Gears of War 3 writer Karen Traviss not working on Judgment

Gears of War: Judgment is being written by Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter author Tom Bissell and Rob Auten, replacing sci-fi author Karen Traviss who penned the series' third installment.

Epic's franchise has frequently been criticised for the quality of its writing. Dead Space story producer Chuck Beaver called it, "literally the worst writing in games."

Even Gears creator Cliff Bleszinski acknowledged that the series had shifted away from his original vision. "The intent was to make [Gears of War] a lot more Band of Brothers and take it a lot more serious," he said in a previous Eurogamer interview.

"If we get around to ever doing more Gears games, I hope we can continue to drift back more towards a Christopher Nolan type dialogue as opposed to a Tim Burton or Joel Schumacher Batman."

Gears of War 3 scribe Karen Traviss didn't do herself any favours when she wrote on her official blog, "I'm a writer who doesn't read novels, and not just because of time, or fear of ideas contamination, but because I just don't like doing it."

Of her replacements, Tom Bissell is an award-winning novelist. In addition to going behind the scenes with Epic Games in Extra Lives, he wrote the Gears of War 3 art book that came in the Collector's Edition of the game. He is currently collaborating with actor Greg Sestero to write a book about the cult film The Room.

Auten has worked as a consultant for Twentieth Century Fox where he had a hand in numerous titles such as James Cameron's Avatar and two games in the Aliens franchise.

The new writers will be on hand for a Q&A session at the San Diego Comic-Con in a couple of weeks, where they'll be joined by Cliff Bleszinski and the voice of Baird, Fred Tatasciore. The panel will be held on 13th July.

Gears of War: Judgment will be out early next year on Xbox 360.