The original Gears of War hit the Xbox 360 like a sledgehammer, going on to sell millions of copies and winning GameSpot's Game of the Year award in 2006. When we reviewed the game, we called it an "amazing technical achievement," emphasising that "games just don't typically look this good." True to our word, games in 2007 had a hard time matching up to Gears' presentational quality, and even now, two years later, the original game is still a standard-bearer.
In early 2008, Epic attended the Game Developer's Conference to show off the latest features of its Unreal Engine 3 technology, as well as to formally announce Gears of War 2. Deformable scenery, improved water, crowd generation, and soft tissue were all demoed to an eager crowd and gave an indication of what Gears fans could expect in the sequel. All of these effects and more made it into Gears 2 when it launched in November 2008, and we claimed that "the sequel maintains [its predecessor's] high technical and artistic quality."
Given that Gears 2 contains many of the same characters, weapons, and locations as the first game, we decided to compare the two. Epic claims that the two-year interim allowed its designers to push the Xbox 360 to its limits, but were they really able to raise the bar any higher? Let's find out.
Environments
When Epic shipped Gears 2, it remade five of the original game's multiplayer maps and published them on Xbox Live. All of these maps are structurally identical, but they do feature substantial changes in certain areas, such as weather.
Mansion
One of the most iconic maps from the first Gears, Mansion has a considerably different look in the sequel. The darkness and the rain have been swapped for what appears to be morning sunshine, allowing you to appreciate more of the finer details in the environments. Check out the plant pots and the mansion itself--they're much more detailed than they were previously. Inside the building, the same holes in the ceiling exist, but instead of letting in trickling rain, they're filtering the sunshine.
Gridlock
One of the biggest improvements to Gears 2 is that there's much more greenery in the environments. Nowhere is this more noticeable than in Gridlock, where the derelict buildings are now covered with vines, and the trees have been left to grow over the years. Despite the neglect that appears to have aged the rest of the map, someone at Epic has been in and redecorated--a new bell has been added to the tower at the center of the level, and the statue opposite the tower has been removed.
Subway
Epic must have gotten bored with all the rain in its multiplayer maps, because Subway is a lot drier than in the first game. It has a scorched-earth feel to it now, with black dust swirling around the exterior environments. The deserted vehicles have a lot more detail, as you can see from our screens, but we miss the light that used to pour into the subway.
Tyro Station
The most unchanged of the remastered Gears maps is Tyro Station. The color palette is less red and more green in Gears 2, but the features, architecture, and weather remain pretty much the same. A huge train periodically bursts through the middle of the level, taking anyone who's on the track with it. Taking the trip is still worth the risk, though, thanks to the Torque Bow and the Hammer of Dawn weapons that await you in the middle of the track. The vans underneath the track, meanwhile, have mysteriously turned into storage containers.
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retospectre posted Jan 30, 2009 4:12 pm PT (does not meet display criteria. sign in to show)