Gears of War patch tomorrow

By Tom Bramwell Published 13 June, 2007

New Achievements and tweaks.

Gears of War's next patch is set to go live tomorrow, 14th June, and introduce eight new Achievements for the "Annex" game-type and "Hidden Fronts" multiplayer map pack, along with adjustments to the "Roadie Run" controls that stop players snagging on walls. According to Microsoft's PRs, "The title update will also help squash multiplayer exploits and provide general housekeeping."

All of which breathless single-paragraph cramming leaves us with little to add other than that the news came to us not via the usual channel of Epic's Mark Rein posting on the official forum, but through a brief press release issued by Microsoft UK's external PR chums, who would also want us to add that while Annex is free, the Hidden Fronts pack currently goes for 800 Microsoft points (GBP 6.80 / EUR 9.30), and will be made available for free to people put off by that on 3rd September.

So there. For more on the Roadie Run tweak, check out Epic's Rod Fergusson explaining things, and for more - oh so much more - on Gears of War, check out our Gears of War Xbox 360 gamepage. Funny it's only on Xbox 360. I wonder if they'll do a PC one? Someone should look into that.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (26) Latest comment 5 years ago

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

  • Xerx3s #1 5 years ago

    Gheys of War lol

  • GamesConnoisseur #2 5 years ago

    How many times have they adjusted Roadie Run?

  • asphaltcowboy #3 5 years ago

    I still don't get why they can't have achievements for unranked games. Can't they just say, if you change any of the default server options, you don't get the achievements? Then we can play unranked (i.e. have fun) and they can be achieved with everyone on a level playing field...

  • Dizzy #4 5 years ago

    "I still don't get why they can't have achievements for unranked games"

    Because people would just start a private game and get the achievements working together without actually fighting each other ;)

  • Veldaban #5 5 years ago

    Is it really such a terrible thing if some people were to do that? They still need to spend the time on it... if they want to get them that way then let them.

  • The-Bodybuilder #6 5 years ago

    @ Xerx3s

    You mean "Gheys of Phwoar".

  • Dizzy #7 5 years ago

    >Is it really such a terrible thing if some people were to do that?

    No but it breaks the concept of "achieving" something.

    If sniper head kill was an achievement... would setting up a private game and shooting your buddy (that doesn't move) in the face really be worth an achievement?

  • Xerx3s #8 5 years ago

    :D

    @ TBB
    Edited by 1 at 13/06/07 @ 14:43

  • barnard666 #9 5 years ago

    I agree, multiplayer achievements in general arent that great, but ranked match ones are just plain wrong.

    command and conquer seems to have it right, it has "play 100 hours of multiplayer" and "collect 10,0000000000000000000000000000 in tiberium during multiplayer matches"

    both are just acheivements that say "I play this a f'in lot" which is cool.

  • afghan_jones #10 5 years ago

    Get in!

    Really good to see Epic committed to keep putting out support for Gears. It remains the highlight of the 360 for me.

    Interested to see what the acheivements will be.

    Ive just got back into this in a big way after dallying with the Halo beta.



    Also, surely it is blatantly obvious why kills etc in player matches dont count as achievements.

    Edited by 1 at 13/06/07 @ 14:46

  • Beano #11 5 years ago

    People still play this?

    Amazing!

  • menage #12 5 years ago

    "
    Because people would just start a private game and get the achievements working together without actually fighting each other ;)"

    And now people don't because we hate screaming and cursing teenagers. Keep achievemnets offline!!

  • Floppy #13 5 years ago

    The multiplayer achievement thing ruined this game for me. I bought it and got through the initial 'tutorial' part, then a mate asked me if I wanted to join the game he was playing at the time.

    I managed to fire off 10 rounds into a baddie, and helped his demise. *PING* it seems I was firing at the end boss and got the achievement for defeating him. Two achievements... the start, and the end.

    I laugh about it now, but not happy at the time.

  • asphaltcowboy #14 5 years ago

    So what? They're lame, who cares? From Epic's point of view, they're still playing their game. Maybe achievements could be given out only if there are 6 or more players on the server... that'd stop pairs of people from getting them unjustly... it would be considerably harder to find 6 people all willing to lame it up. Maybe make it so that anyone can join the server? I don't know, but I do know that ranked games are some kind of hellish nightmare!

  • Dizzy #15 5 years ago

    >People still play this?

    Number 1 game on XBL at the moment and actually has been since launch (excluding Halo 2 on XBox and Halo 3 beta on 360).

    Edited by 1 at 13/06/07 @ 14:57

  • afghan_jones #16 5 years ago

    Why do people think that is they dont like LIVE multiplayer that multiplayer acheivements are unfair in some way. I have a job and not a lot of free time and so I will never get the acheivement in Dead Rising for killing 53,000 zombies or for wearing every item of clothing. That doesnt mean that all acheivements which require you to invest a lot of time into repetitive tasks are unfair. They are boring though.

    If you arent prepared to put time into multiplayer you dont get multiplayer acheivements, why do people see that as unfair exactly?

  • Dermoth #17 5 years ago

    I picked up GoW again after the Halo 3 beta died, and the multiplayer is still as brainless and broken and laggy as ever*. Tweak the roadie run? How about tweaking the lag, nerfing the shotgun, and making the lobbies less atrocious?

    Nah.
    Edited by 1 at 13/06/07 @ 15:25

  • septimus #18 5 years ago

    Lag?

    Never experienced that. Router issue possibly?

  • lennon #19 5 years ago

    First time I played GOW Multiplayer I actually phoned a friend who was offline and told him to get his ass online asap so that we could play I was that impressed. Then after playing the single player for a week or so and going back to the mulitplayer I couldnt believe it had changed so much.

    Every game I enetered I was met with abuse and taunts of noob and from then on I have always steered clear of GOW. Shame really as I felt it really had a lot of promise.

    Still hopefully those idiots will stick with GoW and leave Shadowrun to us normal people. Cant say Ive come across one idiot in that.

  • afghan_jones #20 5 years ago

    "First time I played GOW Multiplayer I actually phoned a friend who was offline and told him to get his ass online asap so that we could play I was that impressed. Then after playing the single player for a week or so and going back to the mulitplayer I couldnt believe it had changed so much.

    Every game I enetered I was met with abuse and taunts of noob and from then on I have always steered clear of GOW. Shame really as I felt it really had a lot of promise.

    Still hopefully those idiots will stick with GoW and leave Shadowrun to us normal people. Cant say Ive come across one idiot in that."


    As someone who has spent a lot of time in GOW multiplayer I can honestly say it isnt as bad as it used to be. (although there are still a lot of idiots)

    Its worth persevereing though as when it works, it really works. Having a full room of 8 competent players, all communicating and working together in their teams is one of the true stand out LIVE experiences and shows what multiplayer really should be like.

    compared to so many other online shooters where half your team are either team killing, running off with the sniper rilf and hiding in a corner, and hardly ever communicating, Gears can be a joy to play.

    You just have to be patient and make sure you prefer the good players and avoid the bad ones.

  • lennon #21 5 years ago

    @afghan_jones

    Funny you should mention the prefer bit of live. For some reason it only really struck me the other day that this is a really powerful feature.

    I think the problem for me is that most of the games I joined seemed to be full of players better than me and not knowing the maps overly well meant it was extra tough.

    Its a game I would almost certainly have gone back to in terms of multiplayer but fail to see the point seeing as I would assume its the hardcore left playing it and I will just get my ass kicked.

    What I really like about Shadowrun is that TKing seems to be virtually non existant and Snipers in no way have and advantage unless they work in tandem with other team members and even then there are ways to defeat them.

    Once the Gow maps are free I might try again but I feel the boat has sailed.

  • afghan_jones #22 5 years ago

    @lennon

    yeah, I try and prefer/avoid people after pretty much every game. Also friend request anyone I get on well with. Works ok. Ive got about 20 people in my friends list from Gears that i know I will always get a good match out of.

    It is a pain when everyone else has been practising this long and it took me a while to get into. try just picking one or two maps and getting them down before trying others.

    How is Shadowrun btw? I found the demo a bit overly complex for what it was and I feel it seems a bit pricey for what you get but I do love a good bit of multiplayer so I may still give it a twizzle.

  • neosalad #23 5 years ago

    aye

    shame they aint changing the achivements to unranked games
    i still havent even played a ranked game, and have no intention of, even for the 10 GP.

  • The-Bodybuilder #24 5 years ago

    >"leave Shadowrun to us normal people"

    Shadow run? Normal people?

    BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA!!!

  • numptyboymatt #25 5 years ago

    I tried a couple of ranked matches, but gave up - Im not particularly good at the game, although to be fair, Im not horrendously bad, and it seems that you just get groups of people who want to play in set groups and nothing else - Ive been kicked out of games or asked to leave so that they can bring one of their friends in and its honestly put me off and I dont think I can be arsed playing again - especially when they are discussing getting you kicked out on the mic for all to hear.

  • neuroniky #26 5 years ago

    Can we have some more single player content too?