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Gears Sells a Million
Gamespot reports that Gears of War has sold a million units in two weeks. This has made it the fastest-selling 360 game to date, beating out GRAW and CoD2 for the honor. From the article: "Microsoft dropped some other statistics as well, saying 'more than 850,000 unique gamers have engaged in 10 million [Gears of War] gameplay sessions while unlocking an impressive 7 million achievements.' Since the game went on sale November 7, the rate of Xbox Live Gold subscriptions, which are required for online play, has increased more than 50 percent. According to Microsoft, the impressive subscription rate is because more than 85 percent of Gears players play one of the game's various multiplayer modes, which include full campaign co-op." The GamerScore Blog wants you to know that rumours you have heard about Gears for Windows were mistaken. For the time being, anyway.
A song which was attached to a commerical which grabbed the attention of millions and made them get shivers down their spine from the sheer amount of awesome. Ten karma points to whoever replies to this with the name of the song and the artist.
The rest is history.
TLF
I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
7 million achievements is impressive. With 850k unique users, that is an average of ~8.25 achievements per user. The game has 49 achievements possible. Beating the game yields 7 achievements: one for each of the 5 acts, one for the prison breakout (the closest thing to getting an achievement by turning on the console), and one for completing the game. That means that on average, each player has played and completed the game. I realize that the stats are slightly skewed by those players that play all the time and have achieved 40+ achievements. I consider myself a pretty average gamer (for a 360 owner) and I have 11 achievements. But, wow, 7 million achievements for 850k users is really impressive -> almost everybody who plays this game plays it until the end. Granted, this game is fairly short (7-10 hrs?), but these stats highlight that the gameplay in Gears is very compelling. Well done CliffyB.
On a side note, was CliffyB famous before Gears of War? I had never heard of him. His wikipedia page doesn't make him sound like a game designer god by any means.
Technically, it's a 3rd person shooter. You're zoomed up pretty close to the guy, without the ability to change the perspective (except sniping). Normally I hate games like that, but this does it rather well.
Graphically, it's a pretty nice game. Sure, PC shooters already surpassed it but for a console game it's quite magnificent. Lots of detail gets rendered nicely for HD content.
Its gameplay is nothing ground-breaking, but it remains quite fun. The enemy AI isn't super intelligent, but smart enough for a good time. The whole game is big on taking cover: IE you walk up to a wall or ledge or stone debris and hide behind it. Then you peak out and fire, run to some different/better cover and repeat; failure to do so results in your death. Sure, there are places with little to no cover at which point it is simple shoot them until one of you die, but those environments are sparse.
The game takes place in a post-warzone Earth. It's been invaded by beings that have burrowed beneath the surface that pop out to slaughter the surface dwellers. Most of the creatures are bipeds (walk on hind legs like a human) with scatterings of more monsterous animals. The atmosphere is pretty dark (literally and metaphorically). The world is in shambles, there's not a building or neighborhood that isn't trashed. You meet some survivors who feel the military has turned their backs on the people, and see that their lives really really suck.
Pretty much, it's THE big console shooter (for the moment). Personally, I found it a lot more enjoyable than the Halo games.
It's not "just another FPS". In fact, it's not a first-person shooter at all. It's third-person, which is an important distinction. Like many people, I prefer my FPS games on PCs, where the keyboard/mouse combination really can't be beat (at least IMHO). When I play a typical shooter (which have been mostly first-person based, hence FPS) on the console, I get the sense that I've lost a lot of control. For some reason, the third-person controls in Gears
As for innovation, it's got plenty of interesting bits to it: a very comprehensive "cover" game mechanic, a new twist on reloading (called "Active Reload"), and the concept of being able to revive your teammates on the fly. None of them alone are "OMG!!!" material, but all together, makes it one very nice package.
Also, one huge bonus to the game is that it has Live-enabled co-op through the "single"-player experience. It's very seamless. I haven't tried it myself, but friends can't stop talking about how cool it is. Apparently that's a similar sentiment with many other folks. It's a feature that many folks wished Halo 2 had.
Does Gears have flaws? It certainly does. Zonk and other reviewers have pointed out that the AI can be fairly dumb (although many people, myself included, think it's just fine), and the multiplayer is somewhat shallow (not enough modes). That said, the sentiment is that the game is just so much fun that despite some flaws here and there, it's very much Game of the Year material.
Oh, and one last thing, yeah, the game is very pretty. But graphics alone don't sell a game, and the things people love about it, go beyond graphics. That's nice to see for a change.
So, in short, give it a shot. It's quite original for a shooter, and a whole lotta fun.
-- jchenx