Gears of War Comments by Kristan Reed

"It seems a tad harsh to mark the game down because idiots play it."

It's the same as marking a game down for bad AI. If the human intelligence affects the player experience, it seems fair to note it in the review.

@kanga: I agree entirely

Whoopee, it starts anew... seriously EG, did anyone want this? I suppose it's good for your hits, but this smells like stirring up controversy for the sake of it. If you feel you cannot sufficiently review a game yet, then wait with the review, this 2-part review thing seperated by a week, frankly, is idiotic. And this is coming from a very big EG fan.

If this is the 14th best game ever, I'm Jesus.

What placing will make you the Prophet Muhammed?

Well done, you qualify for membership of the "I don't understand it so it must be wrong" club.

I don't understand the above statement ... and does that mean it must be wrong?

@dudefella

"but this smells like stirring up controversy for the sake of it"

Writes something, realises the futility, deletes it, loses faith in gamers and gaming, leaves thread, quits job.

/not the last one, obviously

Not surprised...

/me hopes that Epic has this sorted out before I get me an Xbox 360...

http://www.gamerankings.com/Charts/92823...

hehehe

Spot on review of MP. I wish more dev teams would take a look at how Halo 2 handled things. I know alot of people didn't like that options were removed from you but in my experience if you give people responsability and power, they always sod it up!

Why on earth are we still gaming online with systems that require me to have to rush to invite people into games and rejoin each other every 20 mins. Party support! PLEASE!! The game is begging for it. Allow me ro find 3 decent players and move around the online world letting my team down.

I hope Epic don't let us down on the support side. When this game clicks online, it's really really good!

Didn't see any mention of voice comms problems. I (and others) have had problems with this in multiplayer games. Nothing to do with my NAT settings (which are open) and nothing to do with my headset or broadband connection. Tried resetting the console, logging in and out of live, unplugging and reconnecting the headset, all to no avail whatsoever.

Anybody else had issues with this?

I got annoyed with the ranked matchsystem too untill I realised I didnt give a flying f*ck about my ranking or trueskill. Since then I had tons of fun on unranked, where all these troubles are not the case.

@glo: when you join a match halfway apparantly your mic wont work at times but you do hear the ones that joined from start.

"Beware of the sushi. I also find it a bit distressing to order food from a girl in a restaurant that smells of raw fish."

The girl or the restaurant? And why is it a bit distressing?

I am not a Twat and enjoy team play online and talk using the Headset..!

Am i the only one?

Add me to your friends list.

S J Rogers

The girl or the restaurant?

If it was the girl he would have written it "...from a girl in a restaurant who smells of raw fish".

in all honesty the pre and post game options are almost just as important as what happens in the game these days. you need a painless way of getting into the game....penalties for cheaters, lobbies, clans, comms, etc.

i hate it when you finish a match and you get kicked out to start again which takes ages (saints row). Battlefield 2, Halo2 and rainbowsix black arrow have it about right between them. I don't want to wait as long to get in a match as it takes to play a match.

what seems like ages ago in RB6:BA you seemed to playing match after match in quick succession with players that worked together and you managed to plan attacks. This one match at a time thing just leads to games with no structure and the inability to weed out the arsey yanks. Battlefield 2 was a painless multiplayer game too. cos you could just jump straight into a battle without any problems were as GRAW had you waiting ages to get into a game but the lobby works well. Halo2 party system was good too.

@bavelb - I know about joining a match half way through problem. However this problem continued once we moved onto new matches and continued until I got sick of it (after about 6 matches) and quit out for the last time to try FEAR online and see if there was a problem with my headset/connection. There wasn't.

The problem also affected other players in the game so it wasn't just down to me. Anyone else found this?

So... Eurogamer is SERIOUSLY trying to tell me that Gears of War isn't as good as a Tony Hawk game? Seriously? They're not having some kind of laugh? I personally think that's really quite silly, but whatever.

"you'll encounter idiotic hosts that quit out if it looks like their team is about to lose the match (and therefore the stats don't get uploaded). Just as annoying is the regular occurrence of players who drop out of matches and leave your team high and dry for no apparent reason, or people who just plain refuse to even entertain the notion of team play."

And this is basically why I disagree with certain industry voices that online play is the ultimate future of gaming. People are, generally, a bunch of knobs who I spend most of the rest of my life trying very hard to avoid.

I also completely agree with marking a game down if the experience is marred by the people playing it. I just want to know if it's fun enough to be worth me spending money on. If it isn't, then I need to know. Whatever the reason.

Every xbox 360 game on LIVE has been a letdown for me.

Microsoft's ridiculous policy on not allowing ranked matches with friends on your team is seriously stunting their online service, which was so good circa Halo 2.

I truly don't see what they get out of it! Apparently, though I am doubtful of this and haven't seen the actual quote myself, only a paraphrase of it, a programmer for the online portion of GoW has said that He was basically told by Microsoft that the game would not ship with clans or team ranked games.

Microsoft seem convinced that gamers who want to play on a team with friends should be relegated to the lowest common denominator gaming of Player Matches.

I don't think the criticism related to ranked matches is fair. Most of the issues described are inherit to TrueSkill and the idea of ranked matches in itself. They are part of the system, and you will experience the exact same issues playing ranked matches in any other game. Any one developer can't change that, so knocking Epic for it is missing the mark. Any game on Xbox 360 will have these problems, it is in no way exclusive to Gears.

And it's hardly Epic's fault if the people who play ranked matches are idiots. Stick to player matches, like any sane individual would.

@kangaratoo

Come on, man, I am not accusing EG of anything, but you have to agree that it is slightly strange to publish a review in two parts separated by almost a week! What, because I dare criticise EG, I have crossed over the line? What were you going to write? If you've got something to say in rebuttal, I want to hear it. I'd like to hear the other side of the argument. I think it's silly to publish a review with a score attached if you feel you cannot completely review a game yet, which EG obviously did. That is my opinion. That causes you to lose faith in gamers? Get real. I'm not here to blatantly stir up shit or to troll, despite what you may think.

I have to say I ABSOLUTELY agree with everything the review has mentioned, having played myself for the last ten hours.

@hula hoops: Yeah, but it's an easy mistake to make.

Seeing that english is only my second language I'm not sure what it's called in english but the idea is that you're referring to the wrong subject, as in the girl that may or may not have smelled fish.

Can anyone help a non-anglo out here with the proper terminology?

@Walshicus: Way to go comparing apples and skateboards there, champ.

It might be a small consolation to know that if you repeatedly quit out of too many ranked matches (and Epic did their code thing correctly), then your TrueSkill will be marked down. Microsoft's arbitration servers take all that sort of stuff into account. It still ruins your game, but at least they don't get off scott free.

Same sort of thing if you drop out of a ranked match cos you're doing crap and you don't want your score to count. Ain't going to happen. Every player in a game uploads every other player's scores at the end of the match and the scores are arbitrated.

I know all this stuff far too well having had to do it for FEAR.

(Did the comments eat my comment? News at 11!)

@MMUK: If that is the case then you'll have to do a better job of getting the word out as I had no idea that MS has a number of stupid rules that you have to follow.

Any links to the actual restrictions?

@ evildonut - That's fine - but if you're interested in unlocking the achievements (which, saddo that I am is the case) you cannot do so by playing player matches. That very definitely is Epic's fault.

Trying to get your point across, krudster? ;)

Edit: Less funny with only 2 identical comments compared to 6. Not hilarious with 6 either - just funnier.

We now return you to your regulary scheduled programming.

Edit 2: Breaking news! Not fun at all with only one comment from krudster left.

Thank you for your patience.

"3. FPS game on non PC platform capped to 8/10 "

FEAR on the 360 got a 9, as did Half-Life 2 on the Xbox.

Anything else?

THis game is very good, versus mode is good, but co-op is great.

If this is an 8 I wonder what a 9 or 10 game is like?

/goes to look at fear again

Can you 'ignore poster' yourself?

@rusta: Try it and then report back. :)

I'm really hoping they'll fix that clans / groups issue. You can always try making some noise on their forums or leaving messages for Major Nelson... maybe it'll eventually sink in.

King Kong also got a 9 on the first Xbox.

First of all FEAR is a first person shooter, and therefore not directly comparable.

BUT!

If Gears of War had FEAR's standard of AI and had combat as enjoyable then it'd be a 9 or a 10. Well, maybe a 9, and a 10 if Epic could come up with a plotline, characters and scenarios not aimed so squarely at American teenagers.

Good review Krudster and I agree with all your points about the downside of GOW online.

However they are SO true of almost any online game (on any format I would guess) so its a bit unfair to just pick on Epic for not sorting them out. I know they could have done a better job, but so could nearly all developers of online games.

The dilemma of having achievements unlocked in player matches is that you could easily get a mate to stand still while you give him 100 headshots without any consequence to speak of. At least in ranked, you would be seriously harming your leaderboard position if you tried to cheat like this (although you might not care). I think cheating is the primary reason for keeping achievements ranked only.

@MMUK: I will Google for the truth then!

Cheers!

Tomorrow (hopefully), i'm writing my final collage exam ever.
Got GoW and Oblivion (haven't played either yet), and i'm gonna play till may eyes bleed...

Must say i'm going to play Oblivion first.

smugla
17-Nov-06 14:04:05

first lol
ignore poster
no. no lol at all.

first != lol

first = ignored, so if you have anything remotely lol-ish, or even interesting, to say ever again, sadly, I won't hear it. :)

Ok, maybe unfair to single out Epic, but it's a Microsoft published game, therefore Microsoft needs a kick up the backside. Also, it's a 3400 word review exhaustively detailing my expreriences with multiplayer - therefore I'm going to explore points that wouldn't normally get the same level of detail. This is, after all, the most important Xbox Live game to be released since Halo 2, and that managed to get almost everything right. We shouldn't forget the standards other games set, and therefore scores should reflect that.

@Mephistopheles:

My partner has an Xbox Live account, but doesn't play GoW. I could quite easily fix it in exactly the way you mention in a ranked match. Lots of online achievements are open to abuse.

@ManicMinerUK

Really? I didn't know? Maybe I need to brush up on MS's policies on live. Sorry to hear they are preventing people from creating what to me is the perfect example of how to handle online.

I will in future direct my complaints a little higher up.

Thanks for the info

@ MMUK - you reckon there's any way that public opinion could actually change this?

There already is, unfortunately, a storm being kicked up on the xbox.com forums about it, and from the looks of a quick search on the "feedback" part of it, there has been such a storm for a long time, but none of them seem to be listening!!!

I've actually said this a few times in the last week or so since COD3 came out (I haven't sampled GoW yet - don't have enough cash so my girlfriend is getting me it for christmas instead) that, Does microsoft not wonder why Halo 2, with its online system which no-one is now allowed to emulate in 360 games, is still the most popular xbox live game, not even that, but most popular xbox live game played by 360 owners, even though it is now more than 2 years old, and the nice shiny new games get ignored.

Most games I buy nowadays, I get excited that the multiplayer might be great and capture the team spirit that Halo 2 did online, playing a ranked team match with your party but, alas, none ever does.

Maybe a PS3 might be the way to go if they can implement a system which allows gaming with friends without it having to be in the "just for fun" (read as "let's shoot our own team and just generally act like idiots) area.

I've put in some time on the game now today - I think the review score was bang on the money, I might even have gone as far as 7. Graphics only get you so far, I'm finding the game (including the controls) somewhat lacking.

"3. FPS game on non PC platform capped to 8/10 "

FEAR on the 360 got a 9, as did Half-Life 2 on the Xbox.

Anything else?

Yes please, could you comment on point 1, 2, 4 and 5 as well? ... especially point 1 :P

Depends how important those features are to the game. As ever, you look at these things on a case by case basis.

Interesting to note your points about these little-known rules from MS. They may have to cave in shortly - especially if Sony starts allowing devs to do all the things Microsoft are so bone-headedly restricting.

@MMUK - ah I did not know that cheers!

I think really a halfway house needs to be reached then really where there are simply clan matches.

This seems to be the only real way around it I would guess. Ranked match, Player Match, Clan Match. The clan matches would be ranked and use TrueSkill but only for the clan itself, the results would not affect the actual players themselves.

It's an imperfect solution but then if there is no concensus on which way it should go, that would be a good compromise.

Yeah, that sounds a better way around it. Just culling clan matches altogether is ridiculous for a *team* based game.

I wish they'd just put things back how they were. I've never liked the way ranked/truskill carved the community in two. You're either playing for stats, or for fun - the middle ground we had before was better than both.

Sounds like people need to get vocal about it - it's our service that we're paying for