Tag: Gears of war 4

Beating Horde on Insane difficulty. Gears of war 4

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker
Horde 3.0

Gears of war 4 has some serious action for gamers but one mode that certainly stands out is Horde. Gears of war is an Xbox exclusive and no we don’t care if you can play it on PC. PC isn’t a console, it’s a computer and therefore doesn’t count. Many players have tried to beat all 50 waves of horde in Hardcore difficulty and have failed. So the idea of taking on Insane scares them. Let’s take a look.

Insane is the hardest difficulty in the game. Players have way less health than normal and the enemies have more health than normal. Also the enemies are very accurate too. So when you see a drone charging a torque bow, make sure to take cover or die. Players literally die in a few shots and if you are anywhere near a boomshot or drop shot blast, then you are done for. So if you want to stand a chance in Horde then first things first… take cover or die. Second things second be completely aware of what’s going on and what enemies are around at all times. No excuses.

Plant the fabricator in a good spot where you have maximum visibility of the area and good amount of cover, preferably with some high cover too. All players must fight right next to cover and never be alone. Each player of the team needs to have from very good to excellent movement skills to be able to dodge incoming attacks, enemies and get around quickly. Each player’s selected class must have at the very least, 4 skill cards equipped. Communication is very helpful but the marking and pinging system works just fine though. Remember when we said “never be alone” well also make sure you aren’t all bunched up together so that one drop shot kills you all. We’ve seen it happen before when a team rushes to go receive someone and BOOM!

horde Gears of war 4

Let’s discuss the enemies. Some off course require more attention then others. Some enemies you can just handle yourself and the team doesn’t need to know. Enemies like the Scion Boomshot, buzzsaw and drop shot are problem with the drop shot being a major problem unless you are under a shelter. Enemies like them and guardians need to be marked and called out as they are capable of downing players instantly and running fortifications and entire structures. Once called out have the right player handle them unless you need two to destroy them quickly, the sooner the better. Lastly do not underestimate Juvies. Those little freaks can ruin everything. Just one sneaking in can down each player one by one. They can down you in two hits alone. Remember what we said, never fight alone because once downed enemies will rush towards you straight away to finish you off. Call out enemies and finish them quickly and appropriately.

Bosses are the biggest threat and can seriously kill your run. Snatchers are considered the biggest threat and require everyones attention as they can advance on your base the fastest and damage everything real fast. They also have a one shot kill attack that forces everyone to take cover. Take these down fast. Kestrels are just annoying as they do keep their distance but can fire over cover, their missiles aren’t a one though so keep an eye on where it’s firing from and make the necessary adjustments. Soldiers are needed for these things. Carrier is considered the easiest as it moves super slow and it’s attacks are easy to stop. Get the soldiers or heavies to keep the explosions coming and they should be done for. Swarmak is considered the second worst thanks to it’s huge pool of health, constant firing and that it can walk right through your base forcing all to evacuate as coming near it’s foot results in an instant death. You must defeat these fast and everyone must focus it down. Bosses are literally unstoppable and requite immediate attention. The heaviest hitters must focus on them. As we mentioned, kestrels only need soldiers to handle if there are two thanks to their rifles. It isn’t easy for heavies to hit them with their boom shots. Call out to your team when a snatcher is charging up it’s one shot kill so that everyone can hide in Time. Swarmaks and snatchers need everyone shooting at it quick. Beware though as in later waves, when you kill. boss quick, another can spawn. 

snatcher Gears of war 4

The main thing that must be discussed are the classes of the players. What to pick, what combination and what’s not needed at all. The classes are: soldier, heavy, sniper, engineer and scout. Now what’s needed? Every team for insane difficulty needs one scout (just one) because that’s where all the energy comes from. Scouts naturally gain double the amount of energy you would normally get as long as it’s during a wave. Soldiers are needed to be that versatile strong continuous damage dealer. The engineer is needed because they can seriously reduce the costs of fortifications and keep everything strong. Now the two that aren’t needed are heavies and snipers. This doesn’t mean they are useless. It just means they are not essential and it’s up to the team. Heavies deal the most damage of all classes but must stay topped up to do so but there are ways around this. Snipers can almost one shot anything with a head shot but requires more focus and skill due to aiming for head shots only. The best combination is most likely 2 soldiers, 1 engineer, 1 scout and 1 heavy. You could have 1 soldier, 1 scout, 1 engineer, one sniper and 1 heavy. Regardless never have two engineers or two scouts. We also never recommend having two snipers. Two snipers consume too much ammo boxes. Two scouts reduce the bonus of depositing energy as the total is shared. Two engineers just take up another class slot. One can easily handle the job. 

So your scout must deposit bonus in order to gain an extra 50% energy every time you deposit your energy which when combined with your double energy collection is crazy amounts of resources allowing your engineer to buy whatever you need. Scouts should also have health boost and dodge to make collecting the energy during waves much safer and keep you alive. peed boost is needed to get around much faster, rush to downed team mates to revive them and works so well with dodge. The Engineer must have repair boost as it saves a whole lot of energy by reducing the repair costs, remember you will be repairing all the time. Also turret discount and sentry cost are very good as they also save you a lot of money, especially when it comes to turrets which are the most expensive fortification. The soldier must have assault rifle damage, grenade damage and active reload boost. When the assault rifle damage and active reload boost are maxed out, your lancer becomes much stronger than the mulcher dealing insane damage to everything. Even big scions die incredibly fast. Grenade damage is to take out the clusters or that one strong target. For heavies we recommend explosive launcher capacity and damage because well max a drop shot that does 120% more damage than normal is devastating and having like 4 times more ammo than normal is a beautiful recipe but if you combine that with marked damage that’s an additional 50% damage and heavies are all about the damage. Lastly snipers need headshot and precision rifle damage for 170% damage increase on all headshots. You can then combine with called shot and magic bullet for that additional potential damage of 80% for a grant total of 250% on headshots.

Horde 3.0 cards

Now in terms of how to play that’s ultimately up to the team but we can give a good idea. If soldiers have the resupply and grenade capacity cards they can hold 8 grenades and every 15 seconds get another free grenade, which means they can plant two grenades at spots to cover areas and alert team mates of enemies that come through places the team isn’t watching. You could even plant grenades to protect the sniper. The soldier is who should be handling all the juvies, trackers and small enemies. They must give continuous damage and blow up bigger targets with their grenades. The soldier literally just fights everything. Engineers need to get the fences up, a few decoys and definitely some turrets for the stronger more final waves. They alone should do all the building. Scouts need to be out there collecting all the energy while the wave is active, this is the most dangerous and so soldiers and other should be covering them. Grab the energy and drop it off every round as it’s the same amount as if you held on to it for many rounds. Snipers need a good spot of elevation and must be safe with a good exit route in case of emergency. Get those head shots all the time, that’s all you are good for. Heavies need to blow everything up, simple. Big guys? Blow them up. Smaller ones you can just rifle them down but when it comes to higher waves you will need to use your explosives, even for drones. Engineers need to build a weapon lockers for their heavies so they can get back major ammo without taking up a ammo box, off course all can use the locker but priority should go to the heavies. Why soldiers are so good is that with 8 powered up grenades they can take down bosses real fast and anything else for that matter and having the continuous firing rifles like the hammerburst, retro or regular lancers is excellent consistent damage.  Soldiers can literally do anything. The scout is also in charge of reviving people all since they can become the fastest in the whole team. 

Off course there is much more we can say like how if you had a whole team of one class, the soldier class would do the best. Something to think about but here is just some tips and things to think about when it comes to beating horde in insane difficulty. Find what works for yourself and do your best and don’t take things too seriously. So even if you beat all 50 waves in Insane difficulty you will never beat… the ‘Earth Walk!’ 

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Gears of war. Not getting it right.

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker
Gears of war 3

Gears of war is an awesome game and many will agree with that statement. X35 Earthwalker has played every Gears of war game and has completed the campaigns, mastered horde and more. The multiplayer is where the most attention is at. Many changes have come to the game, especially Gears of war 4. We at X35 Earthwalker can say that we aren’t happy with the direction the game is going in and the changed, especially recent ones. 

First of all we will start of with Gears of war 3. Three has the best multiplayer. The mechanics were the best. It was the right pace. In Gears of war 4 the game is so fast paced that players don’t have time to perform executions anymore and those were a big part of the multiplayer. It was where you made a statement to your opponent. it’s where the salt was truly rubbed in. It was the fastest way to create a rival in the match. Now in 4, everything is so fast that no one has time to execute really and if they do it’s the same Gnasher execution. Making the game faster only seems to be something for pro players. 3 was actually new player friendly. New players could try 3 and actually have some fun because they stood a chance at doing something and fighting back. Gears of war 3 had the best multiplayer feel and mechanics. In 4, new players get slaughtered, bullied and abused in game. They don’t stand a chance. 

Gears of war 3

The weapon selection was much better in Gears of war 3. Players can choose from Lancer, Hammerburst, Retro Lancer, Gnasher Shotgun and Sawed off Shotgun. Each weapon had a purpose, technically a counter and forced players to stay alert and have the ability to adapt in match. Gears of war 4 is seriously bad in this department. The retro lancer was removed because many Gnasher shotgun only using players, who love and breathe the Gnasher, complained. The developers listened and made it a power weapon only. Recently a decision was made for the same thing to happen to the Hammerburst. So soon the Hammerburst will be a power weapon as well. This is stupid and it’s the developers only wanting to please people who aren’t good enough to adapt to defeat people who use these guns. The sawed off and retro were good counters to the Gnasher shotgun. It prevented shotgun users from having their way all the time if used correctly. The hammer burst was excellent for supporting your team at a distance and it countered the retro lancer. The Enforcer smg has such a small clip that if you miss a few shots, you will not down your target meaning it isn’t a counter to the Gnasher shotgun. It’s very situational.

Soon the current state of Gears of war 4 will be lancer and Gnasher only. What about the Enforcer? Players already complain about that already. If you aren’t using the Gnasher then you are as they say “a noob who needs to go back to Call of Duty“. So even the enforcer isn’t safe, not that it’s any good really. A simple solution would be to make one mode where it’s like Gears of war 3 in terms of weapon selection while competitive or whatever has the similar settings to what the pros play. Core mode shouldn’t be touched. Only competitive should be adjusted to satisfy other players or create more options. Now new players who play Gears of war go into a match, get 5 kills and 17 deaths and don’t play again. At least with counter weapons you stand a chance against wall bouncing pros who live to feed of the weak. New players don’t know how to wall bounce. Honestly this new change has killed our excitement for the game. Probably just stick to Horde mode now.

So these changes, makes Gears of war have less variety, everyone has the same stuff all the time, more copying pro tournament, less new player friendly, one weapon based matches and more boring. Decision are clearly being made for one group of players and that’s a bad move here. Even the pacing of Gears of war 4 is too fast but that can’t really be changed. We still like e Gears of war 4 and think it’s a great game but these changes will make it just a good game. It’s clear we aren’t happy about this. Don’t be too surprised if you don’t see X35 Earthwalker on multiplayer as much anymore. 

If you are happy about the changed then definitely good for you and we hope you continue to enjoy the game. To all those cry baby Gnasher only using players, well you got what you wanted so  maybe less complaining now… so much hate mail to read through already. We just hope the developers think about what they are doing carefully. Now it doesn’t matter what happens to the weapons, it will never be a match for… the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Gears of war. About the characters

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Gears of war 4 has made some changes for the better while some stuff that was great in Gears of war 3, they didn’t bring over. The developers have to make decisions and not all the time it works well with the players but hey, decisions must be made.

Gears of war 4 has a lot of characters to select from. The largest selection out of all the Gears of war games. Yet some people are still not happy with it. X35 Earthwalker’s favourite character is ‘Day of the dead Del’. It has some gold on the armour, the clothing style looks real nice but the only problem he has with the character is the face paint which looks horrible. They should make the same skin but have it without the face paint. Most of the characters pretty much look to similar and not that different at all. In multiplayer, everyone is moving around quickly, doing what they need to do so the characters will need to be designed in such a way that you can recognise the differences really quickly. The V, E and whatever other day gears characters with the helmets on are not impressive at all. The carmines pretty much look similar except Clayton.

The point is that they could have been more creative with the characters. For example they can create new characters for the sake of multiplayer only. A completely new person and give them unique lines. We do know that it requires more work and effort but we think that’s necessary for a big game like Gears of war 4. Give some new characters signature accessories on their uniform to make it stand out. Maybe a new gear character with bright coloured hair. Or go crazy and create a chef who had to defend himself with a gnasher from a fallen soldier who tried to evacuate him. So the chef still has his chef outfit on or whatever. There is lots you can get away with in this game. Maybe a cool dude still in his suit, maybe he use to be a celebrity like the Cole train. 

Some characters should be in packs but they should have done what they did in Gears of war 3 which was make some characters unlocked through certain achievements get a certain number of multiplayer kills and even make some difficult ones like get the quad to unlock young Hoffman but in knights armour and it has that clangy noise that knight armour makes when moving. Something big like that. They should have brought back unlockable stuff as that gives a sense of progress to players. Last of all they need to bring out the Aaron Griffin character and hurry up! He was X35 Earthwalker’s favourite character in Gears of war 3 and by far the coolest character overall. His lines were epic level and he completely stood out. Bring back Mr Griffin and we will actually use our in game credits to get him.

Overall there is quite a lot that the developers can do concerning the characters in Gears of war 4. Too many characters seem similar and not as much stands out. We certainly have no interest in the colour blast characters but they are cool to some extent. We at X35 Earthwalker hope to see much more from Gears of war 4 in the future. What we can expect to see in the future though… is the ‘Earth Walk!’

Gears of war 4 Campaign. Insane difficulty

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

Gears of war 4 decided to continue the campaign tradition by making sure that it isn’t easy to beat. Seriously, Gears of war 4’s campaign is very ridiculously hard. Many have found it too difficult. Some are still stuck near the start because of those stupid DR-1 robots that continuously walk towards you with the overkill. That’s right it’s that hard but a good challenge and certainly not impossible. X35 Earthwalker himself will provide some advice here as well.

The start of the campaign has been considered as one of the hardest parts of the game, especially because of that one level where a ship drops of DR-1’s and shepherds and you have limited space to run and take cover. Now normally this would’t be too much of a problem but since it’s insane difficulty expect to die a lot. Let’s explain just how hard Gears of war 4 campaign is on insane difficulty. One burst of the hammerburst will bring you almost half dead. One shot from the boltok will bring you near full red. The lancer can kill you within 2 seconds. One shot from the sniper rifle kills you. That’s right, it doesn’t matter where it hits you. If that sniper round hits your foot, well you still are dead. Now you can see where the problem is. A normal swarm drone can literally can kill you within one second. So when those DR-1’s with there abundance of health keep advancing towards you, constantly shooting the overkill (which is stronger than the gnasher) and Shepherds sort of staying back and spraying their enforcer smgs at you, all of a sudden the level near the start becomes incredibly difficult.

It gets much worse and frustrating. The enemies in Gears of war 4, specifically those stupid swarm grenadiers, are far more aggressive than the enemies from the other Gears of war games. Some enemies are actually fearless. For example during X35 Earthwalker’s livestream in a certain level on the way to the hive, there was a certain swarm grenadier that always rushes towards X35’s location in attempt to try and unload a shotgun round into his face. Well why doesn’t he just shot it before it comes near? It’s insane difficulty meaning you do much less damage than normal, also enemies are never alone there are three drones nearby who keep shooting at you and don’t forget how quickly an enemy can kill you and it’s worse when there is a swarm sniper in the back watching you closely. It gets even better. With our low amounts of health, the gnasher shotgun (over powered since Gears of war 2) kills you real quick. Also one melee hit from a drone sized enemy instantly kills you. You need to truly rely on cover, aim and timing.

If only we could leave it as that. Well we can’t. Anyone who knows Gears of war know that the humanoid enemies are technically the easy ones to deal with. It’s the not so humanoid ones that really shake things up. Imagine being in cover with your bots and firing at a group of swarm drones. Then all of a sudden a small group of Juvies start rushing towards you. Now it’s horrible. Juvies are the worst on insane difficulty as they only need to slap you twice to kill you. They can dodge your bullets and even mantle kick you which stuns you and pretty much guarantees your death. You may have to wait until your health recovers as you took some damage from being shot. It forces you to make a choice, kill the Juvies quick before they get close while staying in cover, or run away from Juvies and dodge bullets. Both can end in death. Pouncers make things real complex as they force you to take cover, but if any juvies show up then you have to run, but Pouncers fling things at you which do heavy damage.

So as long as you stay alive all will be well. Wrong! Your bots actually matter in this game. They don’t stay alive forever anymore. When that pouncer jumped on Del, X35 thought he would be fine but nope. Del died and back to checkpoint. If your bot is downed and no one saves that bot then they die and back to checkpoint. So keep your bots alive, especially when it comes to Snatchers. One of the best advice we can give any gamers for Gears of War 4 campaign is that you must try and keep a sniper or similar weapon around at all times as much as possible for handle some areas in the game. A sniper, torque bow, embar, boltok really do help out. They do heavy damage per bullet and all capable of head shotting and killing enemies easily. Especially when they are so far away and sticking your head out for more than 2 seconds can be real risky at times. The up side is that your bots have quite a bit of health and can be useful at times so don’t ever feel guilty about letting your bots take some of the heat for you; however please note that enemies will always target you first, even if your allies are nearby. We have seen Juvies run past all the bots just to get at the player and kill them.

Another thing to take into account is knowing when to use heavy weapons like the buzzkill and muncher. Normally those weapons will destroy everything but in insane difficulty those heavy weapons will get you killed. This is because it takes a little bit of time for you to drop back into cover with your heavy weapon and enemies can still hit you during that time. Pick your moments. If it’s a horde of juries then a buzzkill will tear through the whole of them but if it’s standard drones then that might just be a big mistake. 

So let’s summarise some stuff here. Always stick to cover. Use your bots to your advantage. Take snipers and explosive weapon wielding enemies seriously. Always try to keep a sniper type weapon with you. Know when to revive your bots. Never let any enemy come close. Be careful with heavy weapons. Most importantly just have fun, don’t let it get to you. Don’t be one of those foolish people who break their controllers. If you die, which you will (a lot), then laugh at yourself. Follow X35 Earthwalker on Mixer and twitter to know when he will continue his insane difficulty livestream. Whether you are good at campaign or not, it doesn’t matter but what does matter is that you do the ‘Earth Walk!’

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Gears of war 4 Locust Drones pack

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

The Locust are finally here in Gears of war 4. Earlier today the Locust Drones pack was released. We at X35 Earthwalker have been waiting all this time for the return of the Locust as they were awesome enemies and part of what made Gears of war what it is. We had nothing against the Swarm but the Locusts were much cooler and scary. Finally they brought them to us.

So whats in the Locust Drones pack? The contents that you can get from these packs are 2 locust characters and 2 enemy themed weapon skin sets. That’s it. Only 2 Locust characters. Just 2. No queen Myrrah or theron guard. That’s disappointing to be very honest. We know their strategy. It’s to bring things out bit by bit to keep gamers waiting and gaming to help keep the game alive for as long as possible. We understand it from a business point of view but it’s suppose to be about the gears of war gamers firstly.

Fine then. At least we get 2. What’s the price for 1 of the Locust Drones pack? What!!! 2000 gold coins! Now they have really crossed the line. Is it just like with the UIR pack which charged really high for a bunch of random items which didn’t guarantee anything. You could get doubles. Surely no but it is. X35 Earthwalker had enough to get two Locust Drones packs and after opening them both he got none of the Locust characters when he could have used all those coins to get well over 11 horde packs. It’s disappointing. At least each pack gives you 5 items but gamers like X35 Earthwalker have been excited and waiting for the Locusts for time now and got nothing. Now they expect players to grind their game until they get 2000, 4000, 6000 etc to open the packs. We actually don’t have the time. Once again, like with the UIR pack, we are greatly disappointed.

What’s also annoying is that the packs also gave out skins from different packs like the chillin lancer. Why is it here? Why can’t they just keep it Locust Drones stuff only? It’s not that hard to do. The other skins like the Juvie for the snub pistol and the boomer skin for the markza do have locust theme colours which is nice and how it should be. We have nothing against the contents as we were looking forward to them. It’s just how they are doing this is horrible. 

Overall we say that if you have the gold coins then get some packs and get your locusts. If you have little gold coins then wait and hope they lower the cost. If you have real money to use on games then buy some and give us half (don’t be cheap now). Otherwise we aren’t too bothered to miss this at all. We are sorry Locusts as we love you guys (even though you kill humans) but you aren’t worth that much time. So whether you buy it or not… don’t forget to do the ‘Earth Walk!’

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How to beat the horde in gears of war 4

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

Gears of war 4 horde 3.0 is known now for being incredibly hard to complete. Getting from wave 1 to 50 is proving to be a problem. Some have had problems with casual. Many are struggling with normal. Pretty much everyone is finding hardcore too hard. Insane is just plain insane (Forget about it). X35 Earthwalker has done hardcore difficulty and said that it was really hard and was glad he had awesome team mates. We decided to give some advice on how to tackle hardcore and insane difficulty.

First things first you yourself has to be ready. Please don’t join a team knowing that you are far too weak or haven’t got the skills yet. It will sabotage the team and ruin the whole thing for everyone. How do you know if you are ready? Well how frequently do you die in easier difficulties? Do you know when to stay back? Do you stay in cover. Do you fulfill the role of your class? In hardcore and insane you can’t be messing around as enemies will become so strong that they will punish all your mistakes and destroy your team. Do you need your own team? X35 Earthwalker said that he did hardcore with random online players and no mics. It just comes down to having a good team. Normally at hardcore the players are serious and actually want to complete it so trolling is less likely. So just search for a map and get into the action.

Next. What about your class skills? Your class must have at least 3 skill card slots but preferably four (The more the better). At least one of your skill cards should be level 5 and all the others should be level 4 (except epic skills). Now it does come down to what classes are in your team. Going all soldier will work very well for most of the game until you suffer from a lack of energy so variety is the secret here. The best combination of classes are: 2 soldiers, 1 engineer, 1 scout and 1 heavy. The reasons for this is because firstly soldiers are overall the most useful and versatile class. hey have good defence, dish out high damage constantly and can end the enemy push with one move. Off course over variations work well too like have 1 soldier and 2 heavies instead, which by the way is very strong but ammo may become a problem. At the end of the day do the combination that works best for you. Never have two snipers or two engineers as that is never a good thing. You never need two of them but you must always have an engineer and a scout. When a high level scout and engineer work together, they end up being the reason why you beat hardcore and insane in the end.

The one class that isn’t necessary is sniper. Snipers kill enemies at a much slower rate than other classes, they don’t do the most damage, they have no extra abilities and their epic skill is the weakest of the 3 strike skills. The soldier needs maxed out rifle damage (50%), at least level 4 grenade damage, ammo capacity and must always have the hammer of dawn skill. The hammer is the secret weapon that will save you and the whole team. The soldier must plant grenades to seal of areas from attacks and kill everything small and big. Heavies should have at least a level 4 explosive ammo capacity and damage. Mark damage is a good and can add that extra damage needed to kill bosses quick. Heavy weapons damage is up to you. The heavy must simply blow up everything that walks. Normally they ought to save some explosives for bigger enemies and destroy the bosses. Scouts must have maxed energy deposit, no questions asked. Other skills like maxed out movement speed and maxed out starting health truly comes in handy as time and low health can be an issue but when you combine those two you can be the main person to revive downed team mates. 50% energy deposit + the scouts natural ability to collect double energy is the best way to get energy. Engineers must have the repair tool efficiency skill maxed out and have at least a level 4 fortification health boost (which is a general skill). Those two are a must. Equipping the turret health boost and cost reduction will save you lots of energy as turrets are the most expensive things and always get targeted to be destroyed.

In the first ten waves you can take it easy and stay in cover. Only let the scout collect the energy. Only let the engineer to all the building. Try your best to safely complete all the objectives that appear in the waves as you need the energy they give. Do not buy weapons from the fabricator as you can scavenge many great weapons from dead enemies, everything from drop shots to grenades; however the only exception to this rule is if a soldier wants a retro lancer which doesn’t cost much. Think about how much damage a soldier could do with the rifle damage boost plus the power of a retro lancer. It becomes like a mulcher, seriously. If low on ammo for the whole team then open up an bonus creates you got from completing objective during waves as some instantly grants big ammo to all team mates. Make sure you have a line of turrets for the bosses as they are the only things that can kill the bosses before they reach you. Once bosses like the carrier and especially the snatcher enter your base, it’s almost all over. A heavy who has the increased turret damage skill can easily be the highest damaging thing in the game and will defeat any boss.  Level 4 turrets are a must have. X35 Earthwalker once had two other team mates and himself focus their level 4 turrets at a kestrel and that boss went down really fast… both kestrels. 

Never forget this one thing. Hardcore and insane are completely different from normal and casual. The enemies take less damage and give out much more. In casual you could run in the middle of them and beat them all with your shotgun but it is not so in hardcore. When playing the harder difficulties and reaching waves 30 and above you start to understand how important cover truly is. If not in cover even a ‘Deebee’ robot is easily capable of downing you very fast. At waves 40 and above the enemies will punish you for being in the open for a couple of seconds. Sentinels with tri shots will down you in less than a second if they catch you in the open. Juvies are have said that they are the worst enemies in insane as they are capable of ruining your entire day. They can sneak up on your team and in two swings can down you and then head for your team mates. Never forget to mark certain enemies who could pose a threat like Scion boomers and Pouncers. Enemies like that deserve attention, so let your team know and deal with them safely.

The carrier and snatcher boss will follow you relentlessly, if you don’t have the line of turrets and powerful weapons then you have to do the ‘leading strategy’, invented by X35 Earthwalker himself. First of all, the chances of this strategy succeeding once dealing with the higher level waves is lower than normal. By wave 40 you should have a fortified base with powerful turrets by then. Basically your whole team moves together as a team and leave the base. moving around the border of the map while killing everything in your path. You must be together as that’s the only way to save each other easily and beat strong enemies fast. This way the boss won’t destroy your base but instead keep trying to get you, saving you energy. It’s best that you have your heavies in the front so that they can blow stuff up without obstruction. Have the engineer and scout as a distraction and let your soldiers kill everything and plant grenades behind your team to stop any enemies from making a sandwich out of you guys. 

What is probably one of the most important factors is location. Where you place your fabricator and build your base are immensely important. If you build in the wrong place, you will find that you get attacked from too many angles. if this happens then you won’t get far at all. Next is the location of your team mates. Your engineer has no business being at the front lines. The engineer must stay behind the others but top priority is the base and repairs. The soldier must be at the front line. The scout must be assisting everyone and be the first to help with revives. the speed increase skill is very useful and versatile. The heavy must be second to the soldier. Deciding who gets the ammo boxes is important. Heavies run out of explosive ammo fast and so should be a higher priority for ammo. Make sure that everyone gets ammo. special loot you get for completing challenges should be saved up until later waves and only opened when fighting bosses. if you need ammo then just scavenge from the dead enemies. Always stay nearby and never separate from the group do whatever you want after the wave is done. If your team is getting overrun and all hope is lost then have your soldier use the hammer of dawn ability to destroy absolutely everything because it will.

The last to remember when taking on the hordes is to gain experience. Get playing and give it a go. Don’t be afraid to fail at a wave. Try your best and have fun.

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UIR Pack? Not happy!

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

The UIR pack for gears of war 4 was released on the 22nd of December 2016 and boy did it bring a lot of disappointment and complaints. The problem isn’t what the pack contains as there are some cool looking stuff. The epic characters look really cool in fact. The UIR elite especially looks like some elite forces for sure and that he alone could blow some stuff up. The problem is the price. One pack costs 4400 coins! That’s outrageous, even for those characters. That’s more than the golden elite packs which costs 3500. It’s basically the price of 11 horde booster packs. X35 Earthwalker even said that he would rather buy the 11 horde booster packs every time. The fact that you get the gold coins very slowly in the game doesn’t help at all. One social match earns you around 70-80 coins so you will need to play at least 55 matches to get there. That’s ridiculous by anyone’s standards. Even playing horde wave 1 through to 50 would even get you half of the amount you need to get the UIR pack. You will have to do 50 waves three times and we all know just how hard that is. It’s such a shame.

Many season pass players are upset that they don’t get this stuff for free or even a a discount and are questioning why they even bought the season pass. However the price is a big problem but not the biggest problem at all. The biggest problem is that the pack doesn’t guarantee you the 3 characters and the skins. Nope!! It’s all random. This means that you will have to spend over 10000 coins to try and get everything and 3 attempts will not get you everything at all. This means that you can’t rely on your coins to get them. The only other option is to buy them using real money. That’s right. The price is £8.39 per pack. That’s more than 4 one leg and chips at a chicken shop. That’s more than games on the Xbox store. That’s travel money right there. Now some will say that that’s not much but that depends on your situation. Many players feel excluded from UIR pack and many aren’t able to get it at all. It’s like letting only a few children in on the new toys while the rest can’t play with them. It’s not fair. All this stuff just have to stop. If you go online, you will see the responses and experience of other gamers concerning the UIR pack.

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Gears of war 4 Horde 3.0 Classes

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker

 

Gears of war 4 is going on strong and most gamers seem to be happy so far with only a few complaints. X35 Earthwalker himself is very vocal about this. What many consider to be the hardest thing about this game is completing horde mode. Normal difficulty is too hard for just your standard gamer. Hardcore difficulty is is impossible for most gamers while ‘insane’ difficulty is impossible unless you have a fully organised team who communicate and has some moves on them (skills). Our favourite part of horde is the class skill system. This must have been carried over from gears of war Judgement but improved. You can be any class you want with any character you want. For example if you select ‘Hoffman’, you can make him any class you want.

There are five classes in horde. They are: Soldier, Engineer, Heavy, Sniper and Scout. Each one has their own strengths (obviously). To complete or stand a chance against normal, hardcore and insane, you will need to have high skills for the class you want to be and in order to do that, you must play as that class to level up to unlock extra skill slots (max = 5) and collect horde skill cards from booster packs. The skills for your class add small extras that add up like reduced reloading time,  increased weapon damage, more ammo or even fabricator abilities. We must say though that the fabricator abilities can really be game changers. If you choose to master all classes then that’s up to you. We truly prefer to have at least two or three classes and focus on building them up instead.

Scout is basically the one who never stays still. They are in charge of collecting fabricator energy as they can have the skill to get extra energy everytime they drop it off at the fabricator. So a high level Scout can change a 1000 energy drop off into a 1500 energy drop off. That extra amount can make a difference. The Scout has power skills that when combined are destructive that you may mistake the Scout for the main assaulter. They also have other skills that, makes your health regenerate faster, increase movement speed, increase shotgun damage, increase your health and more. There are two epic skills for the Scout: Rage and X-Ray. Rage allows you to gain health whenever you deal melee or shotgun damage while X-Ray allows you to see enemies through walls while in Tac-Com. When you combine 5 different skills together you can make an invincible Scout. You could combine Rage, health regeneration, health boost, brawler and shotgun damage to make a near impossible to kill, close range monster. 

Heavy is the one that dishes out heavy damage with big guns and explosives for days. If there’s a big monster that needs taking out (and not to dinner) the call in the heavy. Heavys have skills that boost there explosive and heavy weapons damage making them even stronger than before. At a high enough level your boom shot will be able to to pretty much one shot everything. Don’t get me started on what happens when you give a high level heavy a salvo. They also have skills that, increase explosive weapon capacity, increase turret damage, increase turret capacity, increase your damage dealt to marked targets and more. There are two epic skills for the heavy: Mortar strike and Pistol Expert. Mortar strike is a fabricator ability that calls down mortars to strike and harm numerous enemies all at once. Pistol Expert increases the damage dealt with the pistol per bullet. When you combine 5 different skills together you can make an endless explosive Heavy. You could combine explosive launcher capacity, explosive launcher damage, Explosive launcher reload, marked damage and mortar strike to make a grim reaper who constantly keeps blowing things up regardless of where they are.

Sniper is obviously the sniper who relies on the headshots bring things down real quick or finish them off. When there is something at a distance that has a head, a sniper will be able to one shot it. Snipers have skills that boost the damage of sniper weapons like markza and sniper rifle and the damage that headshots do. A high level sniper can help thin out the horde before they get to the team. They also have skills that, reduce the reload time of precision, increase the number of enemies you can mark, fabricator ability to mark all enemies at once and a bit more. There are two epic skills for the sniper: Explosive headshot and Sniper strike. Explosive headshot makes any kill by headshot explode damaging anything nearby. Sniper strike is a fabricator ability that allows you to hit numerous enemies with sniper shots to the head. When you combine 5 different skills together you make a one shot one kill marksman. You could combine precision rifle damage, headshot damage, precision rifle capacity, precision rifle reload and sniper strike to make the sounds on shattering skulls a constant tune for your team to listen to.

Engineer is the one who is in charge of building and maintaining the base and it’s fortifications. When you want a turret, barricade or to repair then the engineer is hands down the best at it. Engineers have skills that increase the health of fortifications that he/she builds (it has to be the engineer), reduces the cost of fortifications that he/she builds and some more. A high level Engineer can prevent anything from being destroyed and make the base defend its self. They also have skills that increase sentry capacity, reduce sentry cost, increase sentry firing rate and efficiency of the repair tool. There are no epic skills for the Engineer. When you combine 5 different skills together you can become the best building/repair man ever known. You could combine the repair boost, two turret skills and two sentry skills to make machines of mass destruction which will be hard to kill if you are nearby.

Soldiers are the ones who fight main combat force of your team. There job is to fight, fight and fight some more. They lay down heavy fire and protect your team. Soldiers have skills that enhance the traditional fighting style of gears of war. There are skills that increase the damage bonus you get for getting an active reload, reduce the amount of damage they take when in cover making you harder to kill while giving out more damage. A high level soldier can take down anything with ease become the wall you need between your team and the horde. They have skills that increase rifle ammo capacity, increase rifle magazine size, increases the damage of grenades, increases the amount of grenades you can carry and more. The soldier has one epic skill and it’s the most epic of them all:. It’s called ‘Hammer strike’. Hammer strike is a fabricator ability that allows you to call in a hammer of dawn on numerous enemies, destroying them all like a boss. When you start combining the different skills you can make a true slayer of every kind of monster. You could combine rifle damage with rifle ammo capacity and grenade damage with grande capacity and finally with hammer strike to make it so that little enemies and big enemies can be taken out in an instance and save your team when surrounded.

The soldier is by far our favourite class and is also the favourite of N63 Prodigy and X35 Earthwalker himself. Diamondz L45’s favourite is the ‘heavy’. Each class is useful and serve their own purpose; however we feel that the one class that a team can do without is the sniper. Don’t get us wrong they can be destructive but we feel that heaves and soldiers could kill better. Put a sniper in a soldiers hand who has the active reload skill card can do more damage than normal anyway. You only need one scout to collect fabricator energy and doesn’t need another in their way. Have at a least two soldiers, one engineer to hold down the fort at least one heavy to blow stuff up. The combinations are plentiful and what makes hide even more fun. Lastly there are general skills that can be equipped to any class. They are: Build cost which reduces the cost of everything you build with the fabricator, Carry speed which increases your speed while carrying the fabricator or heavy weapons, Execution bonus which increases the amount of energy executed enemies drop, Fortification health which increases the health of all fortifications you built (this stacks with other skills) and Team revive which is a fabricator ability that instantly brings back all downed and dead allies. So many combinations.  

So take it easy with horde and don’t get discouraged if you fail a few times, I am sure everyone has. Keep playing to get the coins to get booster packs and get much stronger. For more information check out the link below:

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Gears of war 4 so far

Posted on by X35 Earthwalker
 

 

Gears of war has always been a game loved by us for years. We have played the game since gears of war 1 and each release has made us happy. Gears of war 4 has made a big success and pleased many gear fans from campaign players, to horde players. Gears of war 4 was released October 11th 2016. The campaign was our least favourite of the game modes. This is not because of the fact that the ‘swarm’ aren’t as cool as the ‘locust’ at all. This is because we feel they could have done much more concerning the plot. You discover that the ‘locust’ (spoiler alert) didn’t really die but instead have been mutated into a new enemy. We felt that this new enemy which didn’t make a large impact. When the locust showed up they had the whole of humanities attention and really did rock the earth. The swarm felt like a private matter that literally a handful of soldiers was able to deal with. We didn’t get much action from the cog. We thought maybe the cog would tackle the swarm themselves and in the game we would see a scene where an army of ‘Deebee’ machine soldiers going up against the swarm in a big battle… but nope. Instead we see five robots fight a small group of swarm and that’s it. Gears of war 4 could have done more with all this. Also we felt that ‘Del’ was just the one liner, comical relief guy. He didn’t come of as significant really and really disappointed in that. Dom from earlier gears of war games was way more significant.

The mutiplayer is very good. The multiplayer game mechanics here feels like a mix between gears of war ultimate edition and gears of war 3. It would have been better if they kept it like gears of war 3. It seems harder to casually play the game types that you want as social is based on votes while match making is all ranked or versus bots. Again gears of war 3 felt better but we do see why they done it this way. This way game types that are less popular have a higher chance of being played. The shotgun once again feels like the only weapon to use in the game, especially once they nerfed the hammer burst. Now there isn’t really that much to help players counter the ‘gnasher’ shotgun. The ‘Enforcer’ smg is not good enough. The clip size is too small, if you miss a bit then you won’t have enough to down an enemy. In gears of war 3 you have the sawed off and retro lancer to help stop ‘gnasher’ shotgun worshippers in their tracks. Off course those ‘gnasher’ users complained everytime they died to one and the game developers removed them to please those gamers making this game less beginner friendly as new gamers will die all the time until they learn to use the ‘gnasher’. Judgement was the best at balancing weapons we believe as rifles were actually ruling the mid range battles (Like they should), after all they are rifles. From when a shotgun can beat a rifle at mid range shows there is something wrong. The executions of the weapons are back and there are some awesome ones, especially the ‘tri-shot’ execution. There seems to be less executions than ever before in gears of war 4.

Horde mode is back and better overall. As usual it’s up to 50 waves and they can get brutal real quick. The difficulty has been amped up. Many say that it is in fact too hard. Some can’t beat it on normal difficulty. X35 Earthwalker himself has completed fifty waves of horde on insane in gears of war 3 but explains that horde in gears of war 4 is more than a step up in difficulty. This is also due to the fact that getting fortifications is harder because of the new ‘fabricator’ system. In order to build anything, even caltrops, you need to collect fabrticator energy which you primarily collect from the dead bodies of enemies and secondly from completing wave challenges. The amount you get unless, you are the highest level scout, is so small that you must go many waves without anything which should not be the way to play horde. Horde is about having base and placing defences to help you survive the whole thing. Not going fifteen waves without anything because you really need to save. The bosses make the whole getting and keeping fortifications harder as two of the bosses make the whole process pointless. The ‘Snatcher’ and ‘Kestrel’ are the worst. The Snatcher can leap and just straight up charge right through everything and reach you within seconds. Kestrel just fires over cover and flies wherever it wants,bombing everything you ever held dear to you. In the higher difficulties these two almost means instant death. The horde class and skill system is good though as it adds more replay value and adds a new layer to horde. Upgrading skills is a real pain though as you need packs to get more skill cards but getting packs require golden coins which take long to get. It does become a grind.

Overall the whole game is great and having a lot of fun killing, executing and receiving hate mail from online gamers. Just add options to counter the gnasher, create an free add on to the campaign, give more gold coins per horde and multiplayer matches and readjust the fabricator system in horde and the game will be multiple steps better. The devlopers, ‘The Coalition’ has done a great job.

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