GameCentral revs up the Lancer and goes hands-on with Act 2 of the new Gears Of War game, with impressive open world areas and a new look for old faces.
For all Gears of War’s different settings, across five mainline games dating back to 2006, you couldn’t pick a better one than E-Day. Also known as Emergence Day, it’s this universe’s Pearl Harbour, with hostile subterranean hordes bursting from the ground. We’ve already played a multiplayer preview but this time we’ve got hands-on with the story mode.
14 years prior to the events of the first Gears Of War game, with a pre-soul patch Marcus Fenix at the helm, our hands-on with the new game took place in a heavily populated city still reeling from the ambush. Car showrooms have been turned into combat zones; children’s bedrooms are now snipers nests and battling outside a café, where still-warm coffee rests on tables, brings a new level of urgency.
Open hub sections massively expand the world-building. At one point in my single-player session (the full campaign features drop-in four-player co-op) I’m let off the leash to forge my own route. After diverting down an alley, I find a family trapped in a rapidly crumbling building. Rescuing them gets me a rare weapon mod. These people-saving side quests make Gears Of War: E-Day feel personal.
You could, of course, run right to the main objective, but you risk missing all manner of Easter eggs. One monorail platform features COG soldiers doing push-ups, and a button prompt lets me join in for a quick pump.
Next, in a smashed-up train carriage, I spot a poster promoting star Thrashball athlete Cole Train, who becomes part of your squad later in the timeline. Marcus grumbles he had tickets to watch him play, until the military turned the stadium into a forward operating base. These details draw on decades of lore and bring the world to life.
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Beyond this mini-sandbox, the bulk of the demo is linear: a fight across a bridge, a battle in a tunnel, a trek back across the same bridge. These don’t particularly move the series on in any meaningful way, largely featuring the same weapons, enemies, and overall rhythm as the first game 20 years ago.
Movement is slightly sharper, granted. You’ll snap into cover with a satisfying thud, and link together roadie runs with desperate dives and rolls.
Environments facilitate this fluidity. Characters can run and slide under trucks, mantle up skips, and climb through blown-out windows into apartments, turning slice-of-life settings into tactically advantageous positions.
Fighting amongst snacks and vending machines in a petrol station, or watching a gigantic, spider-like Corpser burst from the ground next to a corner shop contrasts the mundane with the nightmarish.
In fact, this might be the darkest Gears game yet. Dead civilians litter the streets, not yet covered by body bags, streaks of blood mapping their final moments. The city is a gaping wound.
Gears of War: E-Day still finds time for levity, of course, this being a game in which the default weapon is a machine gun with a chainsaw grafted onto it (there’s an interesting cut scene detailing the creation of this monstrosity).
‘Uh, did it just say ‘boom’?’ says one of your squadmates when a boomer utters its signature line. Another time Dom, alive and well before the tragic events of Gears Of War 3, jokes about Marcus eating rotten meat during a mission gone wrong and getting severe food poisoning.
The polish is, of course, massively increased. Now on Unreal Engine 5, it looks better than ever, especially in 4K. Bursts of light from each trigger pull illuminate your character, while volumetric smoke hangs heavy in the air.
Environmental destruction is upped, too. Bullets explode boxes of fruit outside grocers into mulch, while car windshields cobweb under impact. In one fight a grenade partially reduces the wooden sign I’m crouched behind to splinters, so Marcus flops to his back and returns fire while prone.
While you can destroy TVs and knock chunks off concrete, it’s more of a combined effect adding to the overall chaos of combat. In other words, you’d only miss it if it wasn’t there.
You’ll still take cover behind battered taxi cabs, stone slabs, and anything else roughly waist-high, and fire on snarling humanoid enemies who are doing the same to you.
It’s nothing especially groundbreaking, even given the slightly enhanced scale which bumps up the number of friendly COGs and combatants a touch.
One scenario, taking place across three floors of a tube station, makes for a dramatic end to the demo, as two entrenched forces trade fire in a busy spectacle.
This two-hour campaign build provokes both reassurance and worry. While open world areas are epic enough to justify that seven year wait since Gears 5, the linear sections feel like a retread.
Still, with 4v4 online competitive modes and the new Horde Siege PvE mode, the campaign is just one part of Gears of War: E-Day’s overall package.
Formats: PC (previewed) and Xbox Series X/S
Price: £69.99
Publisher: Xbox Game Studios
Developer: The Coalition
Release Date: 6th October 2026
Age Rating: 18
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