But the Gears of War franchise has never really been lauded for its incredibly amazing writing and characterization, and while there are some sort of interesting threads, it ultimately is just a lackluster story.

It sounds like a nice idea and helps give some more characterization to the two characters in Delta Squad who are lacking in that more than usual. Marcus and Dom are absent for the campaign portion, instead switching over to Baird and Cole and set before the original Gears of War as they and their two squadmates, Sofia Hendrik and Garron Paduk, are put on trial for stealing experimental COG technology. The good and the bad mix together to create something that’s only really called a Gears game simply by having some of the characters from the previous entries.

It’s not that it’s a particularly bad game in this series, or even a bad game in general, but what it is is just sort of there.