Gears of War 2: 8.5/10

My three brothers are big into Gears and I've spent a respectable amount of time the past few months playing with them on-line, but I'm quickly growing bored of the thing. It's not like it's a bad game - far from it. Gears is a solid shooter. The cover based mechanics work very well, the graphics are great and, at times, stunning. The characters are memorable, with good voice work and entertaining dialogue, and there's a respectable variety in the multi-player. Although the story itself is pretty much nonsensical, there's enough variety in the campaign mode to keep you going. There's just not enough substance there to hold me for that long. I've played through the campaign three times, once in co-op, so I'm done with that. The tactics in the multi-player just seem like the same thing over and over, race for the power weapons and master the shotgun. We'll, that's not enough to keep me going indefinitely. Overall, though, it's still one of the better games to come out of last fall. I'll still be there to pick up Gears 3 when it comes out.

Story: 3
Interface: 4
Game Play: 4
Challenge: 4
Fun: 4

Overall: 8.5/10