First Impressions: Gears 5 Looks Fantastic but Feels Off

"Feels off and lackluster" thats how I felt about GOW 4. Even the Remaster feels off. Much slower than the 360 versions.

/pass

Nice to see some well-deserved criticism that reflects many of my thoughts on Gears 5, with the gunplay probably being the game's biggest issue. Aiming accuracy and recoil are botched, especially when using the Lancer, and actively reloading on most guns feels inaccurate as well, with the reload indicator literally jumping past the perfect-reload zone, when you hit the zone perfectly.

I played a round of Gears 4's Co-op vs. AI today, and the difference in the Lancer's gunplay - especially recoil - is just ridiculous.

Huh. I found this game so far to be on the same level as the original trilogy, at least when the servers are working. I would argue that some of the points such as quicker chainsawing and the camera shake are for the better.

The first act of this game was surprisingly fun and reminiscent of the old games despite bullet-spongy enemies, that changed with the second act with super boring exploration and absolutely awful and cringy dialogues that were driving me crazy. The pacing in that act is terrible, it's poorly balanced, uneventful and that Matriarch boss fight was so bad it made me uninstall the game for now because I'm so over these reskinned Berserker fights at this point, especially when it feels like you're firing nerf darts at it while being in constant danger of a cheap instakill.

This may sound glib, but did we *need* another Gears game? What reason is there to play these new games by The Coalition over the legacy trilogy?

I played some horde till my character froze up, but I got bored with horde so fast, after 10 waves I was already like...I wish this was the last wave... I like the single player but im taking it slowly on that one, as I have a short attention span

Am I the only one who thinks the sound design in multiplayer is a bit of a mess? The footsteps are all extremely loud and immediate, making you feel as if an enemy player is nearby even when they're not. Your teammates' footsteps don't seem any quieter than your opponents' and it's very difficult to determine what direction sounds are coming from when compared to other shooters.

Interesting. Of all things to criticize, im incredibly surprised you chose sound design. Curious what your set up is, as im using my astro a50 gen 4s in dolby atmos and the sound is second to none. You can literally hear bones crack and break, the oh so juicy sounds pop when you headshot someone. It can actually be quite gross lol Its actually pretty insane how good the sound design is. Firefights have been incredibly robust with sound at every angle. Definitely not a fanboy here by any means, just genuinely surprised as its some of the best directional sound ive heard.
Edit* im specifically talking from campaign experience, what little ive played of horde and multiplayer seems just as good. Footsteps, gun shots etc. Very impactful.

The only thing I've noticed is that the timings for active reloads feel slightly different. I miss way too many of them for someone that grew up with the series and never had an issue. Campaign is great though, they finally did some world building in-game instead of just the books. I actually wanted to explore every corner, and was often rewarded for it.

zDrUnKeNMoNkEyz said:Better be careful when using atmos during ranked matches "The Coalition" might think that's an unfair advantage and ban you...

The footsteps of Gears 1 made it sound like each boot weighed 50 pounds and were solid metal. Gears 5 is more concerned with how the boots sound with the environment, which is different but doesn’t seem like a bad thing to me.

The things that seem off to me are new things to this game and I might just need more time with them. The melee feels pointless especially on higher difficulties with the campaign. The open world is interesting but I haven’t found a reason to justify it yet. The side missions I’ve played haven’t provided any substantial reason to do them except I’m looking for collectibles. This side missions were missed opportunities to tell a short story in the Gears universe and instead we got “check out that tunnel.” Haven’t finished the game so maybe my opinions will change.

SheBeatsYou said:This totally went over my head lol im assuming this reference means something? Do tell 😁

zDrUnKeNMoNkEyz said:Since they love banning for boosting hehe guess it was a lame joke . As stupid as that it is still I wouldn't put it past them thinking having atmos where you can hear footsteps from across the map and pinpoint their direction would be considered a form of cheating. (plays X-files theme)

SheBeatsYou said:Lol ah ok, didnt know that was a thing. Admittedly thatd be weird since they specifically designed it with dolby atmos in mind.

Damn, that video by Crowbcat really shows a good chunk of what is wrong with the new Gears games. I just finished the Gears 4 campaign for the first and what I can say with some certainty only time I will go through it, and though the video is showcasing what is lacking in Gears 5, I am sure most of you would say it could cover 4 as well. I kept thinking the whole time I played through that the series has not changed at all in the 10 or so years since the first, other than to add new enemies, new and undeniably terrible weapons, and a shiny coat of graphical paint that still doesn't help the drab, boxy world that is the Gears of War universe look any fresher.

I mean to be fair it's the (6th?) gears game if you don't include the remaster. Most of these long running shooter franchises fall into Madden mode where each new installment only has a few tweaks and graphical updates. CoD has been a cut and paste franchise since modern warfare. Battlefield 3-4 was laughable at how similar they were. Far Cry, while fun imo, is just a reskin with an average B movie story each installment. I'm sure there are others but you get the point.

I like it so far, my lander does seem very inaccurate though in the campaign, and the "use RB to Saw is messing me up"

SheBeatsYou said:I came across this:

Banning is our toughest enforcement, reserved for accounts detected to be breaching the integrity of our online play. We strive to keep Gears 5 a safe and fair environment for everyone.
If you are banned, Easy Anti-Cheat has detected cheating and we have issued a permanent ban to your account.
https://support.gearsofwar.com/hc/en-us/articles/36003326175...

I have contacted them again to explain that if I could have found a match in my region, then I would not have resorted to boosting match wins. My intent was certainly not to "breach the integrity of online play". I also suggested a 1 month ban for boosting for the first offence, followed by a 1 year ban for the second offence, and then the permanent ban.

And if you are wondering:

Easy Anti-Cheat is a holistic anti–cheat service which uses cutting edge hybrid technology to counter hacking and cheating in multiplayer PC games.
https://www.easy.ac/en-us/

AKAthatoneguy said:I like the sound design overall, but the footsteps are definitely a problem. Constantly sounds like someone's directly behind me. Except for when someone is actually running up behind me, of course. Really hard to tell what direction the sounds are coming from, which is a real gameplay hindrance.