Gears of War 5 preview

The latest instalment in this popular series is about to land and the good news is it’s not too late to get started.

With only a short respite between waves, you’ll want to make sure you make every second count in Horde mode. Picture: Supplied

The fifth instalment in the hugely popular Gears of War franchise will be deploying to Xbox One and PC in a few days, with gamers across the globe getting ready to don armour and prepare to face a new threat on the digital battlefield.

Developed by The Coalition and published by Microsoft, Gears 5 focusses on Coalition of Governments (COG) soldier Kait as she searches to uncover her mysterious connection to the enemy race she and her comrades have been fighting as part of a decades-long war.

A group of journalists visited The Coalition’s studios in Vancouver last week, where we were able to get an extensive hands-on preview of both the main campaign as well as the Horde mode, the five-player co-op mode which will be included at launch.

Kait is the main character in Gears 5 as she searches for answers about her past. Picture: Supplied

While this is the fifth game in the main series, the developers have been at pains to stress it has been designed as an accessible experience for newcomers — which sounds like me, since I haven’t played any of the original trilogy and only dabbled with Gears of War 4.

I had no trouble getting into the swing of things in Gears 5 from a gameplay perspective — it was a traditional cover shooter in that regard, enemies were clearly marked as such, and there were a lot of guns — including the iconic Lancer (an assault rifle with a chainsaw for a bayonet).

The levels seemed visually well-designed too; I particularly liked one set in an abandoned airport in a quasi-Middle Eastern region.

One of the noticeable additions to the game are the vast open world areas where Kait and her comrades travel around via a sail-powered land skiff, exploring the region and accessing points of interest and missions. While it’s not a new concept, it is the first time it’s been used in a Gears of War game and certainly helped to give the world a sense of size and scope from what I played.

The maps are much bigger and more vibrant in this latest Gears of War game. Picture: Supplied

Horde mode was a fun challenge as well, giving me and four other journalists the chance to team up, pick a character from the main game (as well as two space marines from the Halo games and Sarah Connor from the Terminator films), and face off against waves of increasingly hard to defeat enemies, with only a 30 second break between waves to rebuild defences, replenish ammunition, and the like.

It was clear from my time with the game that action remained a strong focus in both campaign and horde modes, which was fine with me — the combat was well done, the guns felt suitably effective, and there were no shortage of enemies to unload shipping container-loads of ammunition into either.

There is a renewed focus on the characters, particularly Kait, and I liked the attention to detail animating her facial expressions in the cutscenes to help bring the character to life instead of just being another heavily armed person with a Crossfit membership, trapeziumesque body shape and bulky armour.

A wind-powered skiff is your major mode of transport. Picture: Supplied

Gears 5 is launching globally on September 10, and as with Microsoft’s other first-party titles it will be available free on the Xbox Game Pass subscription service — indeed, gamers with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate will even be able to play it from September 6.

Studio head and creative director Rod Fergusson said he was very excited about the launch and it was hard to believe the game was only a few days away from debuting.

“In a little over two and a half years we’ve created sort of the best Gears in terms of the biggest campaign we’ve ever done, the deepest horde, versus with 11 modes, a new escape mode, a map builder for escape mode — all done in two and a half years, which is kind of crazy,” he said.

“So I’m excited to get it in players hands and I’m just very proud of the team.”

Despite being the fifth main game in the Gears series, Mr Fergusson said it was probably the best place for a newcomer to start.

“I would almost start going backwards. I would play Gears 5 first because the features we’ve developed for welcoming new players; whether that be bootcamp, the ability to play as Jack, the new arcade mode, which is an easier way to play versus for new players.

There’s a lot there to kind of get you ready to play Gears, and then once you get comfortable in Five, then I would go back and play Four so you know what’s really going on. And then go play the original trilogy.

Horde mode pits you against waves of ever-more challenging enemies and is a lot of fun.

Franchise narrative lead Bonnie Jean Mah said the development team were very aware of new players who would be coming in via Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass service, and had provided an overview aspect before a new campaign start to give them a catch up on who was who and what the key conflicts had been.

“Gears of War 4 was all about this brand new enemy emerging, Gears 5 is about what happens next — that enemy is now attacking humanity on a grand scale,” she said.

“It’s all about getting them [new players] engaged in the game play right away, so we’re not going to throw a tonne of story war on them right away.

“It’s more about getting involved in the action in the game play and so much like coming to a movie series, like Mission: Impossible or The Fast and the Furious, if you haven’t seen all the movies before, you [still] get caught up pretty quickly.”

With only a short respite between waves, you’ll want to make sure you make every second count in Horde mode. Picture: Supplied

Based on what I saw, Gears 5 is shaping up well and should be a popular action game among newcomers and returning fans alike when it releases, and I’m looking forward to playing through the full game and seeing how the story develops too.

Royce Wilson travelled to Vancouver as a guest of Microsoft

Continue the conversation on Twitter @RoyceWilsonAU

Originally published as Gears of War 5 preview