Gears of War 3's online beta launched for a select few people this past week, and Destructoid was there in full force to scratch one grub and screw up our active reloads. Oh, and fail to run into Ice-T, much to our chagrin.
Being one of the staff's biggest Gearheads, I gave the beta an extensive workout in order to provide my thoughts. Please feel free to read on and see what you can look forward to when the beta opens up for all participants next week!
One thing to note about Gears of War 3 is how it feels faster, more intense, and "busier" than past games. The maps seem slightly scaled down and contain more choke points than past titles, allowing for increasingly chaotic battles where anything can happen and blood sprays to the far corners of the earth.
The inclusion of ribbons and medals makes for a more engrossing experience. As with Achievement progress in Gears of War 2, in-game pop-ups constantly inform the player of their accomplishments and how close they are to unlocking new medals. There are medals for almost anything -- ending a match with an execution, getting a set number of kills with every weapon, using an opponent as a human shield, and much more. Practically every little trick in the book will be recognized and rewarded.
Speaking of rewards, Epic has done an amazing job of giving players more than just bragging rights as an incentive to keep playing. The Gears of War 3 online experience is all about personalization and the unlocking of new and cooler gear. From extra characters and costumes to badass new paintjobs on the weaponry, there's a lot to work towards. The player rolling into a match with a flaming Lancer is instantly the coolest guy on the battlefield.
Although the gameplay is far more engrossing and the action feels instantly satisfying, the core gameplay of the Gears series remains the same. As always, it's all about heavy, clunking, manly brutality. Classic weapons like the Lancer, Mulcher and Longshot are all there, and behave how they always have. There's still a difference between downing a player and finishing them off so they can't be revived -- there are also new executions, including a beautiful one where a Locust rips an enemy's limb off and beats the rest of the body to a pulp with it.
Unfortunately, the preservation of the core combat has led to the survival of perhaps the series' most controversial aspect -- the shotty. Yes, the shotgun is as devastating and annoying as ever, and once more appears to have turned a cover-based shooter into one where certain people roll around the map, trying to get close enough to one-hit-kill each other. What's more, there are now two types of shotguns to choose from -- the traditional Gnasher, and the one-shot Sawn-off Shotgun, which essentially guarantees a kill if you get close enough with it. The tighter maps make that circumstance far easier to realize, too.
I am personally on the side that dislikes the shotgun, as I feel it changes the entire point of the game. I find an online cover shooter more compelling than an online roly-poly simulator, and it's a shame that the shotgun is still such a dominating part of the online mode. What's more, the shotgun fans have been catered to rather than diminished. Good for them, I guess.
Even as annoyed as I am at the shotguns, I still keep playing because Gears 3 is looking -- to put it bluntly -- badass. One major positive is how much personality the maps have this time around, with traps and gimmicks lending several of them a unique flavor. Thrashball, for instance, takes place in a devastated sports stadium, and features a jumbotron in the center of the map which acts as a Sword of Damocles, regularly struggling to stay attached to the rafters. It's a losing battle, however, and before the end of the match, you can expect to see it drop -- and hopefully squash a few players on the enemy team.
The beta includes three modes, one of which is the brand new Team Deathmatch. Although I'm always a bigger fan of capture-point modes such as King of the Hill, I have to say that Gears 3's TDM is an excellent new take on a traditional gametype. Rather than reach a certain number of kills, teams win by depleting the amount of lives on the enemy side. Each team has a limited pool of respawns shared by the entire team. Every time somebody dies, they take another respawn, until their side has been whittled down to a final, finite crew.
The pooled respawns put an increased amount of pressure on players, as dying now negatively impacts the entire team, and dying the most will make you the biggest liability. Not to mention, when respawns have finally been depleted and you know you're on your last life, the tension is unparalleled. This new twist is, on the surface, a rather small one, but it changes the dynamics of a traditional gametype quite dramatically.
Gears of War 3 so far feels like the culmination of everything the series has been working towards. It's been refined to a shiny polish, and has taken some of the best elements of other online shooters without sacrificing the heavy feel and ludicrously violent combat that sets it apart from the competition. Outside of the shotgun issue, there's simply very little to complain about. Matchmaking is slick and quick, I am yet to experience any of the game's famous online lag, and overall the experience is more engaging and addictive than any previous Gears title.
Of course, whether the full retail experience preserves all this and adds more remains to be seen, but it's looking damn good to me. I was already excited for Gears of War 3, but having spent a week in the beta, my hype levels are now dangerously high.
Oh, and the new incendiary grenade, that burns its victims to a screaming crisp? To quote Marcus Fenix; "Nice!"
Contest:
8:00 AM on 04.15.2011 | 
on a serious note, really looking forward to gears 3 and the beta, cant wait to start playing on the 18th :D
I'm glad epic have put the character speed up again, if I want to play a tactical cover based shooter I will play
This has made me even more excited for the beta, roll on the 18th..
They should do other cool things with the unlockables....like having the guy who does Marcus voice re-record his lines in the style of Bender the robot.
Just an idea....
FACT: the Gears of War 3 online could be made with the LittleBigPlanet 2 creation tools so I see no reason to get this game.
On a more serious note, this is shaping up to be possibly my most anticipated action game this year. I CAN'T WAIT! GIVE ME!
In essence, it is like playing to 50 in any other game, but then adding the requirement that each member of the opposing team be killed off. This is a cool change of pace, but your article made it sound like you believed that the gameplay or scoring system is somehow different before this point when respawns are depleted - which, again, it isn't. Maybe I misread, but just wanted to point this out.
bro, i totes thought you were serious for a second, bro. totes.
You just cost the team five lives.
Just one thing: "rips an enemy's head off and beats the rest of the body to a pulp with it." - wouldn't it be the arm?
@DAVYDOCK you should try it, bro.
Here goes.
Guys. I have something to tell you. I am mega excited about gears 3. Like you wouldn't believe.
Also. Dibs on Baird.
Also. Also. @janodx
I have a spare if you want it. Check your mail at around 6 p.m. (uk time) and I will mail you the code.
@artranscience:
You're exactly right. TDM is still a zero-sum game. Instead of a +1 for your team, it's a -1 for the other team. The only effect is psychological.
Oh I will dont worry, No.2 sort of put me off the multiplayer to be honest. But from what Jim saying here it sounds more smoother and balanced like the first.
@artranscience:
You're exactly right. TDM is still a zero-sum game. Instead of a +1 for your team, it's a -1 for the other team. The only effect is psychological.
That's exactly what I thought when I read it, and I was gonna point it out but you beat me to it.
@artranscience: Don't worry, it feels different enough. Last Man Standing, at least in UT, feels much tenser and scarier. Rather than racing to get to the top of a limit, you're fighting to keep yourself alive. Even if it's the same, it doesn't *feel* the same. :P Your point about it not really being mechanically that different is correct, though. Well spotted. I hadn't thought of it like that (of course it's a lot different with more than two players/teams).
... and yes, I'm wishing I had a 360... just a bit.
It still changes things in Gears 3, the way they have it set up, since you could conceivably have one super player on your team that regardless of how fast the other team depleted your lives could potentially stay alive to slay the other team himself after all his teammates are long gone. What this change does is it makes the final moments of the match more chaotic. It is cool because now it isn't 50 kills (or whatever the number is, 50 is just a convenient example), it is 50 kills plus exterminate the other team. The final 'win' requirement ups the ante when respawns are gone and you are fighting with whomever you have left on the field.
I just thought the article misrepresented the concept a bit, though, or at least failed to explain that the ONLY change in mechanics comes at the round's finale.
Gears is much less of a carrot on stick game than Call of Duty. There's no killstreaks, no perks (as far as I know for GoW3) and the different kinds of weapons only come in a handful of different kinds each with very distinctive functionalities (Lancer has the chainsaw bayonet, Hammerburst has a zoom function and is easier to control). I cannot say the game is for everyone; it piles on the machismo, the slow pace will turn some people off and, as Jim mentioned, the nature of the game can make the shotgun a little bit too powerful. But it's unlike just about any other shooter out there.
Except for Horde, that lasted for at least a month.
It does suck when you get rushed and blown away and you watch it all happen, but not more so than the rush you get when you're on the delivering end. If anything, I'd say my main distaste for shotguns always rested on the ridiculously reliable "host" shotgun, which hopefully is cleared up in this installment.
Also, EXCITE!
Please hit me up and lets kick some ass together.
Jim: Is the shotgun Gears 1 good, or more of an improved Gears 2 shotty?
Can't wait to gib people on Monday
I'm a Gears veteran and I fall under the category of people who love the pump shotty to the body gameplay. I always believed that the Shotgun in the original Gears made the game. It became hectic with wall bouncing and was true skill based kills. But the game does require a lot of team tactics cause not one person could carry a whole team unless he was host who knew how to play really well.
Epic nerfed the shotty so hard in gears 2 that the gears community on the forums raged for nearly 2 years. Epic released patches in the last 6 months to tweak it and make everyone happy.
Epic learned that although they want the lancer to be the iconic gear weapon it was the gnasher that really caught the crowd and who can argue with that?
There's nothing more satisfying than traversing the cover to get close to your prey and then spraying them across the map with a well aimed, point blank shotgun blast.
Epic won't nerf it further and risk alienating soo many players who gave up on gears 2 after ruining the shotgun and failing to deliver on their lofty claims of no host advantage, seamless multiplayer etc etc.
Gears gets a lot of flak but the multiplayer (and especially mastering the shotgun) takes real skill. It isn't easy and that is also part of the appeal.
That's called stopping power and from what ive seen from gameplay videos it is still in the game.
That's not meant to be an insult, but it seems maybe like you're a fan of Gears' campaign, not the multiplayer. And multiplayer, after all, is what this beta is.
For starters, the mulcher is not a "classic Gears weapon". It was a barely used, mostly ignored gun introduced in Gears 2. The lancer, gnasher, torque bow, etc are "classic" Gears weapons, ones that you associate with the game. The Mulcher is probably the least "classic" of an weapon that has existed in either Gears game.
But worse is your contention about the "most controversial aspect of the game", the shotty. The only thing controversial about the shotty is that every time Epic tones it down the entire community goes into an outrage. If you mean to imply that there's some kind of 50/50 split in the Gears community between people that like the shotty and people that would rather sit behind cover taking potshots with the lancer all day, you're wrong. It's more like 97/3.
Gears has never been a cover based, tactical shooter in multiplayer so I don't know what you're getting at with that. In single player...sure, but multiplayer has always been about shotty battles and fast paced combat, and every time Epic makes a change to quell that the community goes into an outrage until they change it back.
If you're one of those people that likes to sit 100 yards back behind your cover taking potshots with the lancer while the rest of your team fights a man down, then the majority of the Gears MP community thinks of you as one of those "certain people" you referred to, not the other way around.
Also: fuck me, I am one excited little man right now!
@Sexualchocolate
Didn't you say yourself that you had never actually played Gears for any more that just co-op? You're missing out.
I hate that companies give out all the early access stuff to major websites who's employees have so much to cover that they don't really understand the intricacies of the franchise they're talking about.
I get that they want the exposure, and that's fine, but then give some of the early access spots to true fans of the franchise who can answer the questions we REALLY want to know rather than just regurgitating a bunch of information that everyone has known for weeks already.
Don't get me wrong, I've always understood why the Gnasher was popular, but as I was almost always on the receiving end of its power (read: I suck), I was never a fan myself.
That's cool. As an avid gears fan since the release date of gears 1 I've seen many a friend trade his copy of gears because of the gnasher.
It's a brutal weapon and I think it's close combat nature adds a nasty, visceral and personal aspect to it's application.
Add that feeling to being constantly sprayed across the map and you have many disgruntled players who just give up.
I think a lot more people are going to be angry about the shotgun in gears 3. Epic have said they have listened to the fans and got that shotgun up to near gears 1 level excellence. I predict a lot of people will be trading gears 3 in because of this.
Yeah, some people can't handle being bad at games.
Me? I have fun either way :)
Any chance you could give us a quick word on it? The obvious host advantage and latency issues in Gears were the only things stopping me from enjoying it.
"Matchmaking is slick and quick, I am yet to experience any of the game's famous online lag..."
And host advantage doesn't exist with dedicated servers :)
Thanks, I actually read the article again to make sure he hadnt mentioned it but must have still missed it!
I knew there wouldnt be host advantage but there can still be latency issues (see Homefront)
No lag makes me a happy boy. Can't wait until Monday to fire this bad boy up.