Gears of War 2 Experience System Update coming 3/24

[Queasy]

GameSpot

Three months after the second Gears of War 2 map pack was announced, Epic Games has taken the wraps off its successor. The Snowblind Map Pack will arrive on Xbox Live on March 31 bearing four new maps: Grindyard, Under Hill, Courtyard, and a remake of Fuel Depot from the original Gears game. No price has been announced, but the last add-on for the game, December's three-map Combustible Map Pack, cost 800 Microsoft points, or $9.99 in real-world currency.

Though exciting for Horde mode addicts, the Snowblind map pack will be preceded by something far more ambitious. The week prior, Epic will launch its third and most extensive title update, which implements an all-new experience-based ranking system. The old TrueSkill system ranks will become hidden, but will still be used under the hood to "set up the most competitive matches possible."

Under the new system, players will earn experience points for scoring in public matches, advancing all the way to level 100. Upon attaining certain levels, they will be rewarded with the following Xbox achievements: Rookie Gear (level 5), Seasoned Gear (level 15), Battle-Tested Gear (level 25), Battle-Hardened Gear (level 50), and Veteran Gear (level 100). (The last two achievements will also require that players download and achieve feats in the Snowblind Map Pack.) Four other unnamed achievements will be added as part of the update, with a total of 250 GamerScore Points.

In addition to the new experience system--which will only be based on games played post-update--Gear of War 2's Title Update 3 will also feature new auto-balancing features which will swap in bots for players who drop out mid-match. (Those same dropouts will suffer an experience point penalty.) To explain the rest of the update's features--and about Epic's future Gears of War plans--GameSpot spoke with executive producer Rod Fergusson.

click through if you want to read the interview.

 

[Kabob]

Just sold my copy of Gears 2. Any news on if they made it so that "private" matches (or whatever they're called) can have random people join ala Gears 1? I miss the good ol' days of having 6 friends and 2 strangers gaming in the same room and everyone being fine with it, being locked to Pub matches only to fill up your room is ghey.

 

[tatteredpotato]

DP

 

[tatteredpotato]

This is good news, but I haven't played much gears lately since my Xbox RROD'd. Should have the replacement by Sunday though.

 

[RedCOMET]

Did they fix all the glitches to Gears 2 ? or just crank out new maps? Either way, i'll be firing up the projector, receiver and 360 to play this next week. HOpefully they will have some cool new maps for Horde.

 

[tatteredpotato]

Originally posted by: RedCOMET
Did they fix all the glitches to Gears 2 ? or just crank out new maps? Either way, i'll be firing up the projector, receiver and 360 to play this next week. HOpefully they will have some cool new maps for Horde.

This will be the third update for GOW2. The theme of the updates are as follows:

Update 1) Improve Matchmaking Times
Update 2) Fix Exploits
Update 3) (pending) Improve Game Experience

Update 2 was the big one that fixed a lot of big exploits in the game such as:
-Invisible Shield
-Invisible Character
-A lot of crabwalking

Currently the biggest exploit is Standbying which is supposed to be addressed to a certain extent in this upcoming update.

 

[RedCOMET]

Obscure,

Thanks for the info... I really love playing Horde, especially with the GF. And I dabble every now and then with the regular public matches. Its been a while since I've played GW2. When i get home from my 3 weeks hitch of work, i'll be sure to download the new stuff.

 

[erwos]

Ah, good matchmaking systems: people hate them because they tell the truth about your supposed "skillz". Probably moreso in the case of TrueSkill, given how good it is. 🙂

 

[Q]

Hmmm neat

 

[chitwood]

I wish they'd add some sort of rank/achievement for Horde mode.

Something like if you can clear all 50 waves, or 40/50, something like that. Most pub matches cant make it past the late teens, no one ever seems to want to work as a team.

 

[Platypus]

I wish this was right when it shipped.. I've lost all interest in GOW2 by now 🙁

 

[JoPh]

is it bad i have this game and only played horde mode like 10 times and now it collects dust? i really want to coop the single player but i havent got around to it.

 

[Platypus]

Originally posted by: JoPh
is it bad i have this game and only played horde mode like 10 times and now it collects dust? i really want to coop the single player but i havent got around to it.

co-op single player is fun on the hardest setting but only because fighting wave after wave after wave of bad guys is fucking lame after awhile in such a linear fashion. At least on the hardest setting its challenging.

if you want to do it sometime send me a message on live: utkan0s (that's a zero)