Back in 2006 Epic Games released a new third person shooter called Gears of War, due to it's popularity it later went on to create a whole franchise. The series had it's highs and it's lows but overall it was pretty good. For me I feel the series peaked with Gears of War 2, it had a great story, the gameplay was much improved over the original and it introduced horde mode which was really awesome. Gears of War 3 was okay but the story wasn't great and horde mode was not as much fun. Gears of War Judgement was interesting but sometimes the gameplay felt a little unbalanaced especially on higher difficulty settings. Naturally when Gears of War 4 was announced I wasn't exactly foaming at the mouth to play it. I noticed it the other day in CEX for under €20 and thought let's give it ago, how bad could it be?
Calamari anyone? The relationship I have with calamari is a difficult one, I don't love it but I don't hate it. I like some seafood, I like things that are battered, combining the two just seems natural. Strangely though each time I have had it I feel conflicted, never commiting to it fully, I should either like something or I shouldn't. Playing Gears of War 4 I found myself asking was I loving it, hating it?
Story
The introduction is interesting and starts with a commemoration ceremony, you get to see flashbacks from before, during and after emergence day. For those of you not familiar with series emergence day is when the enemy know as the locust popped out of the ground and started slaughtering everyone. The war with the locust is long since over but that doesn't mean there aren't still battles being fought. There are also people disappearing and nobody knows by who or where they have gone.
The protaganist is JD Fenix, son of Marcus Fenix from the original series. He basically looks like a heavier set version of Nathan Drake but nowhere near as funny. There is his punk rock, hipster girlfriend Kait and of course who could forget Del? Yes, Del the third wheel that doesn't get many lines or much character development.
The story starts slows but does find it's feet, well for a while anyway. The pacing feels a little off, a lot happens in the last act that could have happened earlier in the game and the story feels a little drawn out especially considering the pay off. To me it felt like just a set up for a new series, which annoys me because the focus should have been to get this game right before worrying about potential sequels.
Visuals
The last Gears of War game was released on the XBOX 360 so naturally it was a step up, Gears of War 4 looked good but it certainly wasn't amazing. The game is as bloody and gorey as ever and was very much in keeping with the series, which I really liked. The environments seemed to be a lot more detructible then in previous games which looked great along with creating some intersting gameplay. I can't go into too much detail about the enemies (spoilers and all) but one I liked and can mention are the pouncers. The name says it all, they pounce on you and you have to beat them in the head to get them off you. They have both up close and personal attacks along with ranged ones which make them a formidable enemy. One of my favorites areas was the mountain side retreat in Act 1, it was very picturesque and a scene not generally seen in the Gears of War series.
Music
Listening to the score again there is certainly a familiarity to it but at the same time it has a very different sound to the rest of the series. There is the classic guitar riff that is played whenever you clear an area of all enemies, which is always nice to hear. I felt the score itself had an underlining sound that felt like it was constantly building up to something which created a real air of intesity, it was something I quite enjoyed. The creator of this familiar yet new sound was:
Ramin Djawadi who is an Iranian-German composer who has worked on many Films and TV Series and is best known for his work on Game of Thrones. Some of his other works include; Iron Man, Pacific Rim, Person of Interest and Westworld.
If you have not had the chance to listen to Ramin Djawadi's work I would highly recommend heading over to Spotify and checking out some of his work. Overall a really solid score with many short but great pieces, my favorites included; 'Anvil Gate', 'Taken', 'Night Terrors', 'Rise of the Swarm', 'Wind Flare' and 'The Storm'.
Gameplay
Onto the meat! The first thing I noticed in the campaign menu was that there was an option called Ironman. Unfortunately I could not play as Ironman, instead activating the option meant that if you die, even once you have to start the game from scratch. Interesting but very punishing. Horde Mode is back again, if you are curious about it all you have to do is play the main campaign which gives you the chance to try it out in a smaller way.
The controls are pretty much the same as the rest of the series which was good thing. There were old and new weapons, some good and some...well bad, very bad. Greats examples of this would be the Retro Lancer and Marzka MK1, both feel inaccruate and underpowered. The classic Lancer was great and the only thing better than shooting a load of enemies is using your chainsaw to cut them into little bits. The new buzzkill weapon was a lot of fun, basically it shoots out saw blades that can, if you are not careful rebound off the environement and end up hurting or killing you.
There are some fun new enemeies like robots and...well really I can't say more without spoiling the game for you (reading that would really want to make me play it). There were certainly some interesting and fun moments in the game. Riding a bike through a forest was both cool and nerve racking. The new fabricator that allowed you to...well you get the idea from the name was interesting. Later on in the the game there are sack like things which look like giant zits, which if you keep popping them the other characters give out to you which is the kind of dark humor that the series is know for.
The gameplay as a whole was fairly solid, with the exception of a few weapon issues and some enemies that were a little annoying.
Final Thoughts
After 10 hours of gameplay how did I feel? Confused and uncertain. There were moments in the game where I was fully engaged and could not wait for the next section but there were other times where I wished everything would just hurry along. The story has interesting parts to it but as a whole it was not fantastic, especially if you take away Marcus. The visuals were good but not amazing, the music was really good. The gameplay itself was pretty good but felt a little lacking in some places. Will I play Gears of War 5 when it is released? Probably, but I know I won't be rushing out to get it either. Overall Gears of War 4 gets a rocky 3 out of 5
