Ladies and gentlemen, start your emulators! Welcome to this special episode of RetrOS, the show where we give you your recommended dose of nostalgia by reviewing games from your childhood. In this special episode, we take a look at the remaster of the title that put the Xbox 360 on the map, before the legendary Halo 3 launched, and the first time the franchise hit PlayStation consoles.
Does this game live up to the impact of its 2006 release? Or should this remaster be lost forever in the pages of gaming history, and most probably the bargain bin?
Let's find out!
The year is 2006, and Online communications were revolutionised as Twitter was launched to the public. Now, simply known as X, and owned by US billionaire Elon Musk, it is still regarded as one of Facebook's biggest competitors.
Google acquired the site you are watching this very review on, YouTube, for an eye-watering $1.65 billion. In the world of TV and film, the sequel to Pirates of the Caribbean: The Black Pearl, Dead Man's Chest, was released in cinemas. The movie is the highest-grossing film of 2006, with box office earnings over the $1 billion mark. Not joking!
In the weird and wacky world of video games, all eyes were on Nintendo, as their flagship console of that particular hardware generation, the Wii, was released.
Although the console itself had the least powerful hardware of that generation, it still held its own against competitors, such as the Sony PlayStation 3, released in November of that year. 2006 had a lot of influential, blockbuster releases. These include Clover Studios' Ōkami, Half-Life Two: Episode Two, and Bully.
Epic Games' Gears of War was one of them. This particular title was released exclusively for the Xbox 360.
FUN FACT: As I have said before, in my review of Gears Tactics, according to the game's lead designer and director of Epic Games at the time, Cliff Bleszinski, the inspiration for the original Gears of War was his first marriage, which failed, and a trip to London. This situation is also the inspiration for two characters of the series, Dominic and Maria Santiago. Obviously, we will not go into that as we would rather not spoil a key aspect of Gears of War 2's story.
Anyway, back to Gears of War. The game takes place on Sera and is set 14 days after Emergence Day, or E-Day for short. A subterranean race, the Locust Horde has overrun the human population of the planet, thus plunging humanity into a desperate war for survival. You play the part of disgraced soldier, Marcus Fenix, and Delta Squad, A ragtag band of soldiers who are tasked with carrying out a daring plan to counterattack against the Locust by hurting them in their subterranean lairs.
The accessibility scores are as follows-
Visibility 11
In terms of this remaster, The Coalition is taking its development seriously. There are numerous colourblind modes which can be altered in the gameplay section of the options menu. The developers seem to have gone one step further by allowing you to completely customise whichever colour scheme is more suitable for your impairments.
So, a big win for players with visual impairments.
Audibility 10
There is subtitle support, which can be enabled and disabled via the audio section of the Options menu. These are present in both cut scenes and during missions. Also, the subtitles present in this game function in the exact same way as subtitles would work in a TV series or movie.
However, no font size customisation options are available in this game. This is important because a lack of font customisation options can put a player with a visual impairment at risk of getting eye strain while reading the menus and subtitles during this game.
Quite a few remasters that have been released in recent years have that feature, why not this game?! Despite this glaring issue, this game is fairly playable for a player with a hearing impairment.
Mobility 10.5
In the PC version of the game, which was used to test it, you can customise controls using a keyboard and mouse to suit your impairments. Better still, there is controller support for the game right out of the box. When using a controller, there are numerous stick layouts which can be changed on the fly.
Even better, you can customise the button layouts to whichever best suits your impairments. For a game that was originally built for and exclusive to consoles upon its 2006 release, this feature should be a no-brainer. The console versions are a completely different story.
You can only use a keyboard for text chat in multiplayer. Apart from that, you are tethered to using a controller. In terms of mobility-impaired players, having that option to switch input methods makes this game a lot easier to play.
Although personally I would classify that as a "nice to have", the fact still remains that it should be implemented. Skill issue, TC!
Gameplay 9
Well, in short, you will get exactly what you pay for. A second remaster of the original Gears of War. Although this version contains all DLC that was a part of the 2007 release, and the content that was released with the first remaster of the game, the Ultimate Edition, released in 2015.
However, there is no new content included in this remaster to make this purchase worthwhile. This game's biggest attraction is, of course, the original Gears of War being available to PlayStation consoles, which makes the game feel a little half-assed.
Yes, there are the odd graphical enhancements here and there, due to the game being ported to a newer version of Unreal Engine, allowing the game to take advantage of more modern hardware.
In terms of multiplayer, full cross-play between all three platforms, i.e. Xbox, PlayStation and PC is available.
The infrastructure is pretty solid, from what I have played of the multiplayer, I experienced little to no lag whatsoever. But, with the game's setting you back £40, they should have at least provided some form of extra content to justify paying that amount for the game.
In summary, Gears of War Reloaded is a good way to replay this 2006 classic.
As I have said before, all the DLC content in the original version, along with the content released with The Ultimate Edition, is all there, with full cross-play support allowing you to play with your friends regardless of whatever format you play this game on.
However, the developers should at least have given us a little extra content to purchase this game again. If you are a Gears of War fan who is looking for an excuse to revisit this classic, this is a very good way to do it!
OVERALL SCORE 101.25%
See you guys in the next review!
No comments:
Post a Comment