Hearing that they will be focusing on a new enemy - does that mean no Locust in this game? Theres a huge ding in my hype-levels right there.
I keep hearing this whole re-direction to the horror/atmospheric elements of Gears 1. Honestly, to me, they were okay at best back in Gears 1. I feel like Gears 2 & 3 continued focusing on the areas that were resonating well with fans, especially seeing how those two games grew the Gears audience. Sure, trying to strengthen the Gears experience with new ideas, especially after the fantastic over-the-top spectacle that was Gears 3, is quite welcome. But these aren't necessarily new ideas, just new in the sense of, its been awhile since we've had a new Gears game focusing on atmospheric/horror elements. In many ways, Gears actually strikes the same chords Contra games used to for me, but only in 3D.
If we're going to be focusing on new enemies & new threats in Gears 4, then i'm already going to raise an eyebrow - The Pouncer did absolutely nothing for me. It didn't feel threatening, challenging, or scary, and is certainly not on the level of enemies found in the series' history. I'm hoping the next look at the game has something I may find compelling to fight, cause right now I keep finding myself wondering "When are we gonna see/fight some Locust?", and I would hate to keep asking myself that as I play the campaign.
Being a pretty vocal fan of the Gears series with my coworkers/personal friends, I've always had some ideas as to where the balancing should go for the next game that incorporates all of the good of each entry in the series, whilst correcting the 'bad aspects.' This is actually pretty short in what I want out of the MP, but the main bulletpoints regarding each weapon, map design, player modes, etc. should adress what I want.
Multiplayer General
Player Count: Traditionally, I would prefer it if the competitive playlists stick solely to 4v4 to keep the focus on squad-based tactics strong. Not that there's anything wrong with 5v5 Execution/Warzone, but it's mostly a personal preference at this point. It'd be interesting to see TDM with 6v6, but maybe that'd be too much of a stretch for Gears.
Multiplayer Modes: Replace King of the Hill with Blitz. Blitz is a much more balanced alternative to the KOTH formula, and makes the player plan on who will be responsible for capping the point (essentially sacrificing themselves for the points) while the others plot around that point. DO NOT give Team Deathmatch a Ranked option. Otherwise, keep all of the gametypes in Gears of War 3 and give them an option for ranked plays.
Honestly, I wouldn't mind to see Gears with more objective based gametypes. Capture the Flag should make a return from 2 and make it 'Neutral Flag'/attack-defend while Capture the Leader should be the same. Guardian should be the main 'VIP'-esque gametype.
Modes from Judgment -- FFA, Gun Game, Domination -- should be restricted to a single social playlist and custom gametypes only.
Horde 3.0 should look into what Sunset Overdrive did with Chaos Squad; do objectives/small co-op missions to build resources to hold out for the 50 waves. I like the money system, and it would be cool if the money resources were tied to actual player stats as well.
Beast mode...ditch it
Keep Overrun. Class Based Rush is perfect for Gears, even if you have to make dedicated maps for that game mode.
Pretty self-explanatory. Lancer for Full Auto, Hammerburst for Semi-Auto, CHB for Burst Fire. Gnasher...because it's the Gnasher. Snub, Smoke are fine to keep in the primary loadouts.
Lancer: I think this would be a great spot to begin discussing my stance on stopping power and, in my opinion, why it's important in Gears' metagame. Stopping Power in Gears of War should be considered for the Lancer because the SP can be used as a counter to direct charging Gnashers who should be punished in the first place. In the time it takes for you to react to the opponent with a Gnasher, would you rather waste time switching to a Gnasher to meet his, or use your Lancer to set some space between you and the opponent? Keep in mind that by the time you get your Gnasher out you've given the rusher a window of opportunity to get a very meaty shot in, and by the time you make your first hit his second shot comes out and effectively takes you down. What's the point of meeting with the Gnasher, then?
Sure, SP in Gears 3 was horrid and accounted for a lot of fucking stupid kills but it can be toned down: Keep it restricted to the lancer-- a medium range rifle -- and let it fulfill it's purpose as a support rifle to your person that's rushing the pickup, to protect an ally being charged by an enemy. Keep the damage output considerably reasonable, as the gun's relying on SP in the first place. Lancers can still be countered by a good Gnasher shuffling across the map to avoid fire, Pickup users, etc.
Hammerburst: First off, remove the fucking ADS. It's dumb.
With that out of the way the Hammerburst is fine as a minor option for long range gameplay, acting as a counter to Longshot users and Heavy Weapon setups like the Oneshot or Mortars. Damage Output should be scaled so that it's slightly stronger than the Lancer, at the same time reduce the rate of fire for the Semi Auto gun because with a good trigger finger (or a modded controller lol) Hammerburst RoF in 3 was fucking ridiculous.
Classic Hammerburst: Tri-Burst medium range rifle. Simply a choice for people who aren't fond of the HB's Semi-Auto output. The controlled fire should be able to make it viable for hip-fire accuracy. Just reduce the bullet output to whatver it was in Judgment.
Gnasher: I think that the Gnasher as it is in 3 is fine. My only recommendation for it would have to be how the hitboxes work with corner aiming. Simply fine tune it and you'll be alright.
Snub: I LOVE the Gears 3 Snub, and it's utility uses can really shine if they improve off of it. Keep everything about it except the damage output, as it should be reduced. Snub's too good in 3 that it essentially performs as well as the Hammerburst.
Smokes/Grenades in general: Remove the Tac-Com peeping that was in Gears 3 that was with Smokes. The stun is fine. Make them the ONLY Grenades that can be attached to walls. No Grenade suicides when downed, as that defeats the purpose of claiming kills in execution when you can just take them with you??? That's dumb. Keep Bolos, Keep Incins (the floor covering/direct hit kill thing is good. It roots out people holdig out behind cover. Make sure that when it hits cover, it covers the whole thing.), keep Inks. Judgment Grenades suck, ruined the balancing.
PICKUPS
Retro Lancer: Pickup. High Damage, ridiculous spread. Keep it Pickup only. It worked fine in Judgment.
Markza: I would like to see the Markza return, but I just don't see an applicable use for the Markza that can't be done with the ones you start off with or the Longshot. Just seems...risky? Useless? I wouldn't be too pissed if it left.
Breechshot: KEEP. Pickup. Excellent weapon with some ridiculous damage despite the range being a bit off. For Execution, it'd be neat to let this and the Longshot be the only weapons that can distance kill when your opponent is downed.
Longshot: Pickup. I think the Ultimate Edition Longshot is the best incarnation, but I wouldn't mind to see some of the QOL changes seen in 3/Judgment make a return.
Torque Bow: Pickup. Improve it from 3. Make tap-shots stick, regardless of where it goes. Just reduce the damage.
Sawed Off: Pickup. Judgment's incarnation is a good starting point to balance that weapon. Make it a monster at face to face range, and shit everywhere else.
Boltok: Pickup. Improve it from 3.
Gorgon: Make it Full Auto like in Gears 2. Pickup. Originally I played with the idea of the Gorgon being part of the starting weapons.
Boomshot: Pickup. Improve it from 3.
Digger: Pickup. Adjust how sky-aiming works specifically. There were some issues with some of the elevated maps (Escalation, Sandbar) that made sky aiming kind of fucked.
Flamer: Ditch it. Never saw a use of it in 2/3/Judgment.
Heavy Weapons (Mortar / Mulcher / Boomshield / OneShot / Cleaver): Ditch them from Competitive/Social play. Keep them in customs/overrun.
Maps
Look I don't care what the fuck you do with the maps, but if you're going to do asymmetrical maps don't make them as huge as Judgment's were.
Otherwise, just give me Fuel Depot and Mercy and I'm good.
Player Traits:
Other than the usual 'give the male/female' body types the same damn hitboxes, uh....I don't think they should make wall-bouncing, wall canceling any more easier to do.
Some other ideas came to mind like Stamina for running, but I don't think anyone would like that.
Spotting should stay in. Gears doesn't have a minimap, and some people don't play with mics. Communication is key and the simple acknowledgment of where an opponent is should be more than enough.
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I think that's it? Yeah, that's it.
You know...if they put Burn Cards in Overrun I wouldn't be mad.
5v5 should stay, there's a reason why they opened up most classic maps in gears 3. Gears 1 maps are great but I don't want those type of maps anymore. For example if you play UE you can tell how jarring it is to play the old maps + dlc Vs the PC exclusive maps, they were made at a different time and tbh fit gears 2 way better than how it fits UE IMO.
As much as I loved ranked in gears 3, I think it should leave since it just splits the community, even by a small margin like 10k in social to 3k in ranked. But if that's the case, have stacked teams be more likely to be paired up against other stacked teams.
Blitz shouldn't replace KOTH but it should have execution rules.
No one played meatflag or whatever that game mode was called, guardian was king, they could rework the sword mechanic from 3 into an oddball sort of game mode.
With weapons I think that the gears 3 load out system can't change, something being taken out no matter how small it is in a video game these days brings up some type of unwarranted drama or whatever, the weapon changes to retro brought from judgment are welcome, the sawed off can stick with its one shot
Breechshot, IMO, cannibalizes the long shot, it's one or the other and I rather keep the longshot. Also the thing that made the breechshot so good was the fact that aiming reticle in judgment was up all the time, you can just let go of blind fires and unload on someone quick and accurate.
3 Longshot was better than UE because of accuracy during movement and flinching due to getting shot
Torque should reduce dmg but it's actives shots should be able to kill without a stick
There is no improving the boltok, the gun is a 2 shot with active, it's lowkey the best non primary pickup in the game
You seem to remember the gorgon wrong, it's full auto in gears 3, burst in 2
Again like the boltok there's no improving boom, 3 shots, insane radius.
With digger I agree, it shouldn't have that grenade type of aiming, it would be great if there was some type of dead space objective line esque aiming system
Flame was used to push people who are hiding in corners, for example blood drive, once respawns are depleted everyone hides in spawn or frags, the length of the flamethrower takes care of placed mines and makes sure you don't get a full blast of active to the mouth by anyone aiming there, it was a great point after the patch that nerfed it in 3
Mortar pushes people outside of bases, if the map design calls for mortars it should stay, no one used mulcher and one shot got people scared to go out.
Map design should take notes from gears 3, the game still is about map control, with a map like azura you can control up top with hammer but you will lose out on boom if the other team went there instead giving them a power weapon powerful enough to take control of the top again.
I agree on hitboxes, they found something good with UE, I could use big boys like flame grenadier again and not be at a disadvantage from an Anya
Agree on spotting
And burn cards and micros like that, I mean they already had this in judgment just without any price tags. Use the prize box system, add whatever prices they want, guarantee free maps so the community can stay whole
I hope you don't look at this like I'm ripping into your opinion just feel like discussing gears
1 thing that would be interesting that I feel Gears is in a good position to fix.
I never liked ranked vs unranked in games. It splits the playerbase and your game should already have robust matchmaking to pair players up with equal skill. I would keep 1 playlist.
Where Gears can come in is through badges. By giving out badges players can show off that they are super duper uber in Extermination rather than fixing a number next to everyone.
I really like the new creature they shown during the E3 video, but boy I Am going to miss Locust's funny chatter. But I understand it though, they can't possibly exist anymore. But I do wonder.... can we still play as them in MP though?
That part about graphics and framerate sounds great but it makes me wonder if they mean both SP and MP or only MP. Or could this be a case of The Coalition delivering the first truly stunning looking 60fps title on Xbox One? I kind of doubt that.
A few things that came to my mind that absolutely should not be done.
-Launching Horde after launch of the game
-QTE final boss
-Characters being unlocked via slot machine like the REQ system
-More than a few Asymmetrical maps
Some things that would be great
-Campaign mode where a person can invade your game as an enemy like that one mode in Perfect Dark
-Simple Gears 2 Horde mode alongside a more class based Horde
-Beast coming back
-Letting us play as the awesome UIR armor guys in multiplayer
I have a strong feeling that 60FPS will probably be multiplayer only. If The Coalition want Gears of War 4 to be a graphical showcase on the XB1 then they need to aim for 30FPS for the singleplayer.
Embargoes for these sorts of things are incredibly common. MS are giving the press a few days so everyone can write up their stuff and they aren't pushing to get content out asap to be first or whatever.
Embargoes for these sorts of things are incredibly common. MS are giving the press a few days so everyone can write up their stuff and they aren't pushing to get content out asap to be first or whatever.
I have a strong feeling that 60FPS will probably be multiplayer only. If The Coalition want Gears of War 4 to be a graphical showcase on the XB1 then they need to aim for 30FPS for the singleplayer.
Gears 4 will be fine. My biggest fear is that Coalation is getting turned into a Gears of War factory and we won't ever get to see more of that cool looking game they were working on (as Black Tusk) and the track record of quality that goes along with teams that don't get to work on other IPs.
