Gears of War 2 Story Mode Impressions Thread

[Trynant]

Hopefully the long title is good enough to explain what this thread is about.

My main impression of the campaign is that it gets hard FAST. Second chapter of the first act and I'm already having trouble. Still haven't finished the first act yet.

Protecting derricks is hard.

[Rohit]

Heh, I also had problems protecting the derrick, even at normal mode.

Then I realized it had a mounted minigun.

[Trynant]

Heh, I also had problems protecting the derrick, even at normal mode.

Then I realized it had a mounted minigun.

Even with the minigun I was having problems.

Also, I hate tickers in the dark.

[UBerserker]

Do you see the Locust Queen in this game?

[Mozi]

I am playing on Hardcore and the derricks were tough but use the troika to take down the nemaysts from a distance it takes a few tries but not to hard.

Yes I hate tickers as well.

Right now on the end of Act 4 so I won't say much about the narrative but damn this game is good! Already got some ideas in my head about what is going on between Humans and Locust.

Do you see the Locust Queen in this game?

I am wondering the same thing as right now I am really deep in locust territory.... maybe I'll find out after this next mission I am on I hope.

[Trynant]

Worm-blood-covered Gears make me laugh.

I thought my Ticker hatred would go away over time. No, no it doesn't.

I shudder to think what carrying the bomb will be like with online co-op. You know the one I'm talking about.

Killing flame-thrower Drones via exploding the fuel tanks on their back is one of my favorite things in this game.

[DazJW]

I am playing on Hardcore and the derricks were tough but use the troika to take down the nemaysts from a distance it takes a few tries but not to hard.
I found it alot easier to use the Lancer on the Nemacysts and use the turret for everything else on hardcore, I used the turret when I played through on normal though.

Do you see the Locust Queen in this game?

Yes - she looks very, very human. Cue some awful dialogue.

[Mozi]

Ok so I beat the game last night on Hardcore and here are my thoughts/spoilers ahead:

Story:

Looking back at Gears 1 a few things now make sense as to why Adam Fenix had so much data on locust tunnels and the Queen's remark at the very end 'they do no know why we fight this war'

For the first point in Gears 2 when you reach Nexus the locust capital, there is a moment where Marcus wants Jack to access a locust terminal. Once accessed delta squad hears the voice of Adam Fenix stating to win this war Jacinto needs to fall to flood the locust tunnels. So it seems that Adam always knew what needed to be done but no one ever took it seriously till now, and also supports that he has the most information on locust than anyone else.

Additionally when you met the Queen she speaks highly of Adam I guess they were up to something hence supporting that Adam knows more about the locust than any Cog, but why does he know so much is still a mystery.

As for the Queen stating, 'they do not know why we fight this war' well we do now. They too want to sink cities and Jacinto to flood the underground to kill the 'Lambent'. Apperently there is a civil war amongst the locust and the Queen despises lambent beings.

What about Dom and Maria, well he finds her but has to kill her, put her out of her misery from being tortured by Locusts. Maybe it's me and all the chainsawing, grenade tags, and headshots I do in game but that part was not as moving. However, seeing Tai kill himself due to the same torture was more moving and emotional, probably cause this was the first time we see Marcus show any emotion for anyone in this war.

Other things that stood out as odd during the campaign included the beast riders and the old COG complex out in the woods. The beast riders maybe it's me but those things look like little Brumaks trained early to be ridden then grow to enormous size and are fitted with the big guns!

The old COG complex to me seemed like some crazy locust research lab like Area 51 of Sera. Thing that stood out the most were the 'Sires' again just my thought but their sound and movement behaviors were very reminiscent of Beserkers.


Kick ass moments in the game:


- Protecting the Derricks
- Fighting Reavers and Brumaks up close
- Rockworms for cover!
- Killing the massive Rockworm
- Cole Train's entrance
- Centaur Tank missions
- Riding the reavers
- Riding the brumak ( oh what fun that was wish this segment was longer)
- New weapons, Flame thrower, Grinder, and Mortar launcher!
- Cole Train dissing the locust Queen
- Killing flame boomers by shooting the gas tank on their backs!



So all in all it was a great game, a much better single player experience than gears 1. Now to fire up the game on insane mode!

[UBerserker]

Thanks for the stuff guys, getting the game tomorrow :)


Really want to see how lame Skorge "dies", as everyone says...

[Mozi]

Yes Skorge was kind of lame but at least it was not the torture endurance boss battle that was RAAM where all mechanics of weapons change on one dude... :mad:

However the encounter overall from meeting Skorge to his demise was overall very cool.

[edhe]

I shudder to think what carrying the bomb will be like with online co-op. You know the one I'm talking about.


Worked fine. Bit tricky but the Kantus's pistol makes wretches useless.

[Kantham]

The most piss-me-off moment me and my GF had playing trough the entire campaign was the Centaur with the 2 seeders over the mountains. I can't tell you how many times we ended up re-loading checkpoints every time until I figured we could take them down way before they notice us. Which took me aproximately 30 minutes to figure out. :D

[Mozi]

That was ok, the pissed off moment for me was in Jacinto involving reavers and the comm towers... there is one ****er that is so hard to hit and if you miss that guy you fail the mission...

[DeathBooger]

Do you see the Locust Queen in this game?

Stupidest part of the game. You spend all this time fighting to get into the Queen's fortress only to talk to her in some stupid conversation when you could just easily shoot her and end the stupid war once in for all. Instead you just let her walk casually out the door and fight the anorexic Skorge guy instead.

It was a decent romp when it's all said and done though. I'll play Gears 3 if it comes out.

[UBerserker]

Stupidest part of the game. You spend all this time fighting to get into the Queen's fortress only to talk to her in some stupid conversation when you could just easily shoot her and end the stupid war once in for all. Instead you just let her walk casually out the door and fight the anorexic Skorge guy instead.


:lol:

Okay, so I started the game and lol, you have to train the new Carmine. That was nice!
I hope I won't die too much against those Tickers/small explosive goddamn things.

[Kantham]

Stupidest part of the game. You spend all this time fighting to get into the Queen's fortress only to talk to her in some stupid conversation when you could just easily shoot her and end the stupid war once in for all. Instead you just let her walk casually out the door and fight the anorexic Skorge guy instead.


Exactly what I was thinking.

[[SAS]Solid Snake]

Possible theory on the entire story. Has spoilers that cover the whole game. Do not read if you haven't finished the game.

My friend and I believe that the Locust are humans. The research facility talks a little about experiments and my friend says he found a document which has an image of patient which looks a lot like the Queen. I think that one of the groups during the Serain wars attempted to create a super soldier of some sort, and they escaped some how. Either that or they were released, and went rogue after some time. Research documents also detail that the patients are really sadistic which explains the torture routine that they're doing, but I think perhaps that they are breaking down their victims in order to change them into Locust as well. Tai seems to be a very strong religious fanatic who believes in the order of things, and perhaps he held enough constitution to know that he may change into a Locust and thus suicided himself. It's a pretty far stretch, but I can see that occurring. Doesn't quite explain Maria though, although perhaps they don't have much use for females, if indeed the Locust are transformed humans. The research facility also mentions of the evolutionary gaps.

I'm not 100% sure what the emulsion is exactly doing to Locusts but it could be acting as a drug but it seems to be able to deform or spur a giant mutation within Brumaks.

Perhaps Adam Fenix was actually a soldier / scientist involved with the project?

[Mozi]

That makes sense cause at the odd Queen encounter was it Baird who said "It's her" as if they knew her from before and were confused to see that she was the Queen. Probably Baird knows her as well as the rest of Delta hence they did not put a bullet in her head on the spot

But yeah I totally agree the locust are mutated humans in some whack science experiment gone wrong and rogue. And perhaps the Queen is also waging war not against the lambent but as revenge for what was done to her, in a past life.

[dragonfliet]

Once again, the single player is finely crafted, loads of fun and filled with numerous memorable moments, none of which are related to the story. Why? The story is lame. The dialogue is, in general, functional, with some moments where it's gratingly bad. Which is a shame. Like everyone, I'm irritated by the moment with the Queen and I wish that they would simply spill the beans on the locust instead of trying to be coy. It doesn't work out. Lastly, the queen's narration was pretty bleh. Oh well, it was damned fun.

~Jason

[UBerserker]

Eh, the first thing you shouldn't expect from Epic's games is an average story. At least GOW2's one is better than the whole -Reaper: "I'M ANGRY!!!"- thing.

[[SAS]Solid Snake]

A well executed story still means a lot though. A lot of people seemed to really enjoy the exploratory nature of Unreal, but the actual story content it had was pretty standard.

Having an actual author craft some of the story elements however. Like programmer art, you can tell when a programmer writes a story.

[edhe]

I think they've done a fine job of teasing the truth of the conflict, however what gave it away to me, aside from "area 51" etc, was Baird - "How did they build so much so quickly" or so with someone's reply "We don't know how long they've been down here"

Well.. Baird seems to know alot.

I agree that the Queen must be some sort of experiment of the CoG's pre-cog history from the pendulum wars [which were quite long] and with the imulsion's mutating properties there's plenty of scope there for a frankenstein story... though i hope it's not that simple.

The narrative and dialogue's fine, does the job - Dom's story touched me, but i don't think Maria was having the same fate as Tai. God knows what happened to Tai, also touching - if you've not been touched by that then you've not lived enough yet to develop sympathies.

Maria wasn't being broken like Tai, she was a working slave, like the miners - use them as slaves and send your own into battle.

[Hunter]

Me and a friend have been playing through on co-op and I hope people agree that GoW2 works a lot better as a 2 player co-op than a single-player game?

I don't mean that playing on single-player is crap I mean that it works a hell of a lot better when playing Co-Op.

We've just got passed those crawling rock worm things, can't remember exact. Should get some more hours in this week :D

[Nines]

- "They're sinking cities with a GIANT WOOOOORM!"


Anyways, I enjoyed the game a lot, especially the fish boss. :shy:

[J112]

- "They're sinking cities with a GIANT WOOOOORM!"

I lol'ed when I first heard that.

The scene with Maria was so well done imo, best I've ever seen in a video game anyways. The way Marcus reacted made it so much better too, showed a more human side to him.

I must admit that I raised an eyebrow when the lambent were brought into it as a faction vs the locust, part of me says its a bit of a cheap way of propelling the story but all in all I don't mind all that much.

I'm really interested to see where the story with Marcus's father goes, something that heavily involves him in some way would rock, I remember the Fenix mansion more than any other part of gow1 so would be nice for consistency.

So yeah, i Loved it lol. Slightly off topic I guess, but the multiplayer just doesn't seem to interest me compared to how much GoW1's did, anyone else found that?

Edit: 112'th post, not that i noticed...

[UBerserker]

So yeah, i Loved it lol. Slightly off topic I guess, but the multiplayer just doesn't seem to interest me compared to how much GoW1's did, anyone else found that?


I think you're right, expect for Horde (the only thing worth playing) and the Shotgun being weak as hell this time.

[Kantham]

It's all about how they made this game so cautious and casual that makes the multiplayer blows. The shotgun isn't that much of a problem, it's more about the "invincible chainsaw" and "Wall tagging". Also their Halo3-wanna be Matchmaking system is a joke.

The complains are as vast as they were with UT3. Which makes me think about, Epic Games can't really make multiplayer enjoyable now. They do have one of my favorite engine in the industry, but their understanding about how to make a multiplayer game enjoyable is incredibly lacking.

[Mozi]

I'll agree to chainsaw.. but wall tagging ****ing hilarious especially in Submission.

[The Warden]

I found GoW2 easier than GoW1, this based on the single player experience, Why do I say this? I finished GoW2, let it set for about a day or so, Fired up GoW1 and promply Died.

From a single player point of view Both are worth having in your collection.