Emergence Day is finally upon us...Gears of War!

Every so often the gaming world gets a truly amazing title. The big names like Halo, Zelda, and Metal Gear Solid. Well those were some of the standouts from the last generation of gaming consoles but now we are moving into the next generation. The Xbox 360 is still the only next gen console out there with the PS3 and Wii launches looming. A year after it's release the 360 finally receives its first standout game. Gears of War. A game that excels with incredible graphics, perfectly executed game play, booming score, and addictive multiplayer. It has all the key components of a fantastic next generation game. Gears of War is a must buy for any owner of the Xbox 360. The only reason you shouldn't play it is if your maybe under 12 years old.

Story

You are Marcus Fenix, an ex-soldier in the army on the planet Sura. This planet was once very beautiful and prosperous but on one fine day the creatures lurking underneath the ground of every major city, plotting a global takeover, emerged (Emergence Day) from. These creatures are dubbed the Locust because they came like a plague. They are scary humanoid monsters that have destruction written all over them. The human population was devastated by this sudden attack. All seemed lost so in a desperate attempt to survive the humans scorched their own planet with sattelite beams so the planet wouldn't be the Locust's any longer. Now their are few remaining humans who fight back against these creatures. You are one of these humans fighting for a near lost cause, just to survive.

Game Play

In the beginning of the game you are in a prison cell. Marcus was locked up when he disobeyed an officer's orders to attempt to save his father. This isn't explained much further than that. Your pal Dom (Dominic Santiago) breaks you out of your cell when the locust overrun the prison. Right from the start you'll be thrown into the games intense and gory combat. Gears is all about using cover to survive. It's not like Halo where you can suck up bullet after bullet and still be kicking. You can only pop out every so often to fire off a couple rounds or you'll take some major damage. Getting into cover is very easy, simply hit the A button next to the many hunks of rock or debris. You can also get cover from pillars furniture or doorways. From cover you can hit A again to dive out, hop over something, or do a swat turn. A is also used for running which has a sweet looking cinematic effect to it. You might be thinking that the developers have abused this button and trust me they come very close but not over the top. It's very intuitive and responsive. It makes the whole game much simpler than having different buttons do all these actions. Sometimes you'll get mixed up like when your trying to run and end up getting sucked into cover, but after a couple of hours just about anyone will get the hang of it.

The gunplay in Gears of War is probably the best I've ever seen. From cover you'll constantly be popping out to kill the numerous enemies. The gun's in the game are unique and have some real kick to them. Aiming and firing is spot on and oh so satisfying watching the sprays of blood from the locust. The aiming system will seem very familiar to fans of Resident Evil 4. Your view is from the third person but with the pull of the left trigger you'll zoom in even further to get your aiming reticule. There are six different weapons for the humans. The standard pistol, grenades, a boom rifle (sniper), the gnasher shotgun, the hammer of dawn which is beam induced from a satellite if your outdoors, and finally the best in the arsenal, the one you get right from the start called the Lancer Assault Rifle. It fires off automatic rounds holds plenty of ammo, and most importantly has a chainsaw bayonet for those messy close encounters. When a locust gets to close you can hold the B button to rev it up and cut him down to size. The bloody splatter on your screen is really sick...in a good way. Just about everyone's first reaction to chainsaw bayonet will be one of sweet joy and pleasure. It also makes for a satisfying kill in online multiplayer.

The Locust

The locust, however, are pretty well equipped themselves. Along the path of the campaign mode the locust will come out the ground at you’re through emergence holes. Their standard guns are equally as good as yours minus the chainsaw. They will sometimes wield the sniper rifle but aren’t great at getting headshots. A locust with a shotgun can get ugly, but worst of all are the boomers. These beer bellied monsters have a massive cannon like gun that kill you in two shots or less if you fall out of cover. Some of the other enemies include berserkers and wretches. Berserkers are massive locusts that won't die unless you use the hammer of dawn on them. They charge at you with blind fury and if you can't dive out of their path your dead. The wretches are the smallest of your enemies but they can swarm you pretty fast. These little guys are similar to rodents with massive teeth. The final enemy you face is during the dark and you can't exactly defend against them. The small flying bat like creatures of the night will swoop in and kill you nearly instantly if you stay too long in the dark at night. One sequence in the game lets you kill them but only with the mounted beam cannon on a tank.

Gears of War has some of the best game play in a shooter today but you can also tackle the story mode in different ways. The entire game can be played by yourself, but the game was actually built for two-player co-op. With another human controlled character the game becomes a lot easier. Many of the tasks you need to perform require two players also whether he is computer controlled or not. Such things as helping guide your pal with light across a dangerous road. With another person playing alongside you, you can experience how the game was meant to be played. If you have a hard time getting a buddy in your house then you can hook up to Xbox Live and have a friend join that way. At least the screen won't be split down the middle.

Graphics

The game play is outstanding in Gears of War and so are the graphics. The finest graphics I have ever seen on a console game are right here. The environments, the characters, and the locust all look breathtakingly amazing. The first graphical achievements you notice are the main characters. Their faces and armor are so detailed and sharp that you would think it was a cinematic. Their faces even have real looking expressions on them like happiness and anger. The war torn city is amazing as well. It appears futuristic but with a roman influence. You will want to stop and look at the scenery many times throughout the game to marvel at the beautiful architecture and landscape. The buildings dominate the game with their towering size and intricate details.

The Locust are possibly the best looking enemy characters to date in a game. Their faces are wrinkly and charred with a meaty skeletal look about them. These guys are usually very big and come in a few different varieties. Had the graphics not been so good these guys wouldn't be half as scary as they are. When a pack comes out of an emergence hole you know it's time to buckle down and get ready for some action. Best of all in the graphics are the gruesome gore effects. The developers actually made the body parts come apart as if it were really shot that way. The inside of every character was actually modeled for creepy realism. The gore from a shotgun and chainsaw are some of the best. Popping a locust's head off with the sniper rifle is very rewarding as well, simply because of the bloody explosion. Overall I recommend at least looking at Gears of War in action. Epic's hard work has definitely paid off.

Sound

The sounds of Gears of War are just as good as the graphics. The musical score is excellent. The music is very well tuned to the feeling of the game. It gets very heavy in the intense action and scales back down when nothing is going on. I was surprised because it has the soundtrack of a blockbuster war movie. The voice acting and script both are very good too. The voice actors correspond well to their characters especially Marcus. One of your squad mates named Cole the Cole train is the typical football star who is always whooping it up when he kills the locust. The sound effects get a star treatment as well. The guns are booming loud, they all are ultra realistic too. The chainsaw in particular sounds insanely cool. Even the subtle sounds like the squad’s boots on the pavement sound dead on. However, I can't forget to mention the locust. Not only do they look very real and scary but also they sound even scarier. Their voices are deep and raspy, which makes perfect sense. How else would underground creatures sound? The berserkers make a sweet screaming noise too. The pounding they make as they barrel towards you is sure to get the adrenaline going.

Replayability

Gears has all this but wait, there's more. The campaign has not one, not two, but three different difficulties. The first two are doable but the third one, insane, is just...well...downright insane. The A.I. is smart as it is one the first setting. The locust take cover and flank their enemies just as well as your do. Being able to take less damage against smarter enemies makes for an extremely challenging game. Not only this but you have 8-player multi-player over Xbox Live. This is where you'll keep coming back for more. As of now there are only three modes. Warzone is your typical kill fest. Assassination requires the two teams to pick a leader and protect him or lose the match. Execution is like warzone except you have to give every enemy a finishing attack like a curb stomp, chainsaw, or a couple of shots to the dome. These modes maps are small in comparison to the Xbox Live king, Halo 2, but it works well with the 8-player limit. The matches are fast and chaotic, which I'm sure not too many people will complain about. There's even a cool point system which rewards you for making good kills like say...the chainsaw.

Gears in a nut shell

Okay I've gone on long enough. If you read this entire thing I thank you if not I completely understand. I hope I got the point across that Gears of War is a truly outstanding game that only the Xbox 360 owners of the world can enjoy. The best thing is there are many things to appreciate about Gears, the game play, the graphics, and the sound, almost everything. The only flaw I can see is the somewhat limiting multiplayer and the overuse of the A button to cover, but these minor complaints don't take anything away from the whole experience. Gears of War is my candidate for game of the year right now so get out there and play it. Just beware of that ESRB rating, it is M obviously.