You shaky-cam-run through another linear tunnel, debris strategically scattered to block any would-be alternate paths. The corridor opens to a slightly larger room filled with improbably placed waist-high walls and crates. Enemies pour into the room and you duck behind cover, your foes’ fleshy bullet sponge bodies whack-a-moling in and out of view. You shoot them forever. Eventually they die.
A muffled guitar signals the fight’s end, and just in case you missed that someone points it out, saying, “well that’s over” or “that’s the last of ‘em.” You jog to the next hallway, emerge into the next room, and do it again.
Gears of War 4’s brief campaign does feature some creative flourishes, including points where you build defenses like in the game’s “Horde” mode, and more interesting set pieces in the game’s second half, like a massive platform that plummets downward as you scramble for the emergency brake. But the vast majority of the campaign is unimaginative, at least in terms of structure.
Gears of War 4 is not subtle.
It’s easy to understand why The Coalition, Microsoft’s studio in charge of the franchise, played it safe. The series has always been praised for its level design, and Gears 4 is nothing if not archaic (those who enjoy it will likely call it “classic”). Why curbstomp what isn’t broken?
The answer is that, after almost a decade of Gears of War, this campaign structure doesn’t hold up that well. Gears 4 plays it safe in its story missions, rarely deviating from the formula established a decade ago in the original. Luckily, the same can’t be said about the game’s ample versus multiplayer and Horde modes, which feature enough small improvements to feel fresh and will likely provide Gears 4’s long term appeal.
LIKE REVVING A RUSTY CHAINSAW
Gears 4 takes place years after the end of the Locust War portrayed in previous games. The Coalition of Ordered Goverments (COG), which players fought for in the original Gears trilogy, finds itself in conflict with bands of “outsiders” who’ve chosen to live outside its rule. Those issues become moot when a new threat emerges: The Swarm, which look, sound and act suspiciously (read: exactly) like humanity’s old enemy, the Locust.
Gears has never been lauded for its clever writing — the old protagonist was literally named “Fenix” and he started the first game rising from the ashes of a prison cell, I mean come on — but fans have come to care about its world and characters over the years, brotastic as they may be. Without spoiling anything I’ll say a series favorite returns in a big way, and a refreshingly diverse cast of new characters rounds out the world nicely. The slightly tyrannical COG leader Jinn, for example, is an Asian woman who most often appears as a holographic face projected sternly onto the body of a gun-toting robot.
The writing remains puerile (sample dialogue: “I think we’re gonna have to redefine our definition of ‘clear’”). Your squad is ever jocular — they literally never stop cracking jokes, even in the face of the most extreme likelihood of violent death, or when one character is kidnapped by a mutant shrimp thing with a kangaroo pouch made of tentacles.
Gears 4 features a brand new enemy force: The Swarm. Unfortunately they look, act, sound, fight, absorb unholy amounts of lead, and probably smell exactly like the Locust, the series’ classic foes. This prolonged déjà vu is yet another way in which the game feels stale, and it reveals a disconnect in the writing: the characters fail to make that incredibly obvious connection, one every player will realize in the game’s first chapter, until late in the story.
Other new enemies, like the soldier droids employed by Jinn, are even worse bullet sponges than the Swocust (I came up with that), though they’ll occasionally do something interesting like charge at you and self-destruct when they take too much damage. Considering how repetitive the stop-and-pop gunfights can get, being forced out of cover by a lumbering kamikaze robot is almost a welcome change.
COMPETITIVE MULTIPLAYER MADE FOR WORK, NOT PLAY
Gears of War multiplayer has always felt chunky and plodding, a stark contrast to faster-paced franchise shooters like Call of Duty. For the subset of players who revel in lunging circles around each other trying to blow opponents into bloody chunks with a shotgun, Gears of War 4multiplayer has a lot to offer.
The Coalition is pushing Gears 4 as an esports contender, though its success or failure as such will ultimately be determined by the community. Some might call it “tactical,” which it is. Others will call it boring, particularly when respawn timers stretch upward of 20 seconds or longer, depending on the mode. While not constantly gratifying, such heavy consequences create tension, even if those long stretches of downtime will prove more compelling for spectators and viewers than the players who are dead.
Matches generally pit squads of five against one another in a surprising variety of truly inventive modes. “Dodgeball,” for example, knocks players out of the running when they’re killed, but sends them back into the fray if their team kills an opposing player, creating opportunities for incredible comebacks. “Escalation,” which tasks players with capturing three points on a map like Call of Duty’s Domination or Destiny’s Control modes, is designed for dramatic sweeps: holding two zones gives your team more points, but managing to capture all three instantly ends the round in your favor. Do you play it safe and defend the two you hold, or go for total domination?
“Arms race” on the other hand takes teams on a tour of Gears 4’s arsenal, requiring a certain number of kills with each weapon before your team’s loadout is upgraded to the next. Teams race to earn the final weapon. Opportunities for comebacks may occur along the way when the two teams’ weapons become unbalanced. Try being stuck with snipers when five opposing players are charging you with Gnasher shotguns.
Gears 4’s competitive offering was designed with balance in mind. Its maps are symmetrical and players start on even ground, cosmetic upgrades like zombie versions of characters and rainbow-hued guns aside. Power weapons are scattered equidistantly around the map, making the start of most rounds a mad dash to control them. There’s cover everywhere, so if stop-and-pop is more your style than running around with a shotgun you can roll tactically with teammates and overwhelm anyone who tries to get close. Or you get blown to bits, but either way you can’t say it wasn’t fair.