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Gears of War Reloaded Makes a Case for the Return of the 2000s Most Controversial Gaming Trend

On Aug 31, 2025 3:58 pm, by NuclearCoffee

Gears of War: Reloaded is a remaster of an Xbox 360 classic—the third-person shooter that set the Gears franchise in motion all those years ago. As such, it had a lot riding on it ahead of its release: The Coalition had to make it a meaningful improvement over the original, while still retaining its most essential elements, which is especially important given that it’s introducing the Gears of War series to PlayStation players.

One could dissect the differences between Gears of War: Reloaded and its progenitor til the cows come home, but at the end of the day, it can be described best as a serviceable, noninvasive polishing of the seminal original. Remarkably, this works in the game’s favor, as it still holds up in the age of modern third-person shooters. This is rather unexpected, in a sense, since Gears of War is often viewed as the prototypical cover shooter—a subgenre that was greatly maligned in the 2000s and 2010s, due in large part to its ubiquity. But Gears of War: Reloaded proves that the formula may have some life left in it.

After Gears of War: Reloaded, Developers Should Start Looking at the Cover Shooter Formula Again

A Treatise on the Virtue of Cover Shooters

Criticisms of the cover shooter formula have been well-established at this point, but it’s worth going over some of the more common arguments against it: detractors argue that cover shooters engender passivity, that they aren’t dynamic, and that, ultimately, they are boring. It’s true that a mediocre cover shooter can feel like a game of whack-a-mole, where players simply have to wait for an enemy to pop out of cover to shoot, and cower behind cover themselves while the enemy themselves launches an attack. When done poorly, like in a game like Mafia: The Old Country, the cover shooter template can certainly feel bland and overly easy.

But when it’s done well, like in Gears of War: Reloaded, it can actually be quite engaging. Rather than being about split-second reactions or risk-taking maneuvers, like in Max Payne or Resident Evil 4 Remake, a cover shooter can often be more tactical, rewarding players for controlling the battlefield and prioritizing smart positioning. Indeed, a good cover shooter should make the player feel like they’re in a real military fight, pressing their advantage to corner enemy combatants when necessary, luring them toward traps or specific chokeholds, and manufacturing opportunities for optimal damage. Like with so many genres, getting these mechanics right can be a tight balancing act, but it’s one that Gears of War: Reloaded pulls off beautifully.

Why Gears of War: Reloaded’s Cover Shooting Mechanics Work

One of the most central aspects of classic Gears of War is the high time-to-kill, both for the player and for NPCs. This means that succeeding in combat is less about short-term reactions and more about orchestrating scenarios where one can dominate the enemy most effectively. Running head-first into battle is almost never an effective strategy, since the target can simply unleash a barrage of ammunition, and there are limited options for evasion or defense. Instead, players can excel by understanding the enemy’s own desire for self-preservation, and manipulating it. For instance, while an enemy will be safe behind cover in a corner, a well-placed grenade can flush them out into the open, turning their bastion into a trap they can’t escape from. Alternatively, one can flank the enemy and force them into an unfavorable position that way.

Hiding from a Corpser in Gears of War Reloaded

It’s obviously fine to dislike cover shooters on a personal level, but Gears of War: Reloaded demonstrates that the formula has depth that isn’t always appreciated. Hopefully, with this classic cover shooter reaching more players than ever, audiences will see more developers taking notes from this well-executed third-person-shooter template, and continue to iterate upon it moving forward.