Gears is going back to its roots, and we couldn't be happier about it. The Coalition has been, up to this point, light on details about the upcoming Gears of War: E-Day - but a new interview sheds a bit more light on what the team is going for, and it all has us incredibly excited to see the game in action.
As expected before Microsoft properly re-unveils this thing, the chat with GamesRadar is light on nitty gritty details, but it does give us a better overview of the game's core aims, and some fresh details on E-Day's story and setting.
"Our story is set over consecutive days so that players can become intimate with the city, [...] We want them to feel the loss of what was here: the history, the people, and the lives they were living.
You'll get to visit downtown city streets, historical landmarks, military installments, industrial Imulsion refineries, and even forested outskirts,"
That city, known as Kalona, could host one of the most emotional and heartfelt stories in the entire series, if the team is to be believed. That would take some doing after what went down in the original trilogy, but we definitely think setting the game around Emergence Day — when the locust first appeared on planet Sera — gives them the best chance at doing just that.
"The story of Emergence Day is really about what happened to the people of Sera. It was a massive, worldwide event, and we wanted players to feel the impact – so we decided to set this game in a single city. [...] We think it has the potential to be one of the best stories in the Gears franchise, and certainly the most heart and emotion when you're looking at Marcus, Dom, and the origin of the brotherhood that they forge in this game."
The interview doesn't go into any detail about the modes and gameplay options present in Gears: E-Day or anything; we suspect that'll come around the summer with The Coalition not scheduled for Xbox Developer Direct this week. The team does hype this up as "a celebration of both the past and what's to come in the future" and "a big way to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Gears" though, and we can't wait to see what it has up its sleeve later this year.