I posted this elsewhere but I'd love to discuss this here also - what I really fucking hate about all of this is the misinformation, due to mismanagement or intent, about the content in the game.
The Infected Omen skins were supposed to be exclusive to the Epic edition, and then they pop up in the controller instead of just the Lancer as was marketed. The gold weapons were announced to be unlocked through various different methods, with Veteran Gear unlocking something special. Then it's the gold weapon pack again. Then the gold Lancer and Hammerburst are awarded for the first two weeks of play as well. Then maps and characters that have been shown in preview material for months are revealed not to be available at launch but are actually DLC. Then Adam Fenix, supposedly exclusive to the Limited and Epic editions, pops up as included in the IO weapons pack that comes with the controller.
It's just a massive mismanagement of expectation that confuses and pisses off anyone who's paying attention to what they're going to get. It reads like a bait-and-switch but it's brushed off by the developers because they've known about it for months and it was always going to be that way, but that misses the point - the anger isn't just that they're doing it, it's that it's a shift in what they thought was going to happen.
For a lot of people it's just another blow against them. Imagine the guy who's played all three Gears games, played the beta, was at the midnight launch for 2, has the Epic edition preordered, and was level fifty or so in Gears 2 but lapsed. Then he hears that he'll get something special in Gears 3 for getting to a hundred. So he goes for it, he gets it, and then not only is his reward something he's already got, it devalues his previous achievements. Oh well, never mind, they at least made one weapon exclusive. But then his preorder for the Epic edition is also devalued - every DLC pack he got in there comes with the controller. He'd rather have got a controller than a statue. If he'd have known from the start he would have put his money down differently. Now he's wasted both money and time.