Epic’s ‘Gears of War 2’ is star of show at E3

LOS ANGELES — Microsoft kicked off the E3 Media Summit at the Los Angeles Convention Center by showcasing new titles, but its ally Epic Games took the Hollywood spotlight with more details about “Gears of War 2.”

Microsoft’s Don Mattrick, senior vice president of interactive entertainment, introduced Cliff Bleszinski, Epic’s design director, who announced the Xbox 360 exclusive title will ship Nov. 7. He also showed a new trailer for the game.

“Ever since we announced 'Gears 2' at GDC in Feburary, the response has been tremendous,” said Belszinski. “We have the most-anticipated game this fall of any platform.”

The original "Gears," which was released for the Christmas rush in 2006, sold more than 4 million copies and remains one of the biggest all-time sellers for the Xbox 360. Epic is turning "Gears" into an entertainment franchise with a movie, graphic novels, books, toys and much more.

Bleszinski, Xbox 30 controller in hand, introduced the cooperative multiplayer for the new game for the first time. Bleszinski played as “Marcus” (the game’s human star) and Rob Ferguson, producer of "Gears 2" at Epic Games, took control of “Dom” from backstage. The level featured a ravaged city that had been destroyed by a giant locust sinkhole.

In "Gears 2," the locust horde has been literally digging underneath human cities and destroying them from below. They’ve pushed humanity to the brink, forcing people to take the fight to the locust.

Some of the new gameplay demonstrated with the E3 sinkhole level was the ability to grab any enemy locust and use it as a live or dead shield to absorb gunfire, then discard it. Bleszinski used one as a live shield and then snapped its neck at the end.

The objective of the level was to get to the bottom of the sinkhole, where a huge “Brumack” creature with powerful cannons was amongst an army of hundreds of locusts.

This level really showed off the new features of Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 3, which allows for huge numbers of characters on screen simultaneously. Although not shown in action, the demo ended with Dom saying, “If they can ride them, so can we,” opening up new gameplay that will evidently allow players to commandeer the monstrous, full-armed Brumack and use them against the locust.

After the short demo, Bleszinski announced a new five-player multiplayer mode called “Horde,” which allows a group of friends to take on wave after wave of locusts in a progressively more challenging series of attacks.

Micrfosoft had much more to discuss than "Gears."

Mattrick focused on exclusive Xbox 360 games "Fable 2," which was introduced by creator Peter Molyneux. Microsoft also announced the debut of the best-selling, formerly PlayStation-exclusive "Resident Evil" franchise on Xbox 360 with "Resident Evil 5." The game will ship March 13, 2009. Microsoft also announced that "Fallout 3," which is one of the fall’s biggest titles, will receive exclusive downloadable content on Xbox Live.