Epic adding XP/levels to Gears 2

By Robert Purchese Published 9 February, 2009

Title Update 3 bringing bots, too.

Epic Games will be adding experience levels to Gears of War 2 multiplayer in the next title update, due to arrive sometime in the "near future".

That's according to executive producer Rod Fergusson, who says displaying and relying on the complex TrueSkill ranks can be frustrating and misleading.

"What if, instead of skill rank, we instead showed your experience level?" asks Fergusson on the official Gears of War forum.

"You would gain experience through your individual performance in Public multiplayer matches - the higher your score at the end, the more experience you acquire.

"Of course the experience gained across the different match types would be balanced so you couldn't just grind on the re-spawning game types to try and level faster. The experience requirements for each level would grow with each level gained (like a typical RPG) and we'd have 99 levels of experience for you to show off your leetness," he adds.

Fergusson explains that experience-earned will never leak away, and that the only way to lose experience will be by prematurely quitting a match. Power-cuts and disconnects will incur the penalty, unfortunately, but there's no game-wide punishment when a host ends the fight early.

Once a battle has been finished, players will see how much experience they have earned and how far there is to go until the next level.

Levels mean nothing but bragging rights at the moment, but Epic plans to tie Achievements to them when the next set of map DLC is rolled out. This will likely cost, but the Microsoft-placed restriction on Achievements as part of DLC makes this an option Epic cannot bypass.

Interestingly, Fergusson goes on to reveal that bots will now replace drop-outs during public matches, so giving weakened teams a realistic shot at winning. These will be Insane-level AI and added to every team short of five people - even 4v4 matches will gain two bots. It's not yet determined whether bot kills will increase your end-of-game score and thus experience earned.

TrueSkill ranks will still be included and not wiped or reset, but they will be hidden and used solely to match players of a similar rank.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (20) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • DFawkes #1 3 years ago

    Nice, I tend not to play Gears 2 online because I measure my worth in online shooters by a numerical value. Sad, but true, and the reason I love CoD4 or W@W so much.

  • penhalion #2 3 years ago

    Pointless if you don't actually get anything for it. In COD you get new, better weapons, armour and perks. In Wow it's better spells, mounts etc. etc.

    In gears it's just a number with zero benefits. It doesn't even tell you how good someone is because they may only play one kind of gears match and so not have leveled as fast as a crap person who plays all the game types all the time.

  • LiveForever #3 3 years ago

    Fix the lag before you start adding new features lazy epic

  • DFawkes #4 3 years ago

    But at least it won't cause big arguments like the one I witnessed on CoD:W@W, with 2 people comparing penises (possibly Ranks) as they're proof of skill level.

    "I'm a 45!"
    "Well I'm a 53!"
    "Well I have another account that's a 60!"
    "Why do you pay for 2 Live accounts?"
    "I'm better at it than you!"
    "That doesn't make sense little man!" (the Lvl 45 one was a kid of about 10)

    Oh wait, this will totally happen.

  • DutchDemons #5 3 years ago

    good thing they drop the trueskill bullcrap, that was so lame....i was a 3-bar within a day and my bro remains a 2-bar, for having played equally as good imho.

    good thing that they punish people for quitting, but at least let me quit when i want to...don't force the dashboard on me!

  • JahB #6 3 years ago

    Pointless if you don't actually get anything for it.

    wrong. this will fix everything that's so horribly wrong with gears' matchmaking at the moment, and i for one am positively stoked for this.

  • Jonesie2k #7 3 years ago

    sort the lag problems first. this update isn't needed. n when a new ranking system does come, again, copy halo3 cos that is spot on! it is such a good reflection of how good someone is

  • DFawkes #8 3 years ago

    Will it really though? I played CoD:W@W for the first time yesterday, and chose Boot Camp (yes, I'm a wuss). Then it proceeded to drop me into a game with Lvl 50s. Not exactly Boot Camp stuff, but I was good enough to hold my own. To be fair, if it had worked properly I'd have had less of a challenge, but my point is a system like this isn't all that good either, the Level tends to mean nothing.

    What it can do is motivate me to play more. I'll probably not touch Gears 2 online when I have a Rank to increase on CoD, though it's more to do with me liking CoD more.

  • Douche #9 3 years ago

    Adding bots to matches where people have dropped out or been disconnected is of far greater importance to me than adding XP/ levels. People constantaly dropping out is the one thing that was seriously effecting my enjoyment of the game because in Gears, more than most games, being a man down seriously screws your team, especially in Annex, King of the Hill, Guardian and Submission game modes.

    Looking forward to this.

  • sneetch #10 3 years ago

    @JahB
    Pointless if you don't actually get anything for it.

    wrong. this will fix everything that's so horribly wrong with gears' matchmaking at the moment, and i for one am positively stoked for this.

    I'm sorry, is this sarcasm? I'm no longer sure.

    I started playing COD4 multiplayer about a year or so after it came out, the servers were full of 5-star 55s and the skill difference between them was amazing: some of them I was able to own immediately, others kicked me up one side of the map and down the other without breaking a sweat.

    This kind of system doesn't show how good you are it only shows how much you've played and eventually everyone will be level 99.

  • SixFootHalfling #11 3 years ago

    It can't count for anything when 3 out of 4 games are so laggy that the host team always wins, it may as well be a random number generator. In fact, I've played games before that were so bad everyone on both teams was lagging but 1 person, this has never happened to me in Halo, or even in COD4, at least that had the sense to end the game.

    For a company that built itself on online multiplayer, this really is a gigantic cock-up.

    @DutchDemons

    Having to dashboard is a pain in the arse to have to leave an unplayable game, and every time it gets harder and harder to restart the game, although on the plus side, Americans no longer leave the first time you kill them in an annex game.

  • BadDevotions #12 3 years ago

    why add an insane level bot? surely it should be matched by the overall balance of the team? If all the players on a team are shite, then a shite bot should be added. :S

  • smernicki #13 3 years ago

    how about they actually just fix the matchmaking

  • ThePissartist #14 3 years ago

    Anyone actually play this game online? I tried again last night, started a game, the server/host died/left halfway though and I totally lost interest straight away.

    I remember when Epic were the multiplayer game champions - I thought the latest Unreal game was pants and the multiplayer GoW is fairly pants too.

    Oh well, time for Left4Dead...

  • smernicki #15 3 years ago

    I try and play online but give up and play WaW instead. The matchmaking is guff and there's no real incentive to play. Hoarde mode is fun, but it starts taking too long and it's a total frustration if you get to level 30+ and lose connection. Controller vs Wall moment if ever there is one.

    i want to like the online side of this but i just can't.

    this and r6 vegas 2 are two games totally let down by their broken multiplayer.

  • DFawkes #16 3 years ago

    I've never had any probelms at all on R62V, and most of my experience on Gears 2 has been great, but when a guy on your team quits and you lose because you're a man down, that's shit and needs fixing.

  • bad09 #17 3 years ago

    I nearly traded this at the weekend but decided I'm gonna wait until i get my 20gb Virgin connection in a week or so to see if the improved connection makes this playable online, but if it's still as broken as it is now I'll use it against KZ2 or SF4.

    Way to kill one of my favourite online games Epic..

  • kangarootoo #18 3 years ago

    "This kind of system doesn't show how good you are it only shows how much you've played and eventually everyone will be level 99."

    The truth. And that, is the elephant in the room.

    A proper dynamic rating system, that can fall as well as rise, would tell you how good someone is. Something like this is just a bean counter. I can see why they put it in, but its not going to help with matchmaking to any real degree.

  • Pirotic #19 3 years ago

    Ohhh, 2 out of my 3 major gripes with the game being fixed. Looking forward to this patch landing.

  • rowsdower #20 3 years ago

    DoW2 has TrueSkill and levels and it works okay over there. Course, none of them matter much with the game being broken online, but it's the thought that counts.