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| Gears Of War | 
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| From: Microsoft
Category: Video Games
List Price: $29.99
Buy New: $29.95
You Save: $0.04
New (22) Used (27) Collectible (1) from $19.99
Avg. Customer Rating:  481 reviews
Sales Rank: 679
Platform: Xbox 360
ESRB: Mature
Media: Video Game
Edition: Standard
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: No
Age: 17 - 20 years
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2
Dimensions (in): 8 x 10 x 6
MPN: U19001
Model: 882224054034
UPC: 882224054034
EAN: 0882224054034
ASIN: B000FRS9II
Release Date: November 21, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand New Removed from Bundle Pack !!!!!!!!! Fast Shipping !!!!!!!!!!!!
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| Features:
| • | Gears of War's engaging, cinematic story plays out like a Hollywood blockbuster | | • | Unreal Engine 3 technology brings out the smallest details in the largest of battles | | • | To survive you must suppress your enemy, take cover, and use weapons and teammates to outlast the Locust Horde | | • | Xbox Live gameplay offers individualized matchmaking, player statistics, customized games, and more | | • | A.I. teammates are indiscernible from human players in this third-person shooter |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Gears of War thrusts gamers into a deep and harrowing story of humankind's epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet. players live and breathe the role of Marcus Fenix. A disgraced former war hero, Marcus seeks personal redemption as he leads his fire team against an onslaught of merciless warrior fiends. Gamers immerse themselves in an experience so intensely emotional and gut-wrenching that playing will be like controlling a blockbuster action movie. Control Marcus Fenix and his fire team as they pit advanced human technology against the overwhelming and horrific Locust Horde. Gears of War unites next-generation technology with classic, emotional storytelling and a revolutionary tactical combat system, engrossing the gamer in a horrifying epic story of war and survival Unreal Engine 3 technology pushes high-definition visual designs and brings out the smallest details in the largest battle. Experience a rich dynamic world with an unprecedented level of detail
Amazon.com Product Description
Gears of War, an Xbox 360 exclusive game that blends tactical action with survival horror, thrusts gamers into a deep and harrowing tale of humankind's epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet. The storyline plays out like a Hollywood blockbuster -- lead character Marcus Fenix pits advanced human technology against the overwhelming Locust Horde. Built around a revolutionary third-person tactical combat system and breathtaking, high-definition visuals from the Unreal Engine 3, Gears of War immerses you in a horrifying tale of war and survival. 
Gears of War is harrowing tale that pits humankind against the Locust Horde. | 
Marcus Fenix and his team battle nightmarish creatures. View larger. | 
In Gears of War, you must take cover to survive. View larger. | 
Gears of War presents a focused and well-paced cinematic experience. View larger. | The gameplay is focused on a fire team co-op so advanced that your A.I. teammates are indiscernible from human players. Voice recognition and real-time lip synching heighten the absorbing experience. The Unreal Engine 3 technology brings out the smallest details in the largest of battles. With GOW you're sure to experience a rich, dynamic world where characters spring to life. Speaking of life, the battlefield is a lethal place. To survive, you must suppress your enemy with blindfire, take cover in interactive environments, and use weapons and teammates to outwit your dreaded, inhuman foes. And with a title like GOW, it would be shame if you couldn't get online and challenge live gamers. With the next-generation of Xbox Live, you'll be able to experience individualized matchmaking, view player statistics, earn player achievements, customize games, and build personalized gamer profiles. Gears of War shined bright at Microsoft's pre-E3 press briefing, but a deeper demo at Microsoft's E3 booth revealed many of the game's mechanics. GOW is built with both the hardcore and casual gamer in mind. But, instead of selecting a difficulty level at the start of the game, GOW offers a choice at the beginning of each level. In the vein of choose your own adventure, you can select between a difficult or easy path. And it's not just a simple choice of battling tougher enemies; each path (explained by a comrade) represents additional content that is crucial to the storyline. After easing your way into the experience of the gameplay with the simpler paths, you can go back and test your skills on the more difficult routes and never feel like you've played through the areas before. Standing around in the open is likely to get you killed in GOW. You must use cover to survive. With a context sensitive A button function, you won't have to sweat memorizing cumbersome button combos. The A button will: - Slam you into cover. As you approach cover in GOW simply tap the A button to slide and make immediate use of cover.
- Vault you over the cover. Once you're in cover, pressing up and A will vault you over your cover to engage the opponent or next cover opportunity.
- Evade enemy fire. When you're forced to be out in the open, tapping the A button will engage a roll maneuver to evade enemy fire.
- Activate a "Swat Turn." When taking cover on the side of a doorway, pressing the A button will spin your character from one side of the doorway to the other, helping avoid fire.
Ripping a magazine free and replacing it in the midst of bloody combat is no easy task. GOW simulates this difficult action by forcing you to perfect your reloading skills. To be effective in combat you'll need to allot for time to successfully reload your weapon. Do it well and the battle is yours; do it poorly and you may actually jam your gun. Time it perfectly and you'll earn a bonus with a temporary damage boost. Though GOW clearly showcases a sci-fi experience, its roots are in tactical, realistic combat scenarios. Therefore, running and gunning makes for seriously erratic shooting. Think about what you're doing. Unless wasting ammo is your goal, you better stop, aim, shoot, and then move on. Otherwise, the Locust Horde might swarm you and take your life. Gears of War presents a focused and well-paced cinematic experience, and nothing ruins that faster than a time-consuming exploration of every switch or button to find the elusive trigger to open a door. This game introduces a "point of interest" button that comes up on the screen so you can immediately interact with the necessary item to move forward in your gameplay. GOW certainly offers drool-worthy graphics, but the mechanics have also received equal attention. Keep your eyes and ears on high alert for a release date, as Microsoft hasn't let the cat out of the bag on when gamers will be able to tackle this great-looking and great-playing title.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 476 more reviews...
 A blockbuster game! November 30, 2008
Gears of War thrusts gamers into a deep and harrowing story of humankind's epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet. Players take the role of Marcus Fenix. A disgraced former war hero, Marcus seeks personal redemption. You immerse yourself in an experience so intensely emotional and gut-wrenching that playing will be like controlling a blockbuster action movie. Control Marcus Fenix and his fire team as they pit advanced human technology against the overwhelming and horrific Locust Horde. Gears of War unites next-generation technology with classic, emotional storytelling and a revolutionary tactical combat system, engrossing the gamer in a horrifying epic story of war and survival Unreal Engine 3 technology pushes high-definition visual designs and brings out the smallest details in the largest battle. Experience a rich dynamic world with an unprecedented level of detail.
With GOW you're sure to experience a rich, dynamic world where characters spring to life. GOW is built with both the hardcore and casual gamer in mind. But, instead of selecting a difficulty level at the start of the game, GOW offers a choice at the beginning of each level. In the vein of choose your own adventure, you can select between a difficult or easy path. To be effective in combat you'll need to allot for time to successfully reload your weapon. Do it well and the battle is yours; do it poorly and you may actually jam your gun. Time it perfectly and you'll earn a bonus with a temporary damage boost. Though GOW clearly showcases a sci-fi experience, its roots are in tactical, realistic combat scenarios. Gears of War presents a focused and well-paced cinematic experience and is a classic.
 Needs more difficulty levels... November 24, 2008
Everyone has different skills at video games. I am not very good. I found it too difficult and therefore more frustrating than fun. It would have been fun for me if it had two lower difficulty levels: easy and very easy.
A few bullets short of perfect November 20, 2008
I think like most people, the idea of putting money down on an Xbox 360 knowing its failure rate, overheating and Microsoft's tendency to sometimes lose orders or take longer than necessary makes a purchase of the system a paranoid one since you're constantly going "I hope this isn't the day/game that bricks it". However, those that are interested in the system always looked at the one game that looked like a must-have: that of Gears of War. Developed by Epic Games who work on the Unreal Tournament games, this became one of those great action movies that offered an intense experience through its many firefights and seemed to replace its blood with testosterone. Only some big nitpicks make this game less than completely perfect but I have to say, I have a blast with this one.
Story: On the planet Sera, the inhabitants have been terrorized by an alien race known as the Locust Horde who suddenly popped out of the ground on Emergence Day ("E-Day") and are gradually reducing the number of the survivors. While fighting through a prison, Dom Santiago rescues his friend and your main guy, Marcus Fenix, and it's up to you to make it through dangerous cities and areas to hopefully nail a crippling blow to the Locust Horde.
Graphics: This is really a cosmetic nitpick than anything but I never liked the blood in games that uses the Unreal Engine like Uncharted since it was seemed more mass-like and gooey than a liquid but in a game like this, it seems to go hand-in-hand. But one can't deny the graphical power of the engine and from the extremely detailed character animation, scale of the firefights and architecture make this a showcase for what the 360 can bring to the table. Really small nags are the occasional texture problem and slight framerate but they're usually never an issue or distracting enough to cause frustration.
Sound/Music: The movie 300 was something that I tried several times to get into but I never could and one theory was that it was basically a movie for the frat boys who'll cheer at the violent parts and revel in the weird use of heavy metal music yet it has quote-unquote "depth" that made it different than most action movies. Not. Gears of War on the other hand knows it's basically a dumb summer blockbuster movie and just rolls with it from the line readings and one-liner dialogue. It's not meant to elicit tears but it's not eye-rolling either. The music however is fantastic from the creeping sound design to the big bombastic moments during firefights, this is one to have a stereo on.
Gameplay: Whereas shooters like Call of Duty or Halo are all about strafing a little bit from a wall or cover just enough to nail the enemy, Gears of War is all about taking cover. From columns to big blocks of stone, doorways, ruined cars etc, just press A and your character slams his side and is able to avoid enemy fire. Pressing the LT lets you take aim and RT to fire or pressing RT is just covering fire, inaccurate but helpful for nailing charging Locusts without wanting to pop up. Carrying up to 4 weapons at a time, we have the Hammer of Dawn, a laser-targeting system where a satellite will beam huge rays onto the area and all but vaporizing the enemy to standard pistols and shotgun. The highlight of course is the Lancer, which is basically a normal assault rifle only it has a chainsaw for a bayonet. Just hold the B, get closer to an enemy and press RT and we have the perfect dissecting machine. While sometimes it didn't rev up or trying to actually getting it to activate, it's still an immensely satisfying kill.
The big problem with the game is the AI and not the enemies who'll flank, throw grenades and do whatever it takes till you're lifeless on the ground. The AI problems come from your teammates since they are, to borrow a Yahtzee phrase, "pants-on-head retarded". They'll openly go out of cover for seemingly no apparent reason other than wanting to get closer and they'll end up crying for help to be revived which you do by pressing X near the body. It happens with such frequency that I even saved one guy only to literally need help 4 seconds later when he got out of cover instead of just staying put. While co-op in most games is more fun, here it's more beneficial you go through it co-op since the players will be smarter than the game itself.
And to be perfectly honest, that whole magnetic wall thing of characters doing a "roadie run", a documentary-like view of your character football-sprinting through the level, only to be sucked into cover when you didn't want to and I have to say I haven't experienced this once yet. Either I don't run enough or I just never noticed but I will say sometimes characters don't take cover so much as they keep rolling in front of the car instead of taking that much needed slam against the stone. At least thankfully we have "active reload", where during reload a bar will slide underneath the display with a large portion greyed out and one whited out with the rest being dark. Get it in the grey and it's a faster reload, white same thing but extra damage to bullets whereas the rest causes a fumble and he acts like Solid Snake or a Call of Duty player doing one of those painfully long reloads on certain guns.
The game isn't that long though given its repetitive "stop-and-pop" gameplay, as Epic calls it, it prevents the game from being too long and just being more acts and chapters for the sake of it. With multiplayer drawing big crowds, co-op, the achievements as well as COG tags hidden in levels for collectibles, this one'll keep you busy...that is if you haven't bought the sequel yet.
simply amazing November 9, 2008
i got this game for my birthday and i haven't gone a a day since without playing it. it is so much fun, the online multi-player, the campaign, and especially the two player on-line co-op. it's a little too easy on casual but it's still a lot of fun. anyone who owns an xbox 360 should buy this game.
Adrenaline-fueled, Hollywood-style shooter! October 10, 2008
I recently bought an Xbox 360 (yes, I'm late to the party). I've been hearing nothing except how great Gears of War is, and with a sequel coming out in less than a month, I decided to give it a try. Simply stated, the game was beyond my expectations.
Make no mistake, this is the gaming equivalent of a summer blockbuster popcorn flick. The story about a war against the Locust Horde was brilliantly told. When I first started the game, I couldn't put it down for hours. Solid story, very solid voice-acting, and a surprisingly great Star Wars-like musical score all add some much-needed substance to the shooter genre.
As far as gameplay goes, this game is top-notch. The controls are super fluid and easy to grasp. The difficulty is wonderfully challenging...even on "casual" mode. Also, this game features the best use of non-playable characters I've ever seen. The NPC's not only provide depth to the game, but they actually do help you! When they're injured, you actually feel compelled to help.
In fact, the only shortcoming I found was the graphics. While they're definitely not bad, they're also not great. I've never been a fan of Unreal Engine 3 (which Epic created and a huge majority of Xbox games use). The shadows look somewhat hokey and the edges are strikingly messy. It's a shame they couldn't refine it more. BioShock uses the same engine and they managed to make it look incredible. Gears of War 2 (which I will DEFINITELY buy) is said to use an upgraded version of the Unreal Engine, so I'm really looking forward to seeing how it looks.
All this aside, Gears of War is the game that no Xbox 360 library should be without (provided you're old enough, that is!). It's more of a killer app than Halo 3 by far.
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