktower, Escalation, Fuel Depot, Gridlock, Tyro Station, War Machine, Mansion, Mausoleum, and Roof Tops. In multiplayer, there are 3 modes to choose from: Warzone, Assasination, and Execution. Warzone is a standard team deatmact, and like counter strike, once you die, you spectate until the next round. Assasination requires players to kill the other teams "leader". Finally, Execution requires that in order to kil somone, you must curb stomp them (smash their heads into the ground after wounding them), chainsaw them (a chainsaw is attached to the "lancer" machine gun), or kill them with a torque bow (a bow that fires a rocket the explodes on contact.)

The weapons in Gears are very diverse. The Lancer machine gun is most common, and best of all, it has a chainsaw attached to the end of it. So when you come up close to somone, you can press "B" to rev up the chainsaw, and then go in for the kill. Other weapons include a sniper rifle, pistol, magnum, shotgun, grenade launcher, and of course, the hammer of dawn. The hammer of dawn is a gun requiring you to charge a laser beam. Once charged, the gun calls down a laser beam from an orbital satellite, blasting anything in its path.

The sound, of course, is incredible. The music is amazing, and the gun sounds are some of the best you will hear. Like I said, the graphics are some of the best I have ever seen in my life. The amount of detail is scary. For instance, when you shotgun somone up close, you can see individuals parts fly, such as the jawbone, brain, etc. But the graphics don't just excel in a gruesome kind of way. Brick walls, water reflections, blades of grass all look so real, you are going to be stunned. Like I said earlier, the BEST graphics you have ever seen.


The Xbox 360 has been waiting for a killer app. This is the one. Halo 3 comes out in Nov 2007, but this game will make you forget all about Halo until then. People will be buying 360's just to play this game. The game is very voilent, but really, people, this is the MUST OWN game of the year. If you have a 360, you owe it to yourself to play this game. Games like this don't come around very often. Do yourself a favor, and play this game. It is THAT good.

Gears redefines FPS
I'm a Halo FREAK. I love Bungie's masterpiece and will count the days until Halo3 comes out- but Gears of War destroyed my expectations of what a FPS could be like. Gears does things on a level I thought this generation of hardware was incapable of doing! I never would have thought that graphics like this were possible - you simply MUST SEE IT to BELIEVE IT! The high resolution screenshots on the web do NOT do this game justice. And the music is AMAZING to hear in the heat of combat.

And the combat- nothing touches this. Your teeth will be clinched TIGHT the entire time- every bullet is a potential killer and you feel TERRIFIED as the cover you're behind begins to fall apart while Horde forces are flanking your position!! I can not give this game any higher praise than to say it sets the bar so high, I'm only hoping that Halo3 will be able to touch it!

Game of the Year -no DOUBT in my mind