Hands On The Horde With Gears Of War 3

 

It wasn’t long ago that I and  many others were participating in the beta for Gears Of War 3’s multiplayer. And I will admit it was fun for awhile, but it simply failed to really impress me. It certainly was well designed and the few new elements were nice, but it still felt repetitive and not enough had changed from Gears 2.

However, Horde 2.0 is another story. While at E3 I had the chance to play Horde 2.0 and the changes are most welcome. To me it seems as if they took the best of Horde from Gears of War 2 and married it with the best of Zombie mode from Call of Duty and Anarchy from Bulletstorm.

Here’s how it works: When we start a level we have a randomly predetermined Command Post. Within this command post we can build up our fortifications by buying them as well as ammo and repairs. For example some options are barriers and sentry guns, each upgradable as we progress and earn money. To earn money we need to get kills or revive a fallen teammate.

What this means is that the game is going to be more interactive and requiring more teamwork. We still have 50 rounds of locusts to barge through, but we must work together especially on the last few waves of each set. And with wave 10 we get a randomly chosen boss that will require everyone’s attention I’m sure.

Horde 2.0 is looking sweet and plays well. Based on the multiplayer beta and Horde 2.0 I think the game will do quite well. I don’t expect much from standard multiplayer, but it did show the control mechanics well. From playing both modes I expect the campaign to be another epic journey. Maybe we will have less whining from characters as that seems to be the biggest complaint although it did add a sense of desperation and importance to the story. The only mode I believe we have yet to see is Beast mode and we shall have to wait and see.

And last but not least on the Gears subject Microsoft will release a Limited Collectors Edition Gears Of War 3 Xbox 360 Slim console. It looks awesome with an excellent paint job and the same can be said for the controller. The only difference aside from the paint job will be a large 320GB hard drive.  And to be honest I already have two Xbox 360 Slim consoles (Halo Reach and standard black) and I am tempted to buy this one.