Romance is "f***ing hard" - Bleszinski

By Robert Purchese Published 11 November, 2008

And women like Gears, he says.

Cliff Bleszinski has admitted that tugging on our heart-strings in his new chart-topping game, Gears of War 2, was "f**ing hard to do".

"I wanted to put it in the first one, honestly," Bleszinski told MTV Multiplayer, referring to Dom's search for his missing wife, which plays a significant role in the story.

"It was one of the things [where] we didn't have the confidence in our abilities as storytellers at that time. And we didn't have the time to get it in there.

"It's f***ing hard to do, man. It's really hard to do. I think we did an admirable job of it. Is it a Nicholas Sparks romance? No, it's not. But there's a little bit of heart in there. For some reason, Gears seems to have more of a female following than other shooters.

"It's kind of a good priority to have, I think," he added. "If everything in the game is so badass and nasty, then you just lose perspective. It's like a person who just yells all the time."

We'll be interested to find out what the ladies make of the Riftworm level. Anyway, check out our Gears of War 2 review to find out why we're in love with Bleszinski's latest.

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 (46) Latest comment 3 years ago

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

  • the_dudefather #1 3 years ago

    in before predictable 'gears of war = gay romance' jokes

  • Brodie #2 3 years ago

    Actually romance is fucking softly.

    Fucking hard is good old lust.

    :D

  • mattigan #3 3 years ago

    The 'romance' I've seen so far is a bit cringeworthy to say the least

  • optimusprym8 #4 3 years ago

    Have to admit, for a game, it was well done. As for the game appealing to female gamers, my lady says she has a heart-attack just watching me play it

  • aldo_14 #5 3 years ago

    "Ladies especially love MY gears of war", Cliff did not continue on to say, grinning maniacally whilst fiddling a giant chrome crotchguard.
    Edited by 1 at 11/11/08 @ 08:54

  • bad09 #6 3 years ago

    Sorry Cliffy B, my missus prefers Halo3 :)

  • Xerx3s #7 3 years ago

    Haven't finished it yet but so far I don't get the complaints. It's been an awesome roller-coaster.

    I thought that fable 2 would be it but I'm seriously considering putting this i as the goty.

  • Rirekon #8 3 years ago

    "It's like a person who just yells all the time."
    Yeah, that pretty much sums up UT/GoW for me

  • mingster #9 3 years ago

    I thought you meant in real life he was finding it hard to get a girlfriend.

  • ThePissartist #10 3 years ago

    '...women like Gears...'.

    Big hairy women that regularly inject themselves with male hormones and have a tendency to wear dungarees.

    I could imagine some girls enjoying COD, but certainly not a game that involves big characters that look like something that you can buy from a Gamesworkshop store, that like to chainsaw big aliens. I mean, honestly - I'd like to see what these 'women' look like.

    Scary geek beasts.

  • kangarootoo #11 3 years ago

    "referring to Dom's search for his missing wife, which plays a significant role in the story"

    Yes, thats right. Its pivotal. Pivotal you hear.


    "It's f***ing hard to do, man. It's really hard to do."

    Which is why people hire professional screen writers, so the job gets done properly.

    This is one of the things about game development that irks me. We should never be able to use "making games can be a bit tricky" as an excuse. Of course writing a decent script is hard, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to get it right most of the time.

    I don't know what the budget for Gears 2, but they should be able to hire anyone they want to write the plot. Cliffy B and co shouldn't be putting their sticky toffee covered mitts anywhere near a typewriter.
    Edited by 1 at 11/11/08 @ 09:22

  • Colin8703 #12 3 years ago

    My wife loves Gears, especially the multiplayer. She likes the violence. I should probably be worried now thinking about it.

  • Monroe #13 3 years ago

    Oh yeah romance. Right. I was so. Uuh touched. By the romance. In Gears 2. Dom and his wife, right? That was the romance part. So uuh touching.

    And my girlfriend? Yeah she loves Gears. It's like her uuh favourite game. Hypertrophia is really her business and... and...

    Okay I can't do this. Cliff you're an idiot.

  • Zomoniac #14 3 years ago

    You don't always have to fuck her hard, in fact sometimes that's not right to do...

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #15 3 years ago

    "For some reason, Gears seems to have more of a female following than other shooters."

    Probably the same reason why Assasin's Creed had more of a male following.

  • kangarootoo #16 3 years ago

    @Zomoniac

    That's f*ckin' team work

    ;)

  • kangarootoo #17 3 years ago

    "For some reason, Gears seems to have more of a female following than other shooters."

    Is there anything close to a souce for that? I know a few girls that play Halo and Battlefield to a pretty high level (clans and so on), but I don't know any that play Gears of War. Purely my own anecdotal reference of course, but it seems an odd statement to just let slide without question. I'm sure Cliffy B knows a few girls that play Gears, but its probably mandatory in his house or something.

  • mkreku #18 3 years ago

    Yup. Gears of War has always been for little girls.

  • OnlyMe #19 3 years ago

    My wife like all-out-action games, and right now she's playing God of War. She also asked me if I had Gears of War 2, 'cause she liked the commercial. I had to remind her that we played through the first one a few months back. Right after we played through Resistance.

    She's also played through Timesplitters 1,2 and 3. And Metal Gear Solid 1,2 and 3. She played a lot more before we got kids, obviously, but she's still enjoying the occasional game. She doesn't only play action games though, she's played through a few Final Fantasys too, and some platformers. Actually she's played through games in most of the genres.

  • jack_klugman #20 3 years ago

    I thought Dom's wife was called Marcus?

  • ThePissartist #21 3 years ago

    @OnlyMe

    That's quite rare. I haven't played some of those games...

  • seasidebaz #22 3 years ago

    Gears 2? Tugging on heart strings?




    Pansies, the lot of ya.

  • Snarky #23 3 years ago

    Bless them for trying. It's not going to win any awards for story telling, but it's a nice contrast to the constant blood shed.

  • Rash' #24 3 years ago

    and people say Gears 2 is mindless fun. it actually has a heart...

  • menage #25 3 years ago

    Well, my woman likes Fable 2, VP2, LBP. Hell even DMC and God of War.

    Not this.
    Edited by 1 at 11/11/08 @ 10:39

  • Santino #26 3 years ago

    gears 2 is about as romantic as 2 girls 1 cup. its a good game but it is what it is, story is pretty much amateurish crap.

  • Darren #27 3 years ago

    If ever there was proof of the underlying homosexual undertones in Gears of War, it's a cutscene in the new game where Dom after passing out is dreaming of his wife before she fades away and is replaced by the hunkier, macho Marcus Fenix leaning over him, obviously deeply concerned for him. I actually laughed out loud at the "suggestion" of that scene! :D

    And it follows that if ladies like Gears of War for the "big guns"... ahem... then it also follows true that the game will have a homosexual following too, further enforcing the fact that this is a big "gay" game at heart. ;)

    As a gay man myself, I confess to enjoy all the machoness and male bonding. :D
    Edited by 1 at 11/11/08 @ 12:00

  • ArcMonkey #28 3 years ago

    Make another Jazz Jackrabbit game!!!

    That had more romance, and was probably more appealing to women...

  • Gearskin #29 3 years ago

    That big cutscene was powerful stuff.

  • Frandroid #30 3 years ago

    You don't always have to fuck her hard, in fact sometimes that's not right to do...

    That's f*ckin' team work

    What's your favourite posish?

  • kangarootoo #31 3 years ago

    \o/

    /would throw in something about a side hatch just for variety and balance, but we are starting to geek out a bit here.

  • kangarootoo #32 3 years ago

    Oh ok then.

    [link url=http://uk.y outube.com/watch?v=ATf_G-D2CNo
    ]http://uk.y outube.com/watch?v=ATf_G-D2CNo
    [/link]

  • linksdad #33 3 years ago

    There wasnt any romance and that is definately a GOOD thing - just look at how romance spoiled Star Wars.

    There was love and there was tenderness and they were both implemented very well for a video game. And if you stopped to think about it for a second it was a very touching moment.

    What a roller coaster of a game, thoroughly enjoyed my play through on normal this weekend (one of the best run throughs I've played), will be back for more once I get further into or finish Fallout3.

  • GamesConnoisseur #34 3 years ago

    I thought the conclusion of Dom and Maria story thread in Act 4 was a very adult thing, rarely see that sort of moment in game. Other equilavent would be MSG4 but even so did not on the same scale as that bit in GoW2!

    Spoiler Alert!

    Shooting your own wife in the head, freaking hell! So who is the real pansy Dom or Solid Snake?!

  • itsfuzzy #35 3 years ago

    If Cliff thinks there is romance in Gears 2 id fucking hate to be his missus

  • Nithron #36 3 years ago

    @ itsfuzzy: Look at him. Do you really think he goes for the ladies?

  • ThePissartist #37 3 years ago

    “…a cutscene in the new game where Dom after passing out is dreaming of his wife before she fades away and is replaced by the hunkier, macho Marcus Fenix leaning over him…”

    I would have never thought that Gears of War could be considered gay… thinking about it though, maybe the whole thing could be seen as a repressed homosexual’s fantasy story/dream:

    Monsters that come out of holes shooting over big guys with lots of muscles.

    *the above is just a joke, please don't read into it too much*
    Edited by 1 at 11/11/08 @ 19:24

  • rotmm #38 3 years ago

    @Gearskin,

    I agree. I was surprisingly moved.

  • ChthonicEcho #39 3 years ago

    Swearing makes me look fucking cool. It helps me fucking stand out in the fucking crowd.

  • paketep #40 3 years ago

    Whoa, this would count as Epic's stupid comment of the month if it wasn't for Mike Capps whining about the fact that once we buy a game and finish it, we can gift it or sell it, and that PC piracy is oh so huge and nobody wants to buy their buggy POS port of GoW for Windows.

    Next time, Cliffy, next time.

  • gaselite #41 3 years ago

    I haven't played Gears 2 and I don't know who wrote it, but if it's a hard thing to do, or they at any stage lacked faith in their storytelling abilities, then perhaps they should've hired a writing professional to develop the story and work on the dialogue, if not come up with all the written content himself (under instruction from Bleszinski, of course).

    I think it would be a mercy if more game developers approached actual writers, screenwriters for instance (unless their existing staff with writing duties are genuinely good - this is seldom the case) rather than try and wing it themselves because so much of it (storytelling in narrative driven games) basically feels like poor fanfic without the ridiculous sex.

  • qoobah #42 3 years ago

    Well I admit that the "There's a time for us" level and it's ending and the end of Tai was surprisingly adult and serious in a game thats basically the very contradiction of both, I still think the overall "story" and "writing" was worse than piss-poor.

    I mean, damn. Cliche over a cliche followed by a cliche. If there was ever any substance to the story then it drowned in Riftworms blood. Gears is just this type of game I guess, which is not a bad thing as it's very well done and enjoyable for what it is, but come on, lets not fool ourselves. If the devs say they put attention to story and came up with this, then I guess it speaks volumes about industry's overall approach to storytelling in gaming.

  • bonker #43 3 years ago

    "For some reason, Gears seems to have more of a female following than other shooters."

    I assume that he means "female" following ...

  • itsfuzzy #44 3 years ago

    @Nithron: I suppose your right . . . . Lmao

  • jlaakso #45 3 years ago

    Not knowing anything about Epic's development, I'll just say that writing for games is hard. It's not about money or effort, it's the difficulty of finding a writer who gets games in general, gets your concept, writes well, is on the same page with the developer and seemingly the hardest part of all - has the time to get involved.

  • half #46 3 years ago

    I'm actually finding a lot of these comments both humorous and offending. As a woman I love to play Gears. I'm playing it on hardcore single player. I plan to do insane when it's unlocked. Plus I've been playing Unreal Tournament from back in my Uni days. I'm yet to go on live on Gears though since I tend to get serious lag. But I plan to, soon.

    To 'ThePissartist' you don't have a clue about girls that play games. I regularly get attention from men, even had ones trying to get my phone number after I've showed them my engagement ring. I'm not a super model, but I'm ok enough to get chatted up and even begged for my number even though I will be getting married. I own all three consoles, Xbox 360, Wii, PS3 and play the odd game on the PC. I have a DS and play the odd game on the PSP when I can. Having all consoles, well sometimes finding the time to play everything can be a problem. I still have Ninja Gaiden 2, Mass Effect and Orange box to finish off. But I'm getting there.

    The romance element to Gears 2 is a nice touch. I'm really appreciating the more in depth story line this time round, gives it a bit more substance.
    Edited by 1 at 13/11/08 @ 15:44