Gears of War 3

Gears of War 3 is a third-person shooter video game developed by Epic Games and published by Microsoft Studios exclusively for the Xbox 360. Originally due for release in April 2011, the game was delayed and eventually released on September 20, 2011. It is the third installment of the '' series, and the final game in the current story arc.

Gameplay
Gears of War 3, like its predecessors, is a third-person shooter that emphasizes the use of cover and squad tactics in combat situations. The player's character can carry four weapons: one pistol, one set of grenades, and two other weapons, all which can be swapped with other weapons dropped by fallen foes or at stockpiles throughout the game. Most weapons feature a secondary fire mode; the game's signature rifle, the Lancer, includes a chainsaw bayonet that can be used at close range to slice through enemies. When the player reloads a weapons ammunition, they have an opportunity for an "active reload", shown by a small cursor moving over a line with a marked section on the player's heads-up display (HUD). If the player hits a control button when the cursor is in the marked section, they will reload faster with the resulting reload being slightly more powerful than normal bullets. If they press the button outside this section, this temporarily jams the weapon, leaving the player vulnerable. Alternatively, the player can opt to not try to for the active reload, reloading the weapon at normal speed. At times, the player can carry a heavier weapon, such as a mortar or gatling gun, which slows their pace while it is carried.

When in combat, the player can take some damage from enemy fire, filling a blood-colored "crimson omen" on the HUD as a measure of the player's health. By staying out of the line of fire, this will dissipate, but by taking too much damage, the player will become downed, and must be brought to their feet by an ally within a short "bleed-out" period, or else the player will die. The player can also be killed during the bleed-out by the use of an execution move by the enemy. Some types of damage, such as explosives or head shots, can kill the player immediately without the bleed-out period. Similarly, the player can also cause enemies to fall into bleed-out in the same manner. The player and their allies and enemies can use nearly any structure as cover, firing blind from behind it or leaning out to take aimed shots. Players can quickly switch between nearby covering walls or jump over lower cover to rush forward. Within Gears of War 3, some cover can be destroyed after taking some amount of damage, which can be used to a tactical advantage to draw out enemies from cover.

New to Gears of War 3 is the ability to tag enemy opponents; computer-controller allies will then concentrate fire on these marked enemies, while human allies will be alerted to their location on their HUD. Players can now also swap weapons and ammunition with other allies in the course of battle.

The player maintains an experience level that persists across all game modes. The player earns experience through kills, performing special types of kills, reviving and aiding teammates, and through general process of the campaign or competitive modes. Earning levels unlocks the use of special character skins and weapons within the game's multiplayer mode.

Campaign
The story-driven campaign can be played by oneself but allows for up to 4 player co-operative play, with additional players replacing the computer-controlled squad members. Certain sections of the campaign require the squad to split up for a brief period, allowing the squad to approach a battle from two different fronts. Some sections feature the use of a vulnerable servo-assisted Loader to carry very large objects, requiring the rest of the squad to protect it, while others use a Silverback, a similar enhanced suit that is equipped with large weapons to fight back against the enemy locust and lambent.

Though the primary player controls Marcus Fenix for most of the game, some chapters switch control to Augustus "Cole Train" Cole, performing events that are happening simultaneously with those witnessed from Marcus' point of view.

Multiplayer
The game features a competitive multiplayer mode, pitting 5 on 5 player battles using game types from the previous Gears games. Team Deathmatch gives each team 15 respawns for each round; a team wins by forcing the other team to exhaust their respawns and killing the remaining foes. Warzone and Execution feature rounds without any respawning, with Execution further requiring that the players must finish off their enemy with execution-style kills. King of the Hill requires teams to try to hold randomly marked points on a map for as long as possible, earning points to reach a target score first. Capture the Leader tasks the teams to locate and capture the randomly assigned enemy leader for 30 seconds, while protecting their own. A final mode, Wingman, pits 4 teams of 2 players each against each other.

The Horde cooperative mode, where players must survive increasingly more difficult rounds of enemy forces, has been improved from Gears of War 2. Kills in this mode earn the player money that can be used to improve their command post with barricades, decoys, automatic and manual turrets, and the Silverback mechanical suit. Additionally, every tenth wave features a boss character that challenges the team's efforts.

New in Gears of War 3 is cooperative Beast mode, where the players play as the various Locust forces attempting to kill all the humans manning a command post across twelve rounds. Players are given a small amount of money from which they pay to spawn as one of the several enemies available. By breaking down the humans' defenses and killing the humans, the players earn more money to spawn as stronger monsters.

The game runs on dedicated multiplayer servers due to fans complaining of several issues that hampered the multiplayer in Gears of War 2, particularly in terms of input lag and oftentimes that hosts of online games would have a significant advantage over other players in the game.

Stereoscopic 3D
Gears of War 3 includes a stereoscopic mode for 3DTV sets. It uses TriOviz for Games Technology, which is integrated with Unreal Engine 3, for stereoscopic 3D support. All "Gears of War 3" gameplay and cinematics have S3D support, and this extends to split-screen play as well.

Unlockables
Announced via Twitter from Cliff Bleszinski, Gears of War 3 will have unlockables just like Gears of War 2.


 * On April 1, 2011, Bleszinski announced as an April Fools' joke via twitter that Gears of War 3 will have a new unlockable weapon in the form of a 6 barrelled shotgun that has a special ability to shoot nukes. The beta had exclusive unlockables, such as a Golden Retro Lancer by completing 90 matches in any game type, and earning 100 kills with it will unlock it for use in the full game. Players who purchased the Bulletstorm Epic Edition unlocked an exclusive Flaming Hammerburst for use in the beta and the full game.
 * Epic announced that players must hold on to their beta saved file for their unlockables to appear in the full game. It was also confirmed on June 24, 2011 that completing required achievements from Gears of War and Gears of War 2 will earn the player new weapon skins and medals in Gears of War 3.
 * The Gold Lancer and Hammerburst have been confirmed as returning from Gears of War 2 to Gears of War 3. Rod Fergusson announced that players with the Veteran Gear achievement from Gears of War 2 will earn an in-game Old Guard medal and callsign as well as gold variants of all five starting weapons. There was a method to obtain all five gold weapons without the achievement, but after listening to negative fan feed back, they have since made the golden Gnasher shotgun exclusive to Veteran Gear players.
 * Chrome weapon skins for the five starting weapons have also been confirmed to be unlockable by playing the Xbox 360 or PC version of Gears of War and Gears of War 2.
 * It was confirmed by Rod Fergusson that the player will earn the green liquid metal skin in a special marketing promotion.

Downloadable content
The first downloadable content is the "Horde Command pack", scheduled for release on November 1, 2011. In addition to new character and weapon skins, it provides three new maps for use in Versus and Horde mode and three new fortifications that the players can build.

The second downloadable content is "RAAM's Shadow", scheduled for release on December 13, 2011. Included in this DLC is six new multiplayer characters, a new weapon set named "Choclate", new achievements, and over 3 hours of singleplayer gameplay. The story takes place before the first Gears of War, set in Sera post-emergence day. Zeta Squad is enlisted to evacuate Ilima City and protect the citizens against a Locust Kryll storm. The player will be in the role of General RAAM, the main antagonist from the first Gears of War. Zeta is led by Michael Barrick (from “Gears of War” comics fame) and compsed of returning characters such as Lt. Minh Young Kim, from the first Gears of War and Tai Kaliso from Gears of War 2, and also includes a new female character, Alicia Valera.