I just found this little gem...

[Valafar123]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkZP5...e_gdata_player

It'd be years since I last watched this. This beautiful piece of work reminded me why I fell in love with gears in the first place. That darkness, that overwhelming threat, that total sense of helplessness.

The scheme of things felt huge in gears 1 and especially 2. It wasn't just the story of Marcus and Delta, it was the struggle of humanity against shocking odds. Coupled with that melancholic, gloomy aesthetic and feel, it really made for a great game. It had depth.

That's why I didn't really like the Gears 3 campaign. It was too personal and seemed like we spent the entire time listening to Marcus' daddy issues as opposed to fighting a war for survival. The game lacked presence. When I play the first two campaigns, I can still feel the presence of the locust looming over me. Empty buildings had clear signs of struggle. Even the gentle falling of ash in the sky reminds me of the hammer strikes, making me feel insignificant compared to the world around me.

When I think of gears I think of ash and stone, not deserts and trenches. Gears 3 felt so lifeless for the most part. It's different walking in a mass grave than it is to walk somewhere that never had life to begin with. The only time I felt the aesthetic of gears 3 matched the genre was when travelling through the char. But even this felt spoiled for some reason.

For the reasons above, I rather enjoyed RAAM's shadow. It brought back a lot of memories and reminded me of what gears 3 lacked. RS still had the personal level of things, but the greater scheme of things never leaves your sight.

This thread doesn't really have a purpose other than to share my thoughts, and more importantly feelings. This isn't a complaint thread or a hate thread towards gears 3. I just felt more emotionally engaged in the first two games and during RAAM's Shadow. If epic is working on a new gears game, I hope they use the formula that worked so well before.

[DaRkNeSs]

I've just said this in another thread haha:

Gears 1 - Horror Shooter, Gears 2 - Horror/Sci-Fi Shooter, Gears 3 - Sci-Fi Shooter.

Don't get me wrong, Gears 3 is a good game but it's too modern for Gears of War. Too sunny, too positive, too bright and it runs with a Sci-Fi theme rather than the horror origins that made Gears 1 and 2 a brilliant game. Hell even the gore that used to be in Gears 1 and 2 (chunks of flesh, kicking bodies) is gone in Gears 3. I feel your pain, I was constantly looking for a moment in the Gears 3 campaign where I was actually scared (Gears 1 had the Berserker, the Kryll, the Wretches, the train and RAAM. Gears 2 had the New Hope facility [even the name creeps me out]) but the closest I got too being scared in the Gears 3 campaign was...erm...erm.....

[Valafar123]

I've just said this in another thread haha:

Gears 1 - Horror Shooter, Gears 2 - Horror/Sci-Fi Shooter, Gears 3 - Sci-Fi Shooter.

Don't get me wrong, Gears 3 is a good game but it's too modern for Gears of War. Too sunny, too positive, too bright and it runs with a Sci-Fi theme rather than the horror origins that made Gears 1 and 2 a brilliant game. Hell even the gore that used to be in Gears 1 and 2 (chunks of flesh, kicking bodies) is gone in Gears 3. I feel your pain, I was constantly looking for a moment in the Gears 3 campaign where I was actually scared (Gears 1 had the Berserker, the Kryll, the Wretches, the train and RAAM. Gears 2 had the New Hope facility [even the name creeps me out]) but the closest I got too being scared in the Gears 3 campaign was...erm...erm.....

My thoughts exactly. Gears 2 pulled off the synthesis quite well I think, but gears 1 really got the feel perfect (and I rarely compliment gears 1).

[urdumb2]

Evil dark any turn and crazy **** was jumping out at you the commercial for gears 1 made me buy an x box

[Viewing the hue]

I played Gears 2 at a friends and it made me buy an Xbox360, go buy Gears 2, then Gears 1, and finally Gears 3.
I agree I miss the dark content of the game, Gears kind of lost a little of it's essence in 3. A shame too because the multiplayer is awesome. The Slab, Gridlock, and Bullet Marsh however do an awesome job of making me feel in the game.

I have a Rendezvous with death, and I to my pledged word am true. I shall not fail that rendezvous...

[Troyker]

I personally preffered the first 2 campaigns the third as said above was to bright & those boring deserts was slightly let down by the whole Azura angle was like a wtf moment in a bad way & it did nt seem as if what they were doing was all that important which the first 2 games did so well, RAAMs shadow by far the best part of the story from the third game in my opinion there was no gritty feeling to the campaign what so ever but meh MP is what it is for now

[DaRkNeSs]

My thoughts exactly. Gears 2 pulled off the synthesis quite well I think, but gears 1 really got the feel perfect (and I rarely compliment gears 1).

Well I'm actually playing Gears 1 campaign now (hoping to spend my time waiting for DLC 4 announcement by rattling through the campaigns) and you are right. Gears 1 had that perfect balance; even sunny areas in Gears 1 had that horror taint.

[The Doctor]

I'm gonna be honest. I was terrified of Gears 1. Lambent wretches jumping out at me, bodies hanging from the ceiling, it all just freaked me out.

Gears 2 was less scary, less "oh ****" moments.

Gears 3 wasn't scary at all. Even the Leviathan underwater wasn't scary.

[The Dude]

I wouldn't exactly call Gears 1 a horror. Nothing about it was particularly scary. But it was a grimdark game that did unnerve you, especially some of the bloody scenes like Rojas' mangled corpse or that bloody chamber with the wretches in the Imulsion facility where the stranded hides in side room. Some of the things Gears 1 did with its cinematics worked too: the quick flashes, the focus on gore, rapid changes of camera angle and the screaming. It all worked. Not enough to make it a horror, but enough to make you understand that you were in a really ****ed up place fighting a really ****ed up enemy.

But it all changed, very true. Gears 3 had some writing issues of itself and that's because, at the end, writing a novel and writing a game campaign are two different things and Traviss did not take this into account (enough). Overall I have to admit though that 2011 and 2012 have been a fairly disappointing year for writing in video games. Mass Effect 3 is about to let us down bigtime aswell, and at this point I'm seriously starting to think that the award for best written storyline with the most logical followups and the least amount of plotholes is gonna go to Bulletstorm. Not because the story and setting was so bloody amazing, but at least it was original and not riddled with forced emotion (like exploding kids), plotholes and deus ex machinas.

[DaRkNeSs]

I wouldn't exactly call Gears 1 a horror. Nothing about it was particularly scary. But it was a grimdark game that did unnerve you, especially some of the bloody scenes like Rojas' mangled corpse or that bloody chamber with the wretches in the Imulsion facility where the stranded hides in side room. Some of the things Gears 1 did with its cinematics worked too: the quick flashes, the focus on gore, rapid changes of camera angle and the screaming. It all worked. Not enough to make it a horror, but enough to make you understand that you were in a really ****ed up place fighting a really ****ed up enemy.

But it all changed, very true. Gears 3 had some writing issues of itself and that's because, at the end, writing a novel and writing a game campaign are two different things and Traviss did not take this into account (enough). Overall I have to admit though that 2011 and 2012 have been a fairly disappointing year for writing in video games. Mass Effect 3 is about to let us down bigtime aswell, and at this point I'm seriously starting to think that the award for best written storyline with the most logical followups and the least amount of plotholes is gonna go to Bulletstorm. Not because the story and setting was so bloody amazing, but at least it was original and not riddled with forced emotion (like exploding kids), plotholes and deus ex machinas.

Completely agree with you, you hit the nail on the head. Gears 1 was about being in a ****ed up war with a ****ed up enemy. I've just been playing it and the bit in the Lithia Imulsion facility where there's corpses all over the floor and blood all on the walls and the camera changes angles and flashes manically is just awesome. Gears 3 lacks some of these things, as well as something else I noticed. Character speech. In Gears 1 there's loads of sarcastic comments (Baird especially) and there's one bit of dialogue like this

Dom: You know it's bad enough fighting these things in broad daylight, but underground, at night?
Marcus: Yeah, but don't tell Baird that, he's scared ****less as it is

The tone of voice used in this particular dialogue is just lacking in Gears 3 too. I blame that on Travis...

[The Dude]

Well I'm not completely sure if you can blame voice actor performance on Traviss since a stellar voice actor can make even a ****ty line sound amazing (which is why ME gets away with so much atrocious dialogue). The thing is that, and this is something that plagues all sequels and all series, creators start to consider their own creations objectively. The first installment of a series is always the product of inspiration and passion, and whether or not that inspiration resulted in anything that actually works is something you find out through how its received by the audience.

What you get for a sequel is that the first part is considered analytically. Its creators go over what worked and what did not work and start taking from that the things that triggered people's buttons. The inevitable result is a product designed to trigger buttons and thus feels less genuine, while the first installment was by definition designed to represent a more artistic vision, and pushed people's buttons as a result of that. So in Gears 3 you're looking at some very evident examples of this:

1) Dom's death is executed the way it is because people noticed that the Maria cutscene struck chords. And so we get another Maria cutscene, and then a death sequence that doesn't even have a logical place in the story because all the focus went into style rather than substance. You see George Lucas do this a lot aswell in his Star Wars prequels: he does all these things that people liked in the original trilogy, but in the prequels they just feel like hollow copies. Now I'm not saying that Dom's death was hollow in the same way, but it was pretty evident that the whole sequence had been carefully engineered to yield a maximum amount of tears, whereas in Gears 2 the way he had to end Maria was the logical result of how the plot carried itself out.

2) People missed berserkers in Gears 2, so in Gears 3 we get our berserker sequence. If you ask me, the berserker in Raam's Shadow worked better because that was actually a naturally occuring one, like in Gears 1. The idea of being trapped in a small chamber with a rampaging beast is scarier than knowing that you have an infinity of space to roll and duck. Traviss did not know what it was that made Berserkers work in the first game, and so we got one in form but not in spirit. Truthfully, I was just wondering the entire time how a complete berserker managed to spawn from a stalk sac, but then the same is true for Gunkers.

3) The entire New Hope facility in Gears 2 was intended to be a throwback to the Imulsion facility in Gears 1, except I was never scared. In Gears 1, the Imulsion facility had a natural place in the storyline and it fit the theme of the game. In Gears 2 you're plowing through pretty underground tunnels, killing a GIANT WORM, and then suddenly here's a tank now go do the scary facility bit. It was so evident from its execution that the devs had insisted for there to be a scary facility level rather, and particularly the way in which Gears 3 answered none of the questions raised in New Hope makes you understand that the plot had never called for any of that level to happen. It was a shoehorned addition because of an analysis of the response to Gears 1.

Unfortunately this happens to all games, and I think that as gaming will continue to grow and writers will get better at their jobs we'll see less of this.

[Hooded Claw 006]

Well I'm not completely sure if you can blame voice actor performance on Traviss since a stellar voice actor can make even a ****ty line sound amazing (which is why ME gets away with so much atrocious dialogue). The thing is that, and this is something that plagues all sequels and all series, creators start to consider their own creations objectively. The first installment of a series is always the product of inspiration and passion, and whether or not that inspiration resulted in anything that actually works is something you find out through how its received by the audience.

What you get for a sequel is that the first part is considered analytically. Its creators go over what worked and what did not work and start taking from that the things that triggered people's buttons. The inevitable result is a product designed to trigger buttons and thus feels less genuine, while the first installment was by definition designed to represent a more artistic vision, and pushed people's buttons as a result of that. So in Gears 3 you're looking at some very evident examples of this:

1) Dom's death is executed the way it is because people noticed that the Maria cutscene struck chords. And so we get another Maria cutscene, and then a death sequence that doesn't even have a logical place in the story because all the focus went into style rather than substance. You see George Lucas do this a lot aswell in his Star Wars prequels: he does all these things that people liked in the original trilogy, but in the prequels they just feel like hollow copies. Now I'm not saying that Dom's death was hollow in the same way, but it was pretty evident that the whole sequence had been carefully engineered to yield a maximum amount of tears, whereas in Gears 2 the way he had to end Maria was the logical result of how the plot carried itself out.

2) People missed berserkers in Gears 2, so in Gears 3 we get our berserker sequence. If you ask me, the berserker in Raam's Shadow worked better because that was actually a naturally occuring one, like in Gears 1. The idea of being trapped in a small chamber with a rampaging beast is scarier than knowing that you have an infinity of space to roll and duck. Traviss did not know what it was that made Berserkers work in the first game, and so we got one in form but not in spirit. Truthfully, I was just wondering the entire time how a complete berserker managed to spawn from a stalk sac, but then the same is true for Gunkers.

3) The entire New Hope facility in Gears 2 was intended to be a throwback to the Imulsion facility in Gears 1, except I was never scared. In Gears 1, the Imulsion facility had a natural place in the storyline and it fit the theme of the game. In Gears 2 you're plowing through pretty underground tunnels, killing a GIANT WORM, and then suddenly here's a tank now go do the scary facility bit. It was so evident from its execution that the devs had insisted for there to be a scary facility level rather, and particularly the way in which Gears 3 answered none of the questions raised in New Hope makes you understand that the plot had never called for any of that level to happen. It was a shoehorned addition because of an analysis of the response to Gears 1.

Unfortunately this happens to all games, and I think that as gaming will continue to grow and writers will get better at their jobs we'll see less of this.

Travis wrote what would happen storywise, she would have just given a basic plot, the whole thing when you go on about Berserkers is the work of EPIC, it's virtually the same as if me and you made a game, I gave you a plot line and said stick to that plot, but you can do whatever you want with the rest of the game. I don't think Travis was responsible for in-game content like the appearance of Berserkers.
However I agree the death of Dom was far too predictable, personally I would have done something completely unpredictable, like Marcus dies and you continue as Dom or something like that. I enjoyed the New Hope facility level, it had the same dark atmosphere as Gears 1, but as you have been discussing, Gears 3 has no dark, depressing atmosphere, unless you include Raam's Shadow and possibly Char.

[SNiPaZoR]

I've just said this in another thread haha:

Gears 1 - Horror Shooter, Gears 2 - Horror/Sci-Fi Shooter, Gears 3 - Sci-Fi Shooter.

Don't get me wrong, Gears 3 is a good game but it's too modern for Gears of War. Too sunny, too positive, too bright and it runs with a Sci-Fi theme rather than the horror origins that made Gears 1 and 2 a brilliant game. Hell even the gore that used to be in Gears 1 and 2 (chunks of flesh, kicking bodies) is gone in Gears 3. I feel your pain, I was constantly looking for a moment in the Gears 3 campaign where I was actually scared (Gears 1 had the Berserker, the Kryll, the Wretches, the train and RAAM. Gears 2 had the New Hope facility [even the name creeps me out]) but the closest I got too being scared in the Gears 3 campaign was...erm...erm.....

I feel the same way 100% because before Gears 3 was released I went back to Gears 1 to help a friend finish the Campaign and I was still creeped out at some parts even though I knew how the story played out and knew when things were going to happen. Now I really like how Gears 3 looks, but I can understand how they drifted from their origins because, like you said, Gears 1/2 were dark while Gears 3 is bright.

[DaRkNeSs]

Well I'm not completely sure if you can blame voice actor performance on Traviss since a stellar voice actor can make even a ****ty line sound amazing (which is why ME gets away with so much atrocious dialogue). The thing is that, and this is something that plagues all sequels and all series, creators start to consider their own creations objectively. The first installment of a series is always the product of inspiration and passion, and whether or not that inspiration resulted in anything that actually works is something you find out through how its received by the audience.

What you get for a sequel is that the first part is considered analytically. Its creators go over what worked and what did not work and start taking from that the things that triggered people's buttons. The inevitable result is a product designed to trigger buttons and thus feels less genuine, while the first installment was by definition designed to represent a more artistic vision, and pushed people's buttons as a result of that. So in Gears 3 you're looking at some very evident examples of this:

1) Dom's death is executed the way it is because people noticed that the Maria cutscene struck chords. And so we get another Maria cutscene, and then a death sequence that doesn't even have a logical place in the story because all the focus went into style rather than substance. You see George Lucas do this a lot aswell in his Star Wars prequels: he does all these things that people liked in the original trilogy, but in the prequels they just feel like hollow copies. Now I'm not saying that Dom's death was hollow in the same way, but it was pretty evident that the whole sequence had been carefully engineered to yield a maximum amount of tears, whereas in Gears 2 the way he had to end Maria was the logical result of how the plot carried itself out.

2) People missed berserkers in Gears 2, so in Gears 3 we get our berserker sequence. If you ask me, the berserker in Raam's Shadow worked better because that was actually a naturally occuring one, like in Gears 1. The idea of being trapped in a small chamber with a rampaging beast is scarier than knowing that you have an infinity of space to roll and duck. Traviss did not know what it was that made Berserkers work in the first game, and so we got one in form but not in spirit. Truthfully, I was just wondering the entire time how a complete berserker managed to spawn from a stalk sac, but then the same is true for Gunkers.

3) The entire New Hope facility in Gears 2 was intended to be a throwback to the Imulsion facility in Gears 1, except I was never scared. In Gears 1, the Imulsion facility had a natural place in the storyline and it fit the theme of the game. In Gears 2 you're plowing through pretty underground tunnels, killing a GIANT WORM, and then suddenly here's a tank now go do the scary facility bit. It was so evident from its execution that the devs had insisted for there to be a scary facility level rather, and particularly the way in which Gears 3 answered none of the questions raised in New Hope makes you understand that the plot had never called for any of that level to happen. It was a shoehorned addition because of an analysis of the response to Gears 1.

Unfortunately this happens to all games, and I think that as gaming will continue to grow and writers will get better at their jobs we'll see less of this.

1) Dom's death was completely random and unnecessary. All he had to do was get everyone back in the vehicle and drive off, but no he crashes the ***** instead. Why?
2) That is what makes Berserkers scary. There's a fair few times on Gears 1 (today) that I've tried to jump away from a Berserker and met a wall, yet on Gears 3 most Berserker sequences are in the open. Also what happened to the HOD? It used to have to have an aligned satellite, now you can just fire it anywhere outside? Then it runs out of ammo? What?
3) Completely agree. It was like "Oh no we fell into a worm, lets chainsaw our way out of it and go to a random factory". Yeah why not...

[Valafar123]

Well I'm actually playing Gears 1 campaign now (hoping to spend my time waiting for DLC 4 announcement by rattling through the campaigns) and you are right. Gears 1 had that perfect balance; even sunny areas in Gears 1 had that horror taint.

There was light, but it wasn't vibrant. It was sort of hazy and dim giving a real ominous and melancholic feel.

@factory comment: that still scares the **** out of me.

One of the mistakes EPIC made in GoW2 and 3 is that they allowed us to sympathize with the locust. We go from fighting bloodthirsty monsters to fighting a bunch of scaly guys that really just want to get along. :/

[mach1545]

There was light, but it wasn't vibrant. It was sort of hazy and dim giving a real ominous and melancholic feel.

@factory comment: that still scares the **** out of me.

One of the mistakes EPIC made in GoW2 and 3 is that they allowed us to sympathize with the locust. We go from fighting bloodthirsty monsters to fighting a bunch of scaly guys that really just want to get along. :/

That's how I feel.

Gears of War 1 had me thinking "Woah, gotta kill all these mother****in' boogeymen scarin' the crap outta me!"

In Gears of War 3, I was almost rooting for the Locust. I was more upset that they got wiped out than I was upset that Adam Fenix died. :/

[Rattlecat23]

The scheme of things felt huge in gears 1 and especially 2. It wasn't just the story of Marcus and Delta, it was the struggle of humanity against shocking odds. Coupled with that melancholic, gloomy aesthetic and feel, it really made for a great game. It had depth.

That's why I didn't really like the Gears 3 campaign. It was too personal and seemed like we spent the entire time listening to Marcus' daddy issues as opposed to fighting a war for survival. The game lacked presence. When I play the first two campaigns, I can still feel the presence of the locust looming over me. Empty buildings had clear signs of struggle. Even the gentle falling of ash in the sky reminds me of the hammer strikes, making me feel insignificant compared to the world around me.

I rather enjoyed RAAM's shadow. It brought back a lot of memories and reminded me of what gears 3 lacked. RS still had the personal level of things, but the greater scheme of things never leaves your sight.

I completly agree with everything you said. I think RAAM's Shadow was far superior to the main campaign. The set piece battles a far more memorable. The Gears 3 campaign seemed to go down a path i didn't expect, nor did i care about it. It felt too Hollywood compared to the cult classic feel of the previous 2 campaigns. I just hope that someday i will get to replay the previous campaigns in arcade mode as that is the main reason i have replayed the Gears 3 campaign a few times, not because it's so good.