"Gears of War is a short but fun experience, and in some places could be a little bit frustrating..."
You take the role of military deserter, Marcus Fenix. He's a big, bad, tough guy, and looks as hairy as a gorilla. You'll start off in a holding cell within an abandoned complex. Rescued by Dominic Santiago after serving only 4-years of your sentence, apparently. You're reinstated into COG [Coalition of Ordered Governments] forces to once again do battle with the alien threat known as "the Locust horde." Of course the reason the COG forces have enlisted your help isn't because they're nice, it's that they're just really short on man power and need every hand they can get.
Gears of War, as with most shooters, there's a slight "been there done that" aspect to it all but with some nice little twists here and there. Such twists as the cover system, and active reloads, and a gun with a freakin' saw on it!
Taking cover is a vital part of the tactics in Gears of War. Luckily there are large slabs of concrete [and other places] littering the post-apocalyptic maps. Due to the nature of the world, these large chunks of man's past never look too out-of-place.
While cover is a blessing for staying alive, I feel that it sometimes detracts from the game's pace, it can even get grating when in a stalemate. Unless you are brave enough to do something about it, don't. On the plus side, cover is very easy to enter and exit.
Another feature I feel the need to mention is the active reload. The active reload is an interesting tool. Reloading at a higher rate of speed, theoretically, increases the damage you can deal over time, and there's also a slightest damage bonus if you do a prefect reload.
Being as the the active reload is quite unique to this game, it does need a little extra time getting use to. When you do have it down, though, you'll forget you're even doing it. Much like any action you do while drunk -- okay, slightly different, but not really.
There's lot of eye-candy to be seen in this game, of course, since eye-candy is what Gears is synonymous with. The scenery is stunning, and sometimes I'd catch myself looking at the beauty of the buildings instead of shooting the Locust firing in my general direction, oops.
Details on the characters are rather good, too. Imperfection on skin, battle-damaged armour and weapons, the dry, rough-looking Locust skin, and the animations. Oh boy, the animations! It is a spectacle to watch the saw slice things in half like a magic trick gone awry, diving into cover to escape incoming fire, and the crazy roadie run as you dash from point to point.
The lighting/shadows can really add some depth to the models. The way shadow and light combine to highlight features on a face, and the likes, is large part of the graphical beauty.
The reflection on locus and human skin can be, albeit rarely, too much. It can look not too dissimilar from a myspace photo. Maybe epic are using the formula of extreme brightness + less you can see = better.
I don't really have much to say on the sound, I love hearing torque bow arrows deflect off of my choice cover, but that's mostly relief to the fact I'll live another day than an awesome sound effect.
I can safely say the music score isn't very memorable. Can't think of a single tune from the game, to be fair though, that could just mean it wasn't annoying enough to stick in my mind.
I wouldn't say that Gears of War is anything more than a game for the now, I just don't see people looking back to Gears as fondly as they would an old Mario, or Sonic game like we do now. But having said that, I loved the co-op mode, and it brings much needed life back into the campaign.
The online matches have never appealed to me, however, I do know some people who find them a good way to squeeze more play-time out for your money. But I'm not one of them.
The achievements, while not anything different to any other Xbox game, people still want to do the requirements to earn their silly Xbox points. Heh, people, got to love them and their crazy Xbox points.