Review: Gears 5, by The Coalition
by
Stuart Holland
This review was originally a series of tweets, which is why it is structured as it is.
This review was a part of my “Back Catalog” series in 2020, where I went back and achievement hunted in games that I had previously started, but not completed.
Next up on #BackCatalog is Gears 5!
I played a few of the campaign missions but never really got into it at launch, so it’s time to return!
I played a bunch of Gears on 360 and always enjoy the cover-shooter mechanics that Gears does so well
Achievement wise, Gears 5 has tricked me. I unlocked an achievement on the title screen when I started it up again, but that achievement was from a DLC that I hadn’t started before, so suddenly I have 31 more achievements affecting my completion %!
And they’re multiplayer achievements, which are hard
Plus it doesn’t look like I can progress toward Operation 3 specifically without accidentally starting Operations 1, 2, or 4 along the way, with even more achievements to affect my %!
But enough about the achievement mechanics, I’m playing the the campaign!
Gears 5 is beautiful. Like, holy shit, the vistas, there’s so much care in so much of the environment
The characters’ faces during cinematics are so emotive and so finely detailed (never uncanny)
The gunplay is satisfying and I always love the Longshot (sniper rifle)
It’s a lot more open world-y than I expected, but it doesn’t fall into the “I have 700,000 things to do and now this game is a to-do list” trap
When you find dimly lit rooms and Jack lights them up and expertly follows your camera as you look around, but with just enough delay that it feels like you’re in the world, everything is just so eerie
It’s all in 4K and HDR, which look great on my TV. The open up to reveal the snowy mountain in act 2 was breathtaking
I didn’t take a screenshot cuz I was stunned and it was gone, but here’s an achievement image of the same place - in-game you look straight through that valley
I’ve been enjoying Gears 5 way more than I expected. Completed the campaign (which was awesome) and now I’m tempting fate, trying to do the base game and Operation 3 specific multiplayer achievements!
These achievements turned out to be a lot more doable than I expected, since you can do most of them in matches against the AI
And they’re multiplayer achievements, which are hard
There’s a whole map editor in Gears 5, which I had never heard about before! You can make your own custom “escape the enemy base” maps, which are amazing!
Gears 5
