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GameSpot @ Comic-Con 2008

GameSpot @ Comic-Con 2008

July 26, 2008

Xbox Creator's Showcase: Gears of War 2 and Fable 2

The line for this event was unbelievable--it went all the way around the halls, then outside and around the building. Apparently people like these games or something? If it wasn't because of industry connections, I don't think I would've made it inside.

After entering and finding seating, Ricardo told me that Peter Molyneux wouldn't be able to make it, and that it'd just be Cliff Bleszinski, but that's cool 'cause Cliff is great in front of a crowd.


"I have a rendezvous with death."

The panel began with the trailer unveiled at E3 seen above. Once that was out, Cliff came out to applause and talked about how it was his first Comic-Con, how he'd always wanted to go but could never make it, and how he bought a $200 Cthulhu statue. When speaking about some of the other things he had seen, he mentioned that there are talks in progress to sell a Gears of War 2 pack on Amazon.com that includes both the game and the Lancer replica for around $130, though this is still unconfirmed.

From there, he took us on a guided demo of the crane level that was seen on our E3 2008 stage show:


See the same demo shown at Comic-Con.

At this point, they made a couple of announcements that they said were exclusive to Comic-Con:

The Gears of War 2 soundtrack has just been wrapped up from the recording studio at Skywalker Sound, and has been handled by Steve Jablonsky, who has in the past done the soundtracks for The Island, Transformers, and more.

Secondly, they announced that there would be linked achievements between Gears of War 1 and 2. Three specific examples that they gave would be characters unlocked by completing tasks in GoW1. The original Carmine can be unlocked by completing Act 1, Minh Young Kim can be unlocked by collecting 10 CoG tags, and the sinister General Raam can be unlocked by defeating him. This new use for achievements will bring a new dimension to the collection process, and hopefully will be used similarly in other games.

Cliff then went into a discussion of the various characters and showed off some of the artwork. Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago are reappearing of course, as are August "The Cole Train" Cole (despite what you may have heard elsewhere), and Damon Baird. New characters include Chairman Prescott, Maria Santiago (Dom's wife, and the subject of a story-related search), Tai Kaliso, and Dizzy Wallin.

At this point, Joshua Ortega, the writer in charge of much of the story and the writing in the upcoming comic books, made his appearance. Cliff and Ortega bantered back and forth for a time about how persistant Ortega was in asking questions about the story and doing research, and at one point Ortega mentions how one level he had written had 13 revisions.

Gears of War 1 was very much Marcus' story, Cliffy said, wheras Gears of War 2 is just as much Dom's story as it is Marcus'. Discussing the character Dizzy, they say that he's a truck driving blue-collared one of The Stranded recruited through CoG's "Operation Lifeboat" program. He's also voiced by Peter Jason of Deadwood fame. Tai is the quiet but cryptic, spiritual guy that likes to confuse Carmine (Benjamin Carmine, the original's brother) and is covered in Pacific Islander tribal tattoos. Jack, the robot briefly seen in the first game has a lot more screen time, and "Baird is still a dick," said Cliff, much to the audiences' enjoyment.

Another character briefly mentioned is a new CoG soldier named Jay Straton, who is appearing in the Gears of War comic book. It was alluded to that he would also be making an appearance in Gears of War 2, however.

At this point, Karen Travis, the author of the first Gears of War novel made a stage appearance, and began to discuss her experience working on the story. When Travis, author of the Republic Commando books, was first called on about working with the Gears of War universe, she wasn't immediately familiar with the game and so she turned to the advice of her friends Gabe and Tycho from Penny Arcade, who told her it was "Travis-town." She said she was later completely sold on the idea when she found out about the chainsaw bayonets.

Because she writes a lot through the eyes of the characters, she pestered Cliff and the rest of the team about details such as how the armor feels (especially the boots), how you could possibly clean a Lancer after chainsawing a Locust. "They have Lancer floss," joked Ortega.

Near the end of the panel, a last special guest was brought in, much to the crowd's surprise. John DiMaggio, Marcus Fenix himself (and other characters too, including Bender from Futurama) walked on stage and proceeded to throw out some of Marcus' lines, such as the active reload "Nice!" He even held a conversation with himself, alternating between the voices of Bender and Marcus. I can't really say anything else about the man besides that he's a vocal genius.

Finally, Cliff wanted to let everyone know that Gears of War 2 "is not a cave game." He said that only about 30% of it takes place inside of the Locust's home underground (The Hallow), and so there's plenty of outdoor and surface action to play through.


Watch the entire panel.

Category: Bulletin
Posted by LarkAnderson, Jul 26, 2008 11:50 pm PT   10 Comments

10 Comments

  • P0T

    Posted Jul 27, 2008 4:41 pm PT

    This was a very good GoW2 article and the 13min video with Cliff was nice and some new things I have not heard before were mentioned. I liked the info on active reload and the gatling gun. I always wanted a gatling gun that was portable in GoW1 so i'm glad its showing up. Looking forward to playing the campaign on insane with a buddy.

  • P0T

    Posted Jul 27, 2008 4:43 pm PT

    Also I enjoy the stage demo videos you guys do. Obviously the host could be more polished in terms of line delivery but that is a small criticism.

  • Strider_91

    Posted Jul 28, 2008 5:22 am PT

    Wow, how awesome does that look

  • DakoGuyver

    Posted Jul 28, 2008 9:23 am PT

    I don't know how many times I've seen that level from GoW2, but so far I've yet to get tired of it. Can't wait to actually play the level for my self. The shield is great, and I'm happy that you can pick it up after planting it down. But where is the news on Fable 2?

  • LarkAnderson GameSpot staff member

    Posted Jul 28, 2008 11:23 am PT

    There was no Fable 2 news, unfortunately, because Peter couldn't make it. The name of this post (and of all my others) comes directly from the name of the panel.

  • 8smokes

    Posted Jul 28, 2008 4:52 pm PT

    Comic-Con sounded like it was fun. Wish I could have gone. Anyway, Gears 2 is sounding better than ever!

  • skine99

    Posted Jul 29, 2008 1:10 pm PT

    Amazing

  • EvilDarkGon

    Posted Jul 30, 2008 9:51 am PT

    Smash TV meets Geometry Wars?! You had me at the Brumak. Now I'm leaking fluids. All of them.

  • Lost_But_Found

    Posted Jul 30, 2008 3:42 pm PT

    Really liked the article and thanks for posting the Creator's Showcase Video, I really enjoyed watching it

  • acarrillo

    Posted Aug 1, 2008 8:15 pm PT

    What a Trailer men! uuuf! extreme but maybe Doom is hurt!?

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