Gears Of War 3 Beta coming early 2011. Uses Dedicated servers

[Deleted User]

Now that Gears of War 3 has been delayed to the fall of next year, developer Epic Games is using the extra five months to add polish and run a multiplayer beta test.

The test, announced at a press event two days ago, will run sometime in early 2011, but no specifics were discussed. Up until this point, Epic had been using Gears of War 2 as an informal beta for Gears of War 3. The company has adjusted weapons to be closer to their Gears 3 counterparts and has even been running small-scale tests with dedicated servers.

Gears of War 3 will utilize dedicated servers for its ranked and social matchmaking games, which should finally eliminate the dreaded "host advantage" that has become synonymous with the franchise's multiplayer.

Executive producer Rod Fergusson acknowledges the fact that betas on consoles are often thought of as demos by the public. Epic's normal development schedule made it difficult to schedule a beta that allows enough time to react to player feedback for the previous games. The five month extension of the Gears of War 3 release makes this beta possible, even though the game was on track for an April release.

The build of the game I played, barring a few temporarily UI elements and non-final art, felt like a retail-quality release already. Epic won't be adding a ton of new features, but will take the time to conduct the beta and to polish the game.

Gears of War 3 will be released in fall 2011 exclusively for the Xbox 360.

 

[purechaos996]

I wonder if it will be an open beta or not? I'm obsessed with getting into like every beta. I've beta tested for the xbox alone maybe 6 games plus the new dash.

 

[Deleted User]

Not sure... looking forward to this too.

 

[Hadrian]

Just play the first two and imagine different levels.

 

[Edgedancer]

I will play it if its public. I think I will get the game regardless of multiplayer as I have enjoyed the campaigns of the first ones.

 

[RE4zombie]

Yay, another generic shooter from MS

. Can't they come up with a new game concept? I haven't seen a genre-bending 360 title in forever.

 

[Joktan]

How dare you say that re4zombie...gears of war was amazinghad a great time almost beating the whole thing in one night with friends... On topic I hope it's a public one

 

[Guild McCommunist]

Yay, another generic shooter from MS

. Can't they come up with a new game concept? I haven't seen a genre-bending 360 title in forever.

What's a BioShock? Wouldn't say it turned first person gaming on it's side but it was definitely something different. For the record it was Xbox 360/PC for a year before the PS3 version. Or what's a Mass Effect? That was definitely a shift in terms of RPGs.

EDIT: Sure BioShock wasn't a Microsoft game but it does fall under a 360 title. Same goes for Mass Effect 2 (the first Mass Effect is Microsoft's though).

But I do agree Gears is pretty boring. The story modes never seemed all that much fun and the multiplayer seemed even more boring. I just couldn't see why people thought it was like "the" multiplayer game to play outside of Call of Duty and Halo... Although I haven't been fond of those two either.