Holy crap, where did this come from. 4 new Gears of War multiplayer maps are due to be released this week. The Hidden Fronts map pack map pack will cost 800 points and is scheduled to hit the Xbox Live Marketplace this Thursday (3rd May).

• Bullet Marsh: In this Kryll-infested swamp, an old generator still powers the area lights. A few stray bullets could easily knock out the generator, leaving combatants to fend for themselves against the Kryll.
• Garden: This overgrown and crumbling conservatory still has a working fertilization and pesticide system. This system can pose a serious hazard to anyone who ventures into the greenhouse without first venting the air.
• Process: Teams must fight for control of this subterranean Imulsion processing plant, still active despite the cessation of the Pendulum wars.
• Subway: Timgad’s Central Subway station used to serve as a central hub for commuters. Now the tunnels are crawling with Locust.

Well today sees the long awaited update and the arrival of a new gametype for Gears of War. The new gametype called Annex is basically a king of the hill type gametype, whereby players have to try and control a particular area of the map for as long as possible. The other updates improve VGA modes, weapon balancing and general multiplayer bugs. All these updates are explained in more detail below.

Annex Gametype

In Annex, you win by keeping control over key map locations, or objectives, long enough to collect a winning number of points. Every map has two to five identified objectives available for capture, with one objective active at a time. Objectives are based on map weapon-spawn locations and have a potential value of 60 points toward either team’s score. Teams collect those points by maintaining ownership of an objective until all its 60 points have been distributed. Every second that a team controls an objective, the team gets one point. When an objective falls to zero points, the next objective is selected at random.

On the HUD, the current objective appears below the team scores at top left. This indicator contains several pieces of relevant information.  The weapon icon inside the circle indicates which weapon-spawn location is being used as the objective.  The compass along the outer edge of the circle shows the relative direction to the objective.  The number inside the circle indicates how many points remain at that objective and the background icon color indicates which team currently controls it. No color means the objective awaits capture, a red icon means the Locust Horde hold the objective and a blue icon means the COG hold it. When the icon in the indicator circle fills, the corresponding team’s score also changes color, the team begins collecting points from the objective, and the point value of the objective drops.

On the map, a projected ring marks the physical location and boundaries of the objective in the world. The ring’s color indicates the current captor: White means neutral, blue COG, and red Locust. To capture an objective, players must stand inside the glowing ring uncontested for a short period of time. How long depends on how many teammates stand in the ring at once. One player can capture an objective in eight seconds, two players in four seconds, three players in two seconds, and four players in one second. Once a team takes an objective, they are not required to remain inside the ring to maintain ownership.  The captured objective’s points drain until an opposing team member enters the ring, or until its points fall to zero.

Round scores can be set as low as 120 points or as high as 480 points. The first team to reach the target score wins the round.

Respawns:  Infinite, wave-based every 15 seconds

Game Updates

• VGA Cable Support: Monitor resolution widths greater than or equal to 1280 now render as letterbox.  In particular VGA users running at 1280×1024 will now see the game in full 720p (1280×720) resolution in letterboxed form.
• Adjusted Assassination Multiplayer Gametype: Leader no longer has to unlock weapons and now has to be executed to die.
• Adjusted Boomshot: Splash damage to be more effective rendering targets down-but-not-out
• Adjusted Hammer of Dawn: Aiming will be more forgiving of moving targets
• Adjusted Roadie Run: Reduced frequency of accidently grabbing cover while running
• Kill Message Ticker: Ticker can now be seen while down-but-not-out and spectating
• General: Addressed a number of possible exploits in multiplayer

Epic Games have just released their second patch for Gears of War. The next time you load up the game, you will be prompted for an auto update.

Unfortunately, according to Epic, the patch will not be fixing any of the bugs that gamers might be having, but rather it is intended to fix some minor compatibility issues (No game play changes at this time!!).

Epic have said however that the “longjump” and “weapon pickup while running” glitches should be fixed in the next update, along with the VGA issues.

Hot on the heals of the news of new maps for Gears of War comes the details of the patch that should preceed them. The patch should be available sometime Wednesday 10th January.

• Fixed aspect ratio distortion when using VGA cable with 4:3 displays at resolutions higher than 640×480
• Fixed voice issue with new players joining Player Match games in progress
• Players can now get the Achievement for “Dish Best Served Cold” when using Troika turret to kill RAAM
• Fixed rare situation where host could loop countdown and never start match
• Fixed rare situation where players could get stuck after chainsawing in multiplayer
• Reduced Grenade Tag melee distance
• Enabled “Strict” NAT check on host to prevent possible connection issues
• Optimized server browser queries to return results more quickly and prevent scroll bars from hiding quality of service icons
• Reduced number of possible revives in Execution to match Warzone
• Removed host name from Ranked match server browser
• Disabled security cameras in Ranked matches
• Ranked matches now require balanced teams (3v3 or 4v4)
• Increased penalty for quitting a Ranked match to -50 points
• Added additional cheat detection code

Great news for Gears of War fans, two new multiplayer maps will be coming very soon to an Xbox 360 near you. The two new maps, Raven Down and Old Bones, should be available on Xbox Live Marketplace early Thursday morning (11th January)  Wednesday 10th January and be available FREE of charge (Sponsored by the Discovery Channel).

Raven Down

A Raven Helicopter has gone down in the middle of a large scale battle with the omnipresent Locust Horde. Gears have taken out the Seeder and gamers join Delta Forces moving into the crash site from all angles to search for survivors.

Old Bones

In an attempt to eradicate any traces of human history and culture, the Locust Horde has emerged under Sera’s Capitaline Museums and has begun to destroy them brick by brick. Each gamer’s mission is to help the Delta Force recapture the museums before all remnants of humankind’s existence are obliterated.

Good news for Gears of War players using VGA cables on non-widescreen monitors, a fix for the aspect ratio problems is on its way.

Mark Rein, who is vice president of Epic Games, posted the following in the Epic Games forums:

Good news folks. We think we’ve fixed the VGA aspect ratio issue. This still has to go through testing and then certification but provided we didn’t mess anything else up by making this fix it should be in the next update. I can’t predict when this update will be released because we’re still working on a few other things for the update and, as I said earlier, it needs to go through the cert process. As soon as we have a good idea when that will be, and what ended up making it into this update, we’ll publish some information about it on this forum.

Gears of War continues to break records with the announcement that in its first two weeks of release it has sold over 1,000,000 copies. This makes Gears of War the fastest selling title of 2006 and the fastest selling original Xbox game of all time.

Gears of War also bring good fortune for Xbox Live, with paid subscriptions to Xbox Live going up by more than 50% since the games launch.

Some useless stats

• Over 1,000,000 copies sold in he first two weeks
• Fastest selling game of 2006
• Fastest selling original Xbox game of all time
• Over 850,000 unique gamers have played Gears of War on Xbox Live
• 10,000,000 game play sessions on Xbox Live
• 7,000,000 achievements unlocked

Gears of War has finally landed in Europe.

Gears of War an Xbox 360 exclusive that blends tactical action with survival horror, thrusts gamers into a deep and harrowing story of humankind’s epic battle for survival against the Locust Horde, a nightmarish race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet.

Lead war hero Marcus Fenix and his fire team as they face the onslaught of merciless warrior fiends.

A revolutionary tactical combat system and breathtaking, high-definition visuals from the new Unreal Engine 3 immerse you in a horrifying story of war and survival.

MS have announced that the highly anticipated Gears of War will come out on the 17th Novemner 2006 in the UK (11th in the US). Price expected to be £39.99 for the standard version.