Gears of War 4

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Gears of War 4
Studio The Coalition
Publisher Microsoft Studios
Senior Developer Matt Searcy
Erstveröffent-
lichung		 October 11, 2016
platform Windows , Xbox One
Game engine Unreal Engine 4
genre Third person shooter
Subject Science fiction
Game mode Single player , multiplayer
control Keyboard & mouse , gamepad
medium Download , Blu-ray
Age rating
USK from 18
PEGI recommended for ages 18+

Gears of War 4 is a third-person shooter developed by The Coalition and published by Microsoft Studios for Microsoft Windows and Xbox One . It is the fourth main part of the Gears-of-War series and the first part that was not developed by Epic Games itself. The computer game is based on the Unreal Engine 4 developed by Epic Games.

Gameplay

Many elements of the previous titles in the series have been carried over into Gears of War 4 in addition to new elements such as "Dropshot" weapons that fire drills and the "Buzzkill" weapon that shoots rebounding saw blades. Players can also push away opponents with their shoulder at a short distance. Opponents can also pull other players out of cover and use their own skills. The game presents four different categories of weather: from strong breezes (trees, leaves and dust swirling up) to destructive Category 3 storms, which can affect the use of weapons and equipment.

action

Surroundings

Gears of War 4 takes place 25 years after a weapon was used as a countermeasure, "Emulsion", which destroyed the entire emulsion deposits on the planet Sera. Unfortunately, this also destroyed all fossil fuels , prompting humanity to find new ways to survive. The weapon caused so-called "wind flares" that sweep across the planet as powerful wind storms. Due to the aftermath of the Lambent epidemic, the newly formed “Coalition of Ordinary Governments” (KOR) estimates that only a few hundred thousand people survived on Sera. In order to prevent the population decline, cities protected by walls were built to protect the population from the dangers from outside. The KOR prohibited traveling outside the walls. Some survivors reject the KOR's point of view and found their own group called "Outsiders", which lives outside the KOR's sphere of influence and loots resources on the KOR's territory through raids.

The main character of the game is the son of Marcus Fenix ​​and Anya Stroud, JD Fenix ​​( Liam McIntyre ), who, along with his friends Delmont "Del" Walker ( Eugene Byrd ) and Kait Diaz ( Laura Bailey ), face a new threat to the human survival has to struggle.

Summary

The leader of the KOR, First Minister Jinn (Angel Desai), commemorates the 25th anniversary of the people's victory over the Locust. In the meantime, during the ceremony, old Hoffman tells of past battles at Aspho Fields, Emergence Day and Anvil Gate.

JD and Del recently quit KOR because they disagreed with Jinn's tough guidelines. They join a group of “outsiders” led by Reyna ( Justina Machado ). To help their village, JD and Del decide to rob a nearby KOR settlement that is under construction and steal a special 3D printer . They are accompanied by Kait, Reyna's daughter, and her uncle Oscar ( Jimmy Smits ), a former soldier and war veteran. Although they are forced to fight against the new KOR robot "DeeBee", JD and his group manage to steal the 3D printer and escape. They are contacted in the village by Jinn (who communicates through a DeeBee) who accuses them of kidnapping its citizens, to the confusion of JD and the others, before announcing that he will launch a devastating blow on the village. JD and his friends manage to repel the attack and start repairing the village's energy generator again. During the repairs, however, unknown creatures raid the village and take everyone prisoner, including Reyna and Oscar. As a final act, Reyna traps JD, Del, and Kait inside the power generator station to protect them.

After identifying the unknown attackers as the "crush", JD reluctantly asks his father, Marcus Fenix ​​( John DiMaggio ), for help. Marcus, who is still angry with JD because he joined the totalitarian KOR and endangered himself with the subsequent exit, helps JD as reluctantly as JD asked him for help. Marcus shows him that the crush is not human. Marcus decides to lead the group to Fort Reval, where thousands of Locust bodies are buried. After escaping another attack by Jinn's forces, they reach Fort Reval, where they are ambushed by a kidnapper who kidnaps Marcus. JD and his friends follow the kidnapper. They find evidence that the swarm is responsible for the kidnapping of the KOR citizens. The swarm uses the abductee's bodies to create new swarm members. They also hypothesize that the Emulsion weapon won't kill the Locust. Instead, their bodies have undergone a development over the last 25 years, from which the Locust ultimately became the swarm. JD finally manages to find and free his father, Marcus. Marcus reveals to them that the crush works with a collective consciousness and that it was briefly connected to this consciousness. Reyna is still alive and is being held captive in another Locust grave site. None of the other villagers survived there.

Determined to save her mother, Kait asks Marcus to lead her to them. He leads the group to "Tollern Dam", where they discover a grave that has already developed into a swarming stick. The swarm's defense is too strong for them to break through on their own. So they fight their way to a radio antenna, where Marcus asks for help from Augustus Cole (Lester Speight), Damon Baird (Fred Tatasciore) and Samantha Byrne ( Claudia Black ), the latter of whom are both a couple. Baird, an industrial worker and inventor of the DeeBees, contributes two “Mech Suits” with which JD and Kait come to the swarm quarter. There they find Reyna, who has already been forcibly integrated into the swarm network. To remove her from it would mean her death. Nevertheless, Reyna asks Kait to end her life, which Kait tearfully does. She then inherits the amulet that used to belong to Kait's grandmother. On closer inspection, the amulet bears a certain resemblance to the symbol of the Locust queen Myrrah - which means that Reyna was her daughter and Kait her granddaughter.

The ending scene shows that Oscar survived the kidnapping and was able to free himself from the crush by freeing himself from the kidnapper's clutches.

development

Gears of War 4 was originally developed by Epic Games. During E3 2013, Microsoft Studios Vice President Phil Spencer announced that more Gears of War titles were possible. On January 27, 2014, Microsoft announced that it had acquired the rights to the Gears of War series from Epic Games. In addition, Microsoft announced that another Gears-of-War part is being developed for the Xbox One. The development studio Black Tusk Studios , which belongs to Microsoft , was subsequently renamed "The Coalition". Rod Fergusson, former Epic Games production manager for the Gears of War series, joined the development studio and has since played a key role in the development of other parts of the series. Epic Games' Ray Davis said, "After going through hell with Rod Fergusson developing previous Gears of War games, he felt sure he was doing a great job for the series at Microsoft." On April 1, 2015, developer Allie Henze of The Coalition announced that Gears of War 4 would not be released for the Xbox 360 .

Gears of War 4 was first presented at the Microsoft press conference at E3 2015. Studio manager Rod Fergusson stated that the gameplay at the press conference should reflect the overall style of the game. Gears of War 4 should return to the roots of the series as a "monster game" and the environment design should have strong inspiration from Northern Italy . Gears of War 4 is set to take place on Sera, about 25 years after the events of Gears of War 3 , with Marcus Fenix's son JD Fenix ​​as the main character. Due to the situation that the people of Sera want to rebuild their society after the war with the Locust, the weapons of the game were inspired by construction machinery. The game includes a new enemy faction called "the swarm"; the swarm's drones behave similarly to the Locust's from previous games, "juvies" are fast-moving units whose screams can emit containers containing other units, while fighters can hold the player on the ground and fire spikes from theirs Fire tail.

The multiplayer component of the game was co-developed by Splash Damage , who already co-developed the multiplayer for Gears of War: Ultimate Edition . The first multiplayer beta was released on April 25, 2016; Early Access was offered to buyers of the Ultimate Edition on April 18, 2016. The campaign supports single player and multiplayer with two players. Gears of War 4 was the first game in which SGX, developed by Speech Graphics, was used to automatically animate the game dialog. When talking about the future of the game and the whole series, Fergusson said, "It's one of the good things about Microsoft [...] that we will probably make another game."

Gears of War 4 runs at 30 frames per second in single player mode and at 60 fps in multiplayer mode, both modes with 1080p resolution. Similar to Halo 5: Guardians , the game will use dynamic scaling to keep the frame rate constant by reducing the resolution in complex scenes and then automatically scaling it back to 1080p. Ferguson stated that the Xbox One S has an improved CPU and GPU that enable consistent resolution for Gears of War 4 . During the press conference at E3 2016, Microsoft announced that it would release the game exclusively for Windows 10 in the Windows Store. Xbox version and Windows version players can play multiplayer together. In August 2016, Game of Thrones composer Ramin Djawadi confirmed that he was instrumental in the soundtrack for Gears of War 4 . In an interview, Djawadi spoke about the sound. He wants him to be very different from Game of Thrones . Whenever he starts a new project, it should be different and unique.

On September 19, 2016, The Coalition announced that the game had been developed and production would start.

reception

reviews
publication Rating
Destructoid 8/10
Electronic Gaming Monthly 9/10
Game Informer 9.25 / 10
GamesRadar 4/5
GameSpot 7/10
Giant bomb 4th
IGN 9.2 / 10
Polygon 9/10
VideoGamer.com 9/10
Meta-ratings
Metacritic 84/100

Gears of War 4 received “mostly positive” ratings, according to the Metacritic website , which collects ratings and calculates an average. There the game in the Windows version achieved a value of 85 points, based on 20 reviews. For the Xbox version, Metacritic determined a value of 84 points based on 96 reviews. It was, after FIFA 17 , the second best-selling, available at retail game in the UK in its first week after publication.

Ryan McCaffrey rated the game on IGN with 9.2 out of 10 points. He especially highlights the new elements in the form of DeeBees and the new opposing faction "the swarm". According to McCaffrey, the campaign mode is designed to alternate. There you almost never do two tasks in the same area. From a graphical point of view, he praises the various weather scenarios that contribute most of the graphical representation. The multiplayer captivates, as in the other parts, with the horde mode, in which various tower defense elements are continued, McCaffrey continues.

At GameSpot, the game was rated with 7 out of 10 points. Mike Mahardy rates the game as a worthy fourth main part of the series. What struck him negatively were the elements in the campaign mode that were repeated from time to time, such as clearing an area of ​​enemy units until the next mission started. This point of the story mode is perceived as particularly negative when it comes to the selection of scenarios, such as defeating mini-bosses that can arise. The Horde mode, which has already been praised by IGN, also stands out positively. With the various roles that can be selected to best complement the 5-player team, this mode in Gears of War 4 is the best of the full Gears of War series, according to Mahardy . The various small bugs were noticed negatively in both modes, single and multiplayer. Some objects did not load correctly, which resulted in loading a memory point and restarting from there.

Gears of War 4 was nominated in 2016 at “The Game Awards 2016” in the categories “Best Action Game” and “Best Multiplayer”.

Web links

Individual evidence

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