Gears of War: E-Day is out today on Steam, the Microsoft Store and Game Pass, and the early reviews are strong. It sits at 88 on Metacritic for Xbox and 84 for PC, with an OpenCritic average of 87. Most of the praise goes to the gunplay. Most of the complaints go to everything between the fights. Note that this is a roundup of what critics found, not our own playthrough, and most outlets only played the campaign before launch.
The Short Version
If you like Gears for the cover shooting and chainsaw finishers, E-Day gives you the best-feeling version of that so far. If you came for a tightly paced campaign, expect some drag. Critics report a 20-plus hour story with repeated “clear the area” and “survive the wave” objectives, and a few open-world-style sections that several reviewers called dull.
What You Get
E-Day is a prequel set during the Locust war. You play new protagonists Mags and Lucas, with Marcus and Dom in supporting roles. Movement is looser than in older games, with jump, climb and slide options, plus new weapons such as acid shots and the Goreshot. There is local multiplayer, and online modes were not available to reviewers before launch.
What’s Actually Good
PC Gamer’s in-progress review put it bluntly: Gears has never felt better to play. Button remapping and the improved mobility help, and the sniper rifle and torque bow get praise for sound and feel. Hardcore difficulty gets credit for pushing you to use tactics instead of just holding a corner. The darker, horror-leaning tone also landed with many outlets, and a few reviewers called it the best entry in the series.
What to Know Before You Buy
The campaign is the weak point. Reviewers describe repetitive mission design, bullet-spongy elite enemies and boss fights with too much health. Normal difficulty is called too easy, while Hardcore leans on damage sponges. The story gets mixed reactions: IGN liked the heartfelt prequel angle, GameSpot found it disappointing, and others wanted more time with Marcus and Dom.
PC players have a bigger checklist. Hardware ray tracing is required, so older cards without it will not run the game at all. Steam lists an SSD as mandatory and 115 GB of free space. We broke the specs down in our Gears of War: E-Day system requirements guide. Some critics also flagged demanding performance, and Wccftech scored it 7.4/10 because it felt like too small a step from Gears 5.
Who Should Buy This
Series fans who care about moment-to-moment combat will get the most out of it, especially if you already have Game Pass and can try it at no extra cost. If you are on a GPU around an RTX 2060 or RX 6600, plan on lowering settings. If you want a fast, varied story or dislike repeated arena fights, wait for patches and player feedback on pacing.
Price & Where to Get It
The standard edition is $69.99 on Steam, and it is included with Game Pass on PC. A $100 Premium Edition came with early access from October 1. Multiplayer verdicts are still open, so if online modes matter most to you, give the servers a few days before spending money.
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