Gears 5 Catch-All

mrlogical wrote:

Is there an obvious difference between the Lancer and the Retro Lancer? I'm always a little puzzled about what to do when carrying a lancer and seeing a retro model on the ground...I prefer to keep one of my weapons a lancer, and generally am inclined to keep whichever I will have the most ammo for (at least, I think they use different ammo, even though that doesn't really make sense).

I have a couple of story questions about the end of Act 1 and early in Act 2:

Spoiler:

Late in Act 1, when Fahz reveals to Del that JD was responsible for a civilian massacre due to him overreacting to some mob violence, a)is that something that happened in Gears 4? and/or is it something the player is supposed to have known already? b)is that a reference to the events that are the subject of that memorial you come across in act 1? c)or, is he actually saying JD is responsible for some of the massacre that you have just discovered, in the theater? (I don't see how that could be the case, but maybe I missed something that would make that work).

Similarly, in the first few chapters of Act 2, after JD shows up to help Kait and Del, and some time has passed and JD has a shaved head and I think a prosthetic arm, is that supposed to be the first time they're all seeing each other again since the end of Act 1 when the Hammer of Dawn gets out of control? The initial scene played like that to me, but Kait and Del have some subsequent conversations about how JD has changed and him being buddies with Fahz now, and I'm not sure whether that's supposed to be all based on the same 2-3 minutes that we just saw or if it's understood that they've all been working together again for a little bit.

Finally, at this point, mid-Act 2, what exactly do we know about Kait's connection to the locust? I think I've heard that the reveal from Gears 4 was that Kait's grandmother was a locust? Or is it that her grandmother had a baby with a locust? (And was that, like, a science experiment, I assume, and not some sort of unusual romantic situation?) Having just seen the scene where Kait discovers children who were experimented on with locust-y stuff, I certainly have my suspicions about other ways in which Kait may have been involved in this stuff, but I'm not sure what I should already know had I played Gears 4 and/or just paid better attention to the story thus far.

Have you seen the Relic guns? Those are even harder to distinguish between them and the basic gun. For the Lancer/Retro Lancer it's mostly the matter of no chainsaw. I'm pretty sure the Retro Lancer does a little more damage per bullet, but it is less accurate in general. I know that I prefer the Lancer and my son prefers the Retro Lancer - he also likes to charge into enemies with that bayonet, though.

Spoiler:

We're left to fill in the blanks on what happened with JD after the end of Act 1, and that seems to be happening through Kait and Del's conversations through Act 2 (that's as far in as I am right now). For the civilian thing, I don't remember anything about it from Gears 4, so I suspect that is backstory, too.

I don't think it's been confirmed that Kait's grandmother was a Locus Queen, but I'm pretty sure that's the case.

Never really dug into any Gears games beyond an hour here or there, but being that Gears5 turned up free, I’m giving it a shot.

I think I’m starting to bounce off it.

The narrative feels like I’ve just tuned into a telenovela in it’s 23rd season, and have no idea who anyone is or why they’re doing the things they’re doing, but they sure are doing them with a whole lotta bombast….

The combat feels….fine, I guess? I’m playing on Intermediate, and even on that easy setting in the first act, basic mobs still feel super bullet-spongey (as does the player character), and pretty ducking fumb in terms of AI.

I haven’t dug into any mode other than campaign, yet.

What should I do? Does the game feel radically different with the difficulty turned up? Dig into a particular MP mode?

Jonman wrote:

I haven’t dug into any mode other than campaign, yet.

What should I do? Does the game feel radically different with the difficulty turned up? Dig into a particular MP mode?

The story definitely expects you to know at least the story from Gears 4 if not more.

I'd recommend trying the Horde and/or Escape co-op modes before giving up on it.
Escape is pretty quick 3 person co-op that I've been really digging as it has the tension of needing to always be moving forward.
Horde is 5 player and to get through all 50 waves you better plan on at least a couple hours, but I enjoy it when I have that link. Starts off pretty simple but by the end you're going to have to really work as a group to survive.

I think the key difference is their secondary abilities. The regular lancer has the chainsaw, the GL has a sort of missile launcher, and the retro has a charging bayonet attack. Other than that I think they're very similar in damage, clip size, etc...

Answers to your story questions for Act 1 and Act 2 (and a little bit of Gears 4):

Spoiler:

He's referencing something that happened in the past that they've talked about a few times but you never actively saw happen. Before they met, he was a soldier in the COG while she was an Outcast. This happened during that time.

I don't think it's the first time they've seen each other since, but it's clear they've grown apart and some time has passed since the opening act. That's how I took it at least. I think you're supposed to understand that they had a falling out over his involvement in the massacre and basically went their separate ways.

Really the only thing they reveal in Gears 4 is that Kait's grandmother was the locust queen from the earlier games. It's unclear up until then how deep those ties go. I'm not sure precisely where you are in Act 2 so i don't want to reveal too much.

I personally think Gears 4 was good and worth playing through before this one, but if you don't then the recap will do the job for the most part. There's nothing major you're missing story-wise outside of that.

Thanks for the clarification. As is often the case, I think just knowing that there's other stuff I haven't played in the series makes it too easy for me to over-complicate things as I imagine what I might have learned in the other games.

I played another round of Escape last night, but glitched out after about 15 minutes, which was disappointing. I kinda like the idea of that mode, although my biggest problem is with the scarcity of weapons and ammo, particularly since, at least in every round I have played, my rando teammates always snatch all the weapons and ammo before I have a chance to, it's frustrating.

I also played more Horde mode and thought that was pretty fun. The first time I played it, sometime last week, I was in a map that was like a dusty town. The fabricator would only let me make extremely limited fortifications (I think just the spike strip and maybe a decoy?), but I could also buy stat bonuses (extra damage, extra health, etc.). So I was surprised when, last night, playing in a very different map (it looked kinda like a museum?), I had a much wider range of fortifications available (turrets and weapons lockers among other things), but no ability to buy stat bonuses. And actually, as I write this, the explanation has occurred to me--is this character-based, rather than map based? Because my first round I was Marcus, and this time I was Del. Anyway, I liked mounting, healing, and upgrading my turrets.

Is there a way to join horde sessions in progress, at least other than joining a friend's game? In my two play sessions, most or all of the randos I've been playing with have dropped by about Round 20. I'm curious to see how it develops from there, but don't want to stick through it myself (the AI helpers seem terrible). Maybe I just need to join the GWJ Gears and Beers crew.

jigsawhc wrote:
Jonman wrote:

I haven’t dug into any mode other than campaign, yet.

What should I do? Does the game feel radically different with the difficulty turned up? Dig into a particular MP mode?

The story definitely expects you to know at least the story from Gears 4 if not more.

I don't know, I never played any of the Gears games and I have no problems following the story in 5 after watching that recap thing in the beginning.

Jonman, have you finished Act 1? The game's flow changes drastically when Act 2 starts, I personally don't like it when games have such a long prolog before changing everything.

Shooting and sponginess won't change though, I guess it's a classic cover-based shooter approach.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/wT5HR7r.jpg)

Just finished it. I thoroughly enjoyed it, great game!

Completed Act 2 over the weekend. Still enjoying it. The boss fight at the end of Act 2 made me more convinced of the correctness of my decision to play on the easy difficulty mode. The boss fight still presented some amount of challenge (I died once) but once I figured out the best approach, I was able to execute it and move on.

I've also been playing a fair bit of Horde mode, which I really like, although there are things I continue to be confused by. I don't understand anything about what the power taps are and how they work, and clearly it's a roll of the dice in terms of whether your teammates do or not--I had one fairly long play session where neither me nor my teammates ever figured out how to get the tap to spawn (or more like never understood that was a thing we needed to do) while in a later session (one I figured out how to join at Wave 20, answering a question I'd had previously), the crew I was playing with obviously understood how it worked, as we ended up with 5 or so of the taps going. I'm also confused about how building works, how some of the powers work, etc., etc., etc. My ignorance makes me feel insecure when I, at level 11 or so, often find myself in groups where everyone else is like level 30+ and presumably knows what they're doing, so I worry I'm inadvertently screwing up, putting turrets in the wrong place or wasting resources or whatever else. But I like the mode, and I think I will do some reading and/or youtube watching to try to get a better feel for how it works.

I’m curious but is anyone playing this? It seems like this one died off with barely a whimper. Feedback has been pretty mixed but I get a very definite meh vibe about this game. Maybe the franchise has just gotten too long in the tooth.

I guess the cool thing is that with Game Pass, Microsoft doesn’t really need to have Spiderman level hits. Kind of like Netflix they just need lots of content to keep people subscribed.

The cool thing is it will be sitting in my library for whenever I get to it and I don’t have the pressure of having paid $60 to make me feel obligated to play it!

I really enjoy it and it looks great.

Docjoe wrote:

I’m curious but is anyone playing this? It seems like this one died off with barely a whimper. Feedback has been pretty mixed but I get a very definite meh vibe about this game. Maybe the franchise has just gotten too long in the tooth.

I guess the cool thing is that with Game Pass, Microsoft doesn’t really need to have Spiderman level hits. Kind of like Netflix they just need lots of content to keep people subscribed.

The cool thing is it will be sitting in my library for whenever I get to it and I don’t have the pressure of having paid $60 to make me feel obligated to play it!

I don't think it's dead at all. I've been playing a fair amount of multiplayer and I never have any problem getting matches. Hoarde and Escape are quite active as well.

Docjoe wrote:

I’m curious but is anyone playing this? It seems like this one died off with barely a whimper.

It probably seems this way because the game, while pretty good and very much alive, doesn't really have any controversies to spark discussions. It's a solid game with no major bugs, no major inventions, no loot boxes, doesn't step on any political toes.

It's just a very solid and pretty fun game, what's there to talk about.

I played multiplayer twice and I stunk. Also, I enjoy the whole "battle pass /Rocket pass" thing, and daily/weekly challenges, but it scares me in a game I want to play casually. It's a turnoff because it activates my FOMO and since I'm playing it casually, I know I'll be MO!

Right now I'm trying to keep up with Apex Legends' battle pass (I maxed the first two) and Destiny, and it's a lot. Next Tuesday brings Apex's and Rocket League's Halloween events as well as Destiny's Iron Banner. I need more time!