The Gears of War franchise was previously among the tentpole series for Xbox, but believe it or not, there hasn’t been a new mainline entry since before the pandemic. Gears 5 continued telling the story of a new generation of COGs in 2019, complete with wide-open exploration areas and an emphasis on Kate Diaz’s familial ties. While the next evolution of Gears brought some intriguing ideas, the story didn’t seem to resonate with the wider player base as widely as the original story focused on Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago. With Gears of War: E-Day, The Coalition is returning to the start, back years before the events of the first Gears of War, to tell the tale of the Locusts’ emergence on Sera.
The Coalition views this as a return to the series’ roots, giving players a chance to see how the events that have largely only been alluded to within the Gears of War games play out before their very eyes. Taking place over the course of three days, players get to witness the fall of Kalona in a way that The Coalition wants to make feel like an all-out monster invasion. Through the power of Unreal Engine 5, The Coalition was able to model the entire city, even if it’s not an open-world game. This means that you’ll see vistas off in the distance, and not only will you be able to visit them, but also watch them fall as the three days progress; the longer the game goes, The Coalition says, the more everything falls into chaos and destruction.
“It is a very linear game, so it has very classic Gears levels that are linear streets leading to arenas and combat arenas, but we do have sections that open up into a wide linear couple of blocks,” studio creative director Matt Searcy says. “You always have a main objective, you’re always going to the next thing. You don’t get to pick and choose what your quests are, and you can’t just re-traverse all over the game however you want. Our story re-traverses through the city, but we’re pulling you through a very linear adventure. We just wanted to find a way to really feel Kalona, and also the way the gameplay mechanics can experience E-Day.”
This time around, players control Bravo Squad, a team of COGs brought together by circumstance. Following the end of the Pendulum Wars, Marcus and Dom arrive in Kalona for a military ceremony. At this point in time, Marcus and Dom are only connected due to their service, as well as their shared love for the late Carlos Santiago, Dom’s brother, who had been killed in battle. It’s only been a few weeks following the end of the Pendulum Wars, which lasted nearly 80 years. However, while at the bar that evening, the peace they expected to follow the end of the war is violently interrupted, as holes open up all over the city and Locusts emerge, brutally murdering the majority of the human population; it’s brutal, dark, and very gory. Marcus and Dom spring into action straight from the bar, joined by Lucas Reyes and Mags Carter.
“They’re all returned home, and they’re all trying to figure out what life looks like next for them,” studio brand director Nicole Fawcette says. “Marcus and Dom are having this conversation when the ground starts to shake and chaos erupts around them, and these four people that were just kind of living their lives in the bar, basically get thrown together by their shared values of being a Gear and knowing that duty comes first. They run towards the danger rather than running away from the danger. […] Mags Carter is a former Gear veteran; she served previously in the Gears and was dishonorably discharged, and we’re not going to get too far into her story, but now she works at the Imulsion refinery. Both her and Lucas are from Kalona, and that’s really great when you’re playing through the game, because Marcus and Dom are not from the city; they’re here for a very special event. They basically get stuck in the city as Emergence Day unfolds, and Mags and Lucas are basically your guide to the city.”
Gears of War: E-Day features four-player online co-op throughout all modes, as well as two-player splitscreen co-op. On top of that, players can select any character they want from the start. And together, players can utilize the new suite of moves, including jumping, sliding, and the ability to perform high mantles to scale taller walls than before. There are other minute changes, including the camera pulling out instead of pulling in close when you sprint to allow for more spatial awareness. On top of that, the active-reload’s U.I. location has changed to be in the middle of the screen to be more intuitive with the player’s natural sightline.
Since Gears of War: E-Day takes place 14 years prior to the events of the first Gears of War game, I ask Searcy if he envisions using that added padding between these entries to turn this single game into a multi-game prequel saga. As you might guess, he’s guarded in his answer.
“When we look at telling Gears stories, one of the awesome things about working on Gears is it’s got a bunch of lore, a bunch of characters, all sorts of stuff,” he says. “We had this moment, I think we talked about it in 2024, where we just, at the studio, wanted to tell this story really, really badly. We decided that would be our next mainline entry, and we basically have been focused on that this whole time. And now, on this day, we’re still trying to land this one, right? We always look at it as we have all these opportunities to tell stories, whether they’re this time frame or other time frames, all sort of characters. We don’t really have a commitment to what the next one’s going to be right now, but it was really awesome to go back here, and I think there’s a rich amount of storytelling in all over the Gears eras.”
Though the gameplay session I witnessed was nothing beyond what was shown during the Xbox Showcase’s Gears of War: E-Day Direct, I appreciated getting additional insight straight from the team behind what I consider to be one of the most promising games on the calendar this fall. For me, Gears of War was once worthy of being mentioned alongside Xbox’s greatest first-party franchises, and though it’s been on hiatus for nearly an entire console generation, E-Day looks like it could very well signal a return to the greatness I once expected from the franchise. We’ll see if it delivers on that, when Gears of War: E-Day comes to Xbox Series X/S and PC on October 6.
