As I played Gears of War: Reloaded, I thought to myself: I’ve roadie-run these dirty, broken streets before, in these very same oversized military boots. I go right and down a side street, just as before, to flank some Locust soldiers behind a turret. I kill one with gunfire from my Lancer, then chainsaw the other bastard a moment later. Marcus Fenix roars. Blood sprays everywhere. I’ve done this before, too.
I’m having a fine time playing Gears of War: Reloaded—out now on Xbox, PS5, and PC—but I’m not sure why we’re I’m doing this over again. Again. I start to wonder, as I blast away another Locust soldier with my trusty Gnasher, if this is all Gears of War is now. It makes me sad. Marcus slams behind cover. Time to close the same E-Holes I closed 10 years ago. And 20 years ago.
In 2015, when Xbox as a brand was in a very different place, the company published Gears of War: Ultimate Edition on Xbox One. This was a remastered version of the original 2006 Xbox 360 game. It was a logical, if somewhat boring, way for Xbox to get more games on the Xbox One, something it desperately needed at the time. The plan was simple: Just remaster one of your classics using the PC port as a starting point, and now you have a “new” Xbox game. And Ultimate Edition was a great way to play the original Gears of War, boasting improved visuals, better performance, and a campaign act that was previously only available on PC. It was also fun in 2015 to return to the original Gears of War a decade after it first arrived, while knowing that the franchise was moving forward with Gears of War 4 the following year.
In 2025, Gears of War: Reloaded, a remastered version of Ultimate Edition, arrives at a time when the future of the series is less bright and rooted entirely in nostalgia. Past promises of a bigger universe feel more empty than ever. Now, returning to the first game that started everything nearly 20 years ago feels less like a celebration or homecoming, as it did in 2015, and more like digging up a body, replacing its old chainsaw gun with a shinier one and making it dance one more time.
Let loose the Gears of War
Summarizing Gears of War‘s plot feels about as useful or necessary as explaining Batman’s origin. But sure, let’s do it again. Again.
Somewhere in the galaxy, a planet called Sera was once a thriving world filled with humans. Then the humans found a super-powerful fuel and fought each other for control of it for a long time. Then, creepy monster people living below the surface appeared, started a new war, and killed a lot of folks. That’s right about where Gears of War picks up. Badass soldier and do-rag aficionado Marcus Fenix is in prison for crimes that aren’t fully explained, and his friend and squadmate Dom breaks him out to help fight the Locust and maybe, just maybe, end the whole war. Considering the fact that a few paragraphs back, I mentioned Gears of War 4, you can guess how effective the plan is. Regardless, that’s your main goal in the cover shooter’s campaign: Bring a big light bomb to the Locust and kill them all.
Over the course of Gears of War‘s six- to eight-hour campaign, players are asked to push through plenty of collapsed buildings, creepy caves, dilapidated mansions, and destroyed cities, fighting hundreds of Locust soldiers and monsters. Mainly, this is done by hiding behind cover and shooting enemies who also like to hide behind cover. But there is also a section where you are forced to drive a big truck. It sucks. The parts where you creep around a facility in the dark are much better. But yeah, you mostly take cover and shoot things.
Today, in 2025, this sounds like so many other games. But back in 2006, this was genuinely a unique and fresh take on the shooter. And to Gears of War‘s credit, even two decades later, the combat in this first entry in the franchise still feels heavy, satisfying, and fun. Hopping around cover and poking your head out to pop enemies before leaping over a wall to chainsaw down the final foe is still a genuinely exciting ballet of blood, bullets, and blunt force trauma. And now, in this new remastered remaster, the game runs at 60FPS and at 4K resolution with a host of spiffy new lighting effects.
But unlike Ultimate Edition, which was a massive improvement over the original back in 2015, Reloaded is just a minor upgrade. The improved performance in both campaign and multiplayer, which runs at 120FPS now, is a welcome improvement. Still, when comparing screenshots side-by-side, it’s pretty tricky to spot the differences between Ultimate Edition and Reloaded. And I’m the kind of guy who was excited for the PS5 Pro, which I played Reloaded on. Yet even I can’t find much beyond the improved framerate to praise in this reheated remaster.
Living in the past
Gears of War: Reloaded is also just another reminder that Xbox seems unsure of what to do with a franchise that was once so popular it drove thousands of people to tattoo their bodies forever with the game’s logo. For a time, it seemed like the franchise’s stewards since 2014, The Coalition, had a plan, and the support of Xbox to pull it off.
Gears of War 4 arrived in 2015 to positive reviews, strong sales, and a killer ending tease. In 2019, we got Gears 5, a darker and more experimental entry in the series that offered up some tantalizing open-world segments, expanded on the lore in some big ways, and ended with a gut-punch of a cliffhanger. In 2020, Gears Tactics launched. It was an X-Com-inspired spin-off that felt like Xbox letting the franchise truly expand beyond cover shooters. We even got a short-lived mobile game, Gears Pop, which wasn’t good, but at least showed that Xbox was confident in the series and willing to take swings.
And then…nothing. Gears of War went dormant, and that powerful ending in Gears 5 started to mutate from a hint of an exciting future into a sad reminder of what could have been. Xbox went through a lot of shakeups and layoffs, and the future of Gears of War seemed uncertain. Finally, in June 2024, a new Gears game was announced: Gears of War: E-Day. But it will be a prequel to the original game. Womp womp. An origin story of how Marcus and Dom became best bros. And while I’m happy to get a big new Gears game in 2026, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed. Instead of moving forward, paying off that cliffhanger ending, and committing to something new, The Coalition and Xbox are going backward. A safer, more boring option. Speaking of safe and boring…
So to hold people over while they wait for E-Day next year, Xbox has put out Gears of War: Reloaded. It arrives on Xbox Series X/S, PC, and for the first time ever, on a Sony home console via a PlayStation 5 port. Does this mean E-Day will get a PS5 port, too? Maybe.
Regardless, this is a similar strategy to the one Xbox pulled a decade ago when it released a remastered version of the original Gears of War before moving forward. But this time around, it feels extremely desperate. Sure, some PlayStation owners might be happy to get to play Gears of War for the first time, but so many people have played this game already. A remastered version even! We’ve done this dance before. Xbox is serving up old leftovers and hoping you like it.
And sadly, after this detour down a road we’ve traveled already, we don’t get to move forward. Seemingly like Marcus himself, we’re stuck in a loop. Doomed to linger in one era of the series. The same characters stuck doing the same thing until the heat death of the universe. But hey, maybe in 10 more years, Xbox will remaster Gears of War again (again) and this time they’ll add raytracing or 3D audio. I can’t wait to run down the same dirty streets again in 8K.
Perhaps the franchise will actually move forward one day and finish up the story it started back in Gears of War 4 and continued in Gears 5. Maybe Marcus will get closure. A chance to move on. To finally have an ending that sticks. Or at the very least, maybe Xbox will just remember the other games in the franchise and remaster one of those next time. Seriously, Xbox, where are the Gears of War 2 or Gears of War 3 remasters? For now, we just get another remaster of 2006’s Gears of War that is totally fine, looks a bit better, and is now on PS5. Enjoy?