Disclosure: Xbox provided this product free of charge for review. All opinions in this review are my own.
I have finally closed out my initial playthrough of Gears of War: E-Day, a title I was excited about but not necessarily one I had much faith in. Series developer The Coalition proved they can make a compelling Gears game with Gears 4 and 5, both of which I enjoyed and felt took the series forward with interesting new stories. Revisiting E-Day always ran the risk of messing up established lore and introducing other dumb things that don’t necessarily make sense. While Gears of War: E-Day does indeed introduce some retcons, it gives us a fantastic look into the horrors of being on the ground during the darkest moments of Sera’s history.
Story
The UIR has surrendered to the Coalition of Ordered Governments, and after nearly 80 years of war, Sera is finally entering an era of peace. Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago are attending a war memorial in Kalona to honor the fallen in the battle at Aspho Fields two years earlier. After the ceremony, Marcus and Dom reflect on what the future brings as they honor Dom’s brother and Marcus’s best friend, Carlos Santiago. Unfortunately, peace is short-lived as a new threat emerges from the ground. E-Day is in full swing. Marcus, Dom, and the rest of humanity must quickly learn and adapt to the new normal the locust horde has just unleashed.
Gears of War: E-Day has a great story, and even with some retcons for gameplay purposes, I was pleasantly surprised by what the game had to offer. We are tossed into the game with Marcus and Dom as they try to figure out what is happening to the world around them. For anyone who has only played the original games, it is a bit surprising to head into this game and not have Marcus and Dom be best bros. Carlos was the glue that bound them, and his death at Aspho Fields and E-Day itself are what forged that brotherhood, culminating in the game's final acts. But unless you read the books or comics, that’s lore you would have no idea existed.
By coincidence of location, Dom and Marcus are joined by the new characters Lucas Reyes and Mags Carter. Both characters had me wary at first, as prequel-type characters can either be incredibly cringe or annoying in the worst possible ways, or both. Lucas is as green as they come, and while he may be considered annoying, I never found him to be so. Mags obviously had the internet in an uproar, but she turned out to be far more compelling than I could have hoped for in a jaded ex-COG suffering from Rust Lung. Compared to a different female character in another recently released Microsoft title, the difference is night and day. The game does give both characters story attention, but the balance between all four characters worked for me.
Of course, Dom being in Kalona at all is a pretty big retcon since prior lore had established him being in Ephyra with his wife Maria, and kids on E-Day. His kids' tragic death and Maria’s later disappearance a few years later are central to his entire character arc throughout the franchise. E-Day changes up these events, but leaves room for the Maria storyline to potentially happen as originally established. One event I don’t mind being changed a bit is the creation of the chainsaw Lancer prototype. In old lore, this idea came about after Tai Kaliso used a chainsaw to defeat a drone a year after emergence. This event now happens in-game, and we get to see the ineffectiveness of the original MK1 Lancer play out. Russ creating the original prototype for Marcus’s father to then refine and mass-produce works just fine for me. It also helps fix Gears of War Judgment's own inclusion of a chainsaw Lancer. Having this extended lore from the books and comics come into play is a nice touch and shows that there was good attention to detail paid while crafting the narrative of the game.
Gameplay
Gears of War: E-Day feels fantastic to play. The basic gameplay will be familiar to anyone who has played previous entries in the franchise. Cover shooting mechanics are better than ever, with more destructibility and movement options available. Sitting behind a barrier and having half of it explode results in your character taking an even lower position. It is a great addition! Like past games, you can stick to nearly every surface and move around them. You can also move off or go over cover like in past games, but E-Day now makes use of a dedicated jump button for better terrain traversal. I love it, and it makes moving around the city and engaging in fights far more interesting.
Each weapon feels great to use. Several classics return along with some new ones to add to the sandbox. The Gut Punch was exceptionally handy to keep on hand during the course of my playthrough, but I had to swap back to the good ol Torque Bow once it showed up. In a more arcade approach, each weapon has the potential to add up to 4 upgrade mods to improve its capabilities. Armor and a new ability system have similar upgrades. It is a fun system, and certainly serves the gameplay in good ways, but it does make the game feel less grounded than the others in the series outside of Judgements Declassified Missions. You are able to swap weapons and change mods at any Supply cache scattered around the city. From a storytelling perspective, the caches honestly make no sense despite them trying to explain them. But oh well, it’s fun!
I love the progression E-Day introduces with mixtures of linear and open-world segments. Though the linear portions are certainly the clear winners for the most part. The whole game being set in Kalona as it succumbs to the Locust invasion portrays just how brutal the Locust are far better than the silent ruins depicted in the original games for me. Though, in the original games, it could be argued that the derelicts are more a showcase of the COG’s brutality with the Hammer of Dawn Strikes. The city is as much a player in the gameplay loop as the characters. You will revisit different areas of the city multiple times, and each time you get to see how badly it has been hit by the invasion.
This can lead to a possible sense of repetitiveness, but my only complaint really came from running back and forth between main objectives. If I took time to explore the open areas, it really added to the overall atmosphere, but I know not everyone is looking for that. Thankfully, each open world segment isn’t incredibly large, so it never got overwhelming. Numerous side objectives are also scattered throughout that reward you with mods for completing them. The collectibles, on the other hand, are completely overdone, like with most modern shooters. You have a ton of lore-based collectibles and over 100 hardcases to find. Hardcases grant you unlockable mods for weapons and armor and new abilities, and are worth seeking out; I just don’t enjoy doing so.
Several of the set pieces are a sight to behold as the game unfolds. The ending in particular brings an awesome sense of urgency and dread. I also love that the game manages to throw in forested and underground moments to give you a well-diversified environmental experience despite the city setting. And just when I begin to question something, they give me an in-game explanation to try and explain it. It isn’t always the most compelling thing, but I appreciate them trying. Several key boss fights happen throughout the game, mainly involving Brumaks, but they are a lot of fun and even proved challenging on Normal difficulty during a solo run. I can’t wait to revisit them on Co-op insanity!
Audio
E-Day offers best-in-class audio across the board. Guns sound awesome, and the environmental effects add to the immersion. Character voices and locust cries also add to the intensity. The music is fantastic and ties the whole package together. I did have to adjust the sliders a bit to get the voice work to stand out over the rest of the soundscape on my surround sound setup. I guess you could say the default mix would be more realistic in a combat setting. I just like my lore! John Dimaggio and Carlos Ferro reprise their roles as Marcus and Dom. While Marcus sounds like Marcus through and through, Dom sounded a bit off to me during the early parts of the game. The tone shift that Dom has in the final acts is quite a contrast and brings him more in line with his portrayal in the original trilogy.
Visuals
E-Day is a good-looking game. It captures the atmosphere perfectly, and the game taking place over several days and nights, with different times of day, lets you fully appreciate the destruction of the scenery around you. Lighting and reflections are fantastic, and watching parts of buildings crumple is an experience. Character and enemy models look great and again capture the Gears vibe. The new Gore system is absolutely disgusting. Enemy dismemberments look “better” than ever, and seeing your shots take pieces of enemies with them is nasty. Needless to say, the game makes full use of what Unreal 5 has to offer. On my 5080, I was able to run the game smoothly, but shader compilation takes forever on this one. Seeing how well the game looks at even low settings was also pretty impressive. Considering they got this one running smoothly on Series S, it should hopefully work well for several hardware tiers.
Replayability
As a mainline Gears of War title, E-Day can keep you occupied for months or years depending on how you play. The campaign is the main focus of my review, but Multiplayer and Horde modes are also included out of the box. I don’t care for multiplayer PvP, but Horde mode has me curious to dive in after I finish a co-op run of the campaign. On the campaign side, co-op and collectibles are a big driving force for me to revisit despite disliking collectibles. Several easter eggs are also present throughout the game, and I just learned about the cluck punch that I can’t wait to try!
What It Could Have Done Better
For this section of the review, I have to once again call out the open-world sections of the game. While it is cool to see more of the city at its various stages of destruction, they can kill the overall pacing. Bonus objectives are roughly the same: defend this area until time runs out or enemies are eliminated. The lack of variety is a bit unfortunate. The lack of enemies outside of major encounters during these segments could also be pretty boring for some. The Horde mode-style sieges also happen a bit too frequently for my tastes, but considering the story and environment, I can forgive them. Plus, I love setting up turrets to mulch things for me! I also wish we could have seen a bit “more” during the epilogue, but I hope we get another game that explores more of the early years of the Locust invasion. I also have to admit that a couple of the emotional scenes don’t land the way that I’m sure was intended. Why a character introduced at the start of a chapter and dead by the next needed that big of a sendoff is beyond me. Sure, it could help add to Lucas’s journey, but he already had enough in his backstory to help with that. The PC version is also susceptible to crashing issues. The first update fixed most of my issues, and fixing up my memory timings cleared up the rest for me. Still, those first few days after release were rough, and I hope you all have a smoother journey than I did when I got started.
Verdict
Gears of War: E-Day turned out to be a far better experience than I could have hoped for. It does a good job of conveying the confusion, hope, and dread of E-Day and does so while mostly respecting the series-established lore. It isn’t a perfect game, but it is one that feels like a best-of moments compilation of the franchise. While I hadn’t planned to purchase it till it went on sale, I had full intentions to play through it with Game Pass before receiving this review code. For fans of the franchise, it is an easy recommendation. For newcomers, I can still easily recommend it if you are looking for something new, but a sale never hurts either.