Cliff “Don’t call me Cliffy B” Bleszinski on Gears of War 2 fixes

By Tiberius Jonez

Gears of War was a great game – no doubt about it. The campaign was fun, and while the multiplayer was what really gave the game its long legs, it was far from perfect. Many players hated the grenade sticking (I loved it) and Epic addressed that issue with a patch that somehow made me even better at it. Others found the chainsaw randomness annoying. But without a doubt the biggest complaint I heard during online matches was about the host shotgun advantage. Basically, if the host of a match used a shotgun, that player could destroy the entire opposing team even when it seemed a certainty that he was out of shottie range or not even aiming at his victim. It could turn a mostly great online experience into a frustrating, cuss-laden, controller-throwing scream fest.

Well, in a recent interview with GamePro, Gears creator Cliff Bleszinski says Epic has addressed all those bugs, and that Gears 2 will best its predecessor in every way. From an improved cover system and chainsaw duels to more players online, a more stylized lighting engine and much more, Gears of War 2 appears to be well on its way to taking the franchise to all new heights of bloody goodness.

UT3 for Xbox 360 only "on hold"

There was some confusion going around the nets yesterday regarding the Xbox 360 version of Epic's Unreal Tournament 3. A couple of well known game sites had reported that Epic's Mark Rein had said work had not yet begun on the Xbox 360 version, which was not correct. What he meant was, the game was put on hold (apparently a while ago) so that they could focus on getting the PS3 and PC versions out the door. Joystiq got verification from Rein himself.

Joystiq quotes Rein as saying, "What I probably should have said was 'start working on it again.' We had the game up and running on all three platforms up until last spring. In fact Official Xbox Magazine came out and played the game for a great cover story they did on it. We stopped working on the 360 version so we could concentrate our efforts on shipping the various PC and PS3 versions. Once we get those out of the way, and take some time to enjoy the holidays with our friends and families, we'll start working on the 360 version again. There's still a decent bit of work to do. For example we have simple LAN play but no Xbox Live implementation yet and we need to work with Microsoft to figure out how to accommodate mods on their platform."

You Xbox 360 owners can stop worrying, not that you were all that worried with Mass Effect dropping next week. PS3 and PC gamers need some positive mojo right about now. Especially PC gamers, I swear, except for Crysis and World in Conflict, it seems like there hasn't been a great PC game since Half Life 2.

Gears of War "Annex" Update This Week

With all the matches being played on Live each day it sounds pretty strange to call multiplayer a "weakness" for Gears of War. But even the most avid of those players recognize that the basic team deathmatch variants available only graze the surface of the team-play potential of the game. This week Epic plans to release Annex, a new game mode that steps up in a big way to fulfill more of that promise. And we're not just saying that; we've played it, and afterward it left no doubt that once released this is the new mode of choice everyone will be playing.

Aside from the new game mode, it seems the Lancer has gotten a little boost to it's stopping power; a welcome change to everyone sick of being run down by enemies with shotties.

1UP has all the details from their exclusive hands-on time with the new game mode. It sounds very exciting.

I'll see everyone online once it hits!