Launching that on PC first/ only is a weird decision that might bite them. The console audience for Gears is much larger than any PC audience that might exist.
You say that but strategy type games always do better on PC. That's a mistake the Halo Wars series made, not having a PC version is preposterous for an RTS.
Do they have sales released for Wars and Wars 2? It seems very possible that that particular series does better on console.
The first Halo Wars did really well, but I would say on the back of the bundled in Halo 3 DLC at the time. There were a number of other RTS released on 360 such as the C&C series and Battle for Middle Earth, but Halo Wars 1 was far and away the most successful entry. And it didn't have a PC version.
They fixed that with Halo Wars 2, which was the first play anywhere title and had crossplay, the whole nine yards. But I don't think the second one did nearly as good as the first, mostly because the history of the franchise and how Microsoft dismantled Ensemble after the first Halo Wars.
That's my point though. Strategy spinoffs of longtime console series have a somewhat niche audience. Cutting out all the fans of the series you're spinning off from their original platform of choice is... not smart imo. Tactics on PC will appeal to 1) fans of the console series who also happen to own a good PC (this is where I slot in), 2) PC fans of the series who haven't minded much of the series still not being ported, and 3) people who like XCOM style games a lot. Does #3 make up for losing the largest Gears fanbase in the world (fans of the series on Xbox who only play games on Xbox)?
There are a huge number of Halo fans on PC. Why do you think it was such a huge deal MCC was coming to PC? Halo 1 and 2 cultivated a huge mod scene and seperate community to the console one. And again missing my point, RTS's live and die by their competitive scene, and I imagine the idea with bringing in Ensemble and trying to make it a legit RTS, the idea was for it to succeed on more of a StarCraft level.
Idk I don't think the average Gears fan actually gives a fudge about Tactics, since it's more aimed at scratching the Xcom itch with a more violent flair. Much like the average Halo fan doesn't care about Wars.
The amount of Gears fans who are Xbox only and would be willing to make the jump from a stop-and-pop third person shooter with a heavy multiplayer focus, to a singleplayer only turn based strategy game, is proabbly smaller than existing TBS strategy fans who'd be willing to try a new game in that genre.
Also, it's not like it's not going to come out at all on Xbox. They just focused on the PC first because that's where the fans of the genre they're making live. Consider that while the X-Com reboot was multiplatform at launch, the sequel was PC first.
So with the new characters its good to see they cut the xp requirement in half, but I'd have preferred they dumped that completely and just required specific goals to unlock them.
There are a huge number of Halo fans on PC. Why do you think it was such a huge deal MCC was coming to PC? Halo 1 and 2 cultivated a huge mod scene and seperate community to the console one. And again missing my point, RTS's live and die by their competitive scene, and I imagine the idea with bringing in Ensemble and trying to make it a legit RTS, the idea was for it to succeed on more of a StarCraft level.
Idk I don't think the average Gears fan actually gives a fudge about Tactics, since it's more aimed at scratching the Xcom itch with a more violent flair. Much like the average Halo fan doesn't care about Wars.
Gears Tactics isn't an RTS and I think Ensemble was joking if they ever thought Wars would be a huge competitive success. Which I don't think they did at all. The focus was clearly on the campaign, that's where all the marketing went. Wars 2 focused on maybe being an esport, but flopped because even PC RTS games aren't the biggest esports anymore. Not by a long shot.
My brother is a much bigger fan of Gears than I am (he played 3 and 5 competitively for months at a time) and he was THRILLED by this trailer, which apparently came as news to him. So I dunno, don't count it out.
I don't think Ensemble thought that, it's that Microsoft bought them and made them make a game in the vein of StarCraft, with co-op modes and ranked ladders... But also not making a PC version for the first release. It's wild to me, but the mid 00's was a wild time for Microsoft. I bring that up because it's a very similar situation, taking a well-known first party property and shoving the theme onto another style of game. And while I love Halo Wars it's just a memorable footnote of that franchise's history. There's not a lot of crossover between FPS and RTS fans, and I don't think there's a lot of Third Person shooter fans who also line up eagerly for turn-based tactical games like Xcom, which was bred on PC and grew to include console versions over time. I would say the Xcom "community" is centered around PC but then again I could be mistaken.
I'm not counting anything out, but I'm not predicting a sales juggernaut either. It's just another good addition to the Game Pass lineup, and that's always a good thing.
I don't think Ensemble thought that, it's that Microsoft bought them and made them make a game in the vein of StarCraft, with co-op modes and ranked ladders... But also not making a PC version for the first release. It's wild to me, but the mid 00's was a wild time for Microsoft. I bring that up because it's a very similar situation, taking a well-known first party property and shoving the theme onto another style of game. And while I love Halo Wars it's just a memorable footnote of that franchise's history. There's not a lot of crossover between FPS and RTS fans, and I don't think there's a lot of Third Person shooter fans who also line up eagerly for turn-based tactical games like Xcom, which was bred on PC and grew to include console versions over time. I would say the Xcom "community" is centered around PC but then again I could be mistaken.
I'm not counting anything out, but I'm not predicting a sales juggernaut either. It's just another good addition to the Game Pass lineup, and that's always a good thing.
Oh XCOM games are extremely PC focused, but it turns out console people like these games too. The decision to not port 2 right away disappointed some vocal people, and they did port it eventually. Even Civilization Revolution was apparently successful, so the idea that console people ONLY like action games should just go away. Just make sure the game can be played well on console, is all. I imagine it's a mix of resource management and making sure the console version runs properly that is having them launch this way. If the PC version launches kind of buggy... PC games are allowed to get away with this more so than console games are. Phoenix Point dropped in a laughable state, which I mention since it's the similar genre.
For what it's worth, I loved Halo Wars and thought it was a much better game than its sequel. I don't know how to make this statement relevant to the Gears of War thread, but I just wanted to call out how much I enjoyed Halo Wars.
Regarding Gears Tactics, I'd love to play it, but it's not on console and I don't have a PC that can run it.
A little half XCom game and Gears Tactics? Don't mind if I do! Aside from the obvious April is starting to look up! I have both games preordered and Gears is preloading
For what it's worth, I loved Halo Wars and thought it was a much better game than its sequel. I don't know how to make this statement relevant to the Gears of War thread, but I just wanted to call out how much I enjoyed Halo Wars.
Regarding Gears Tactics, I'd love to play it, but it's not on console and I don't have a PC that can run it.
Halo Wars 2 is a great game that I need to finish. But that doesn't mean Halo Wars isn't also good--I think the first game is a bit more robust as a singleplayer experience (maybe it's just down to it being quite unique at the time), whereas HW2 is, of course, graphically more impressive and I feel as tighter controls on console.
Sorry, I suppose this wasn't really relevant to the discussion either. I own the complete collection of XCOM 2 on PC, but for some reason it's never quite clicked with me. I'm hoping the Gears of War setting, a greater abundance of familiar faces and places, does a better job luring me in.
To give you an idea of how much I, the resident Gears head, fell off of Gears 5, apparently the Coalition teased what might be campaign DLC.
Over a month ago.
Apparently during a GDC replacement Microsoft game stack there's a brief snippet of a cutscene involving the 3 hivebusters in a location that doesn't look like any current hives. Now, this could just be a new pre-Hive cutscene, or it could be something more.
But the fact that I didn't even know about this until stumbling upon it today says a lot, I think.
To give you an idea of how much I, the resident Gears head, fell off of Gears 5, apparently the Coalition teased what might be campaign DLC.
Over a month ago.
Apparently during a GDC replacement Microsoft game stack there's a brief snippet of a cutscene involving the 3 hivebusters in a location that doesn't look like any current hives. Now, this could just be a new pre-Hive cutscene, or it could be something more.
But the fact that I didn't even know about this until stumbling upon it today says a lot, I think.
It occurs to me that I literally never tried the Hivebusting mode even once. I'll need to at least give it a shot at some point...
To give you an idea of how much I, the resident Gears head, fell off of Gears 5, apparently the Coalition teased what might be campaign DLC.
Over a month ago.
Apparently during a GDC replacement Microsoft game stack there's a brief snippet of a cutscene involving the 3 hivebusters in a location that doesn't look like any current hives. Now, this could just be a new pre-Hive cutscene, or it could be something more.
But the fact that I didn't even know about this until stumbling upon it today says a lot, I think.
It occurs to me that I literally never tried the Hivebusting mode even once. I'll need to at least give it a shot at some point...
It was heavily dependant on getting a good group of people. A bad PUG could ruin that game, as would people who quit after minor setbacks.
+1
BRIAN BLESSEDMaybe you aren't SPEAKING LOUDLY ENOUGHHHRegistered Userregular
edited April 2020
I got back into bustin' Hives with a buddy, and even with a rando 3rd pug it was already a much easier time than what I remember it becoming a month or two after launch.
Oh XCOM games are extremely PC focused, but it turns out console people like these games too. The decision to not port 2 right away disappointed some vocal people, and they did port it eventually. Even Civilization Revolution was apparently successful, so the idea that console people ONLY like action games should just go away. Just make sure the game can be played well on console, is all. I imagine it's a mix of resource management and making sure the console version runs properly that is having them launch this way. If the PC version launches kind of buggy... PC games are allowed to get away with this more so than console games are. Phoenix Point dropped in a laughable state, which I mention since it's the similar genre.
Basically most of this
I remember there being a pretty vocal furore over the "PC Exclusivity" of XCOM 2 since they'd made some pretty great-working console versions of their previous games, and from what I can see the vast majority of comments to trailers for Gears Tactics have been "XCOM in the Gears Universe? Sure that makes sense I'm keen" up to "I don't really know much about Gears but I'm big on tactics games and I'll give this a shot"
The intersectional between people who love Gears and people who love tactics games isn't necessarily a non-zero, seems to me that the game itself has found a broad potential audience
I've been playing a shitton of gears lately. Finally unlocked Lizzie, but I've been chain running gridiron and it's great. Really excited for tactics as well.
I had zero idea about the campaign dlc thing though
I got back into bustin' Hives with a buddy, and even with a rando 3rd pug it was already a much easier time than what I remember it becoming a month or two after launch.
Oh XCOM games are extremely PC focused, but it turns out console people like these games too. The decision to not port 2 right away disappointed some vocal people, and they did port it eventually. Even Civilization Revolution was apparently successful, so the idea that console people ONLY like action games should just go away. Just make sure the game can be played well on console, is all. I imagine it's a mix of resource management and making sure the console version runs properly that is having them launch this way. If the PC version launches kind of buggy... PC games are allowed to get away with this more so than console games are. Phoenix Point dropped in a laughable state, which I mention since it's the similar genre.
Basically most of this
I remember there being a pretty vocal furore over the "PC Exclusivity" of XCOM 2 since they'd made some pretty great-working console versions of their previous games, and from what I can see the vast majority of comments to trailers for Gears Tactics have been "XCOM in the Gears Universe? Sure that makes sense I'm keen" up to "I don't really know much about Gears but I'm big on tactics games and I'll give this a shot"
The intersectional between people who love Gears and people who love tactics games isn't necessarily a non-zero, seems to me that the game itself has found a broad potential audience
Also the audience on PC for tactics games is bigger, and kinda starved. Phoenix Point didn’t deliver, and Chimera Squad is getting some mixed reactions.
The more I think about Gears 5, the sadder I am. They took the most interesting thing about Kait a threw it out the window.
You sound like me with the Final Fantasy VII remake.
I'm replaying through Gears 5 as part of a "all collectibles" run. So, yes, relic weapons are a thing (like the Legendary weapons in Halo 5, but with less variety, and some being inferior, while others are very good). I'm starting to wonder how I missed every single one of them on my first playthrough.
The more I think about Gears 5, the sadder I am. They took the most interesting thing about Kait a threw it out the window.
What thing was that?
On another note: The more I play Horde the more I wish they hadn't gutted the ammo and buildables. And the button to buy skills and activate ultimate was just a dumb design, there are other buttons on the controller idiots.
The more I think about Gears 5, the sadder I am. They took the most interesting thing about Kait a threw it out the window.
What thing was that?
On another note: The more I play Horde the more I wish they hadn't gutted the ammo and buildables. And the button to buy skills and activate ultimate was just a dumb design, there are other buttons on the controller idiots.
The more I think about Gears 5, the sadder I am. They took the most interesting thing about Kait a threw it out the window.
What thing was that?
On another note: The more I play Horde the more I wish they hadn't gutted the ammo and buildables. And the button to buy skills and activate ultimate was just a dumb design, there are other buttons on the controller idiots.
Her mental connection with the Swarm
They threw that out of the window (by which I mean they made it a central plot point), and threw a bunch of other things in through the window.
Her best friend/ex boyfriend dead, her mother revived, and they could write a mental connection to the Swarm/her Mom back in with roughly no minutes work.
DF gave a very bullish look at Gears Tactics from a technological standpoint. I'm surprised I didn't even realize it was in the Gears 5 engine (i.e. extremely polished implementation of UE4, at least on consoles).
Definitely went ahead and started the download because why not? I'd rather play it on console, but who knows when that's going to happen, and in the mean time there are obvious advantages to the KBAM setup here. Unfortunately, today the Windows Store is rather slow (maybe related?) compared to the blazing speed I downloaded Subnautica. Downloading it from Steam would probably be faster, but considering I've played about 10 minutes of XCOM 2 since I bought it on Steam I'm a little wary of a purchase.
Why in the fuck is this game 30G's?! What in the hell. . .
EDIT: Just watched the DF video and I guess it's doing some work.
Yeah, between cinematics, voice acting, and Gears of War grade world textures, 30 gigabytes really isn't that much.
XCOM 2 is seventy six gigabytes.
0
FreiA French Prometheus UnboundDeadwoodRegistered Userregular
Fun fact: the white forelock in the main (?) character's hair is a medical condition called poliosis, which can occur on its own harmlessly, or occur as the result of other, more serious conditions. I know because I have a less pronounced streak! But you can't tell anymore because I'm 33 and I have a full head of grey hair. Or, I guess he could have dyed it like that himself if that's fashionable in his time period/world, I don't know.
Also, I love tactics games in this vein but also I've played every Gears since the first one (and liked each one to varying extents), so Gears Tactics is kind of an obvious buy for me, just like Chimera Squad was (which adds some interesting mechanics and is an interesting side project to the main XCOM games, imo). Gears Tactics looks more traditional XCOMish, some stuff added, some stuff replaced to be more Gearsy and etc and, well, I haven't watched a lot of gameplay so I'll just be going in mostly blind.
Gears Tactics is the first Gears game I care about strictly because it's not a "Gears" game. It's a tactics game set in the Gears universe.
I literally only bought XCOM 2 for the modding community. I've known about the franchise for more than 20 years now, ever since the old days of PC Gamer magazine, but the setting has never interested me. The modding community is shockingly capable.
Wow. Good to know Prescott has always been a slimy dick.
I'm liking it so far, but still very early.
While the boxes of equipment you can find on mission really is no different from Advent dropping gear in XCom 2 my initial reaction was "Eww, loot boxes again"
Found what could be an annoying misstep by the developers. They have check points, but don't really let you manually save. You can save and exit or save and quit to main menu, that is it. I discovered this because on Mission 1-2 it crashed to desktop and I'm now having to redo a couple of waves of enemies I cleared already.
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That's my point though. Strategy spinoffs of longtime console series have a somewhat niche audience. Cutting out all the fans of the series you're spinning off from their original platform of choice is... not smart imo. Tactics on PC will appeal to 1) fans of the console series who also happen to own a good PC (this is where I slot in), 2) PC fans of the series who haven't minded much of the series still not being ported, and 3) people who like XCOM style games a lot. Does #3 make up for losing the largest Gears fanbase in the world (fans of the series on Xbox who only play games on Xbox)?
Idk I don't think the average Gears fan actually gives a fudge about Tactics, since it's more aimed at scratching the Xcom itch with a more violent flair. Much like the average Halo fan doesn't care about Wars.
Also, it's not like it's not going to come out at all on Xbox. They just focused on the PC first because that's where the fans of the genre they're making live. Consider that while the X-Com reboot was multiplatform at launch, the sequel was PC first.
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Gears Tactics isn't an RTS and I think Ensemble was joking if they ever thought Wars would be a huge competitive success. Which I don't think they did at all. The focus was clearly on the campaign, that's where all the marketing went. Wars 2 focused on maybe being an esport, but flopped because even PC RTS games aren't the biggest esports anymore. Not by a long shot.
My brother is a much bigger fan of Gears than I am (he played 3 and 5 competitively for months at a time) and he was THRILLED by this trailer, which apparently came as news to him. So I dunno, don't count it out.
I'm not counting anything out, but I'm not predicting a sales juggernaut either. It's just another good addition to the Game Pass lineup, and that's always a good thing.
Oh XCOM games are extremely PC focused, but it turns out console people like these games too. The decision to not port 2 right away disappointed some vocal people, and they did port it eventually. Even Civilization Revolution was apparently successful, so the idea that console people ONLY like action games should just go away. Just make sure the game can be played well on console, is all. I imagine it's a mix of resource management and making sure the console version runs properly that is having them launch this way. If the PC version launches kind of buggy... PC games are allowed to get away with this more so than console games are. Phoenix Point dropped in a laughable state, which I mention since it's the similar genre.
Regarding Gears Tactics, I'd love to play it, but it's not on console and I don't have a PC that can run it.
Halo Wars 2 is a great game that I need to finish. But that doesn't mean Halo Wars isn't also good--I think the first game is a bit more robust as a singleplayer experience (maybe it's just down to it being quite unique at the time), whereas HW2 is, of course, graphically more impressive and I feel as tighter controls on console.
Sorry, I suppose this wasn't really relevant to the discussion either. I own the complete collection of XCOM 2 on PC, but for some reason it's never quite clicked with me. I'm hoping the Gears of War setting, a greater abundance of familiar faces and places, does a better job luring me in.
Over a month ago.
Apparently during a GDC replacement Microsoft game stack there's a brief snippet of a cutscene involving the 3 hivebusters in a location that doesn't look like any current hives. Now, this could just be a new pre-Hive cutscene, or it could be something more.
But the fact that I didn't even know about this until stumbling upon it today says a lot, I think.
It occurs to me that I literally never tried the Hivebusting mode even once. I'll need to at least give it a shot at some point...
It was heavily dependant on getting a good group of people. A bad PUG could ruin that game, as would people who quit after minor setbacks.
Basically most of this
I remember there being a pretty vocal furore over the "PC Exclusivity" of XCOM 2 since they'd made some pretty great-working console versions of their previous games, and from what I can see the vast majority of comments to trailers for Gears Tactics have been "XCOM in the Gears Universe? Sure that makes sense I'm keen" up to "I don't really know much about Gears but I'm big on tactics games and I'll give this a shot"
The intersectional between people who love Gears and people who love tactics games isn't necessarily a non-zero, seems to me that the game itself has found a broad potential audience
I had zero idea about the campaign dlc thing though
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Also the audience on PC for tactics games is bigger, and kinda starved. Phoenix Point didn’t deliver, and Chimera Squad is getting some mixed reactions.
They’ll eat up Gears Tactics.
You sound like me with the Final Fantasy VII remake.
I'm replaying through Gears 5 as part of a "all collectibles" run. So, yes, relic weapons are a thing (like the Legendary weapons in Halo 5, but with less variety, and some being inferior, while others are very good). I'm starting to wonder how I missed every single one of them on my first playthrough.
What thing was that?
On another note: The more I play Horde the more I wish they hadn't gutted the ammo and buildables. And the button to buy skills and activate ultimate was just a dumb design, there are other buttons on the controller idiots.
They threw that out of the window (by which I mean they made it a central plot point), and threw a bunch of other things in through the window.
Definitely went ahead and started the download because why not? I'd rather play it on console, but who knows when that's going to happen, and in the mean time there are obvious advantages to the KBAM setup here. Unfortunately, today the Windows Store is rather slow (maybe related?) compared to the blazing speed I downloaded Subnautica. Downloading it from Steam would probably be faster, but considering I've played about 10 minutes of XCOM 2 since I bought it on Steam I'm a little wary of a purchase.
EDIT: Just watched the DF video and I guess it's doing some work.
Yeah, between cinematics, voice acting, and Gears of War grade world textures, 30 gigabytes really isn't that much.
XCOM 2 is seventy six gigabytes.
Also, I love tactics games in this vein but also I've played every Gears since the first one (and liked each one to varying extents), so Gears Tactics is kind of an obvious buy for me, just like Chimera Squad was (which adds some interesting mechanics and is an interesting side project to the main XCOM games, imo). Gears Tactics looks more traditional XCOMish, some stuff added, some stuff replaced to be more Gearsy and etc and, well, I haven't watched a lot of gameplay so I'll just be going in mostly blind.
To be fair, that's way cooler than just "that specific part of my hair lacks melanin."
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I literally only bought XCOM 2 for the modding community. I've known about the franchise for more than 20 years now, ever since the old days of PC Gamer magazine, but the setting has never interested me. The modding community is shockingly capable.
Hmm...I have a decent but outdated gaming laptop so I'll try and run it on that.
Would play it on my XB1 but it shat the bed like a few months ago and I don't feel like buying a new one or paying for repairs.
The game may have ugly black bars behind subtitles, but that's nothing to do with the engine.
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Cosmetic customisation is never unnecessary.
At least they didn’t lock it behind micro transactions.
I'm liking it so far, but still very early.
While the boxes of equipment you can find on mission really is no different from Advent dropping gear in XCom 2 my initial reaction was "Eww, loot boxes again"
Hopefully crashes will be rare.