I know everyone is reviewing or has reviewed this game already. Let me start off by saying, I was a fan of the first game. Sure, the story was lacking and it became quite repetitive, but I liked it. Now, on to the second one. What can I say; the game is great. THIS, is Gears of War 2.

The story is actually a part of the game this time. Joshua Ortega did a great job taking a really piss poor back-story from the first one and crafting quite the compelling narrative. Many of the loose ends from the first are tied up quite nicely and we have some form of closure. There are still a few plot holes, but they are necessary for reasons you can ascertain from completing the game. In a time when most shooters just rely solely on their namesake, this one stands out to me for some reason. Some may complain, but this is a thousand times better than Halo 3's story.

Graphically, the game has been punched up quite a bit. There is more than just brown on brown (They added a tan color to some things this time). Seriously though, the outdoor forest areas are very impressive, with a good amount of destructible trees to take down. The cityscapes are some of the best I've seen. There is also a wide variety of areas now as well. As I said before, there are outdoor forest areas, the usual burned out cities, but there are also snow capped mountain tops and you even go in to "the belly of the beast". Literally. All in all, much improvement was made to give a more diverse playing field this time around.

Game play has been tweaked as well. A ton of new kill animations (besides the fan favorite curb stomp) have been added, my favorite of which is the sniper rifle kill. The weapons are all still fairly balanced during single player and have received quite a few tweaks in the multiplayer as well (Which I'll go into in a bit). There is a good variety of different game play sections in the game. I won't ruin any of them, but suffice to say there is more to driving than just tanks in this one.

The new multiplayer is one of the real stars of the show here. While most of the old game types just got tweaks that make them VERY fun, the standout in the multiplayer is the new Horde Mode. You and up to 5 of your buddies are set in the map of your choosing and have to defend against 50 waves of enemies with ever-increasing difficulty. Now I played a game with one other friend...the @$$hole goes running for ammo and dies at the very beginning of the match, leaving me to fend off the entire Locust horde on my own (Although, he did provide good coverage of where enemies where coming from. Thanks MajorWhiteBoy). There were some very tense moments in my stand against about 20 to 30 enemies. Keep in mind they have very good AI and pinned me in a room with no ammo. It's moments like these that make me want to keep playing again and again.

All in all, this game is great. If you weren't a fan of the first, give this one a rent and see what you think. If you were a fan of the first and don't have this one yet...WTF ARE YOU WAITING FOR?!?!? Go get this heat now. After much deliberation and thought, I decided to not give out a rating for this one. Why you ask? Well, I turn it back around on you...Why should I? Instead I just give you a pic of a chainsaw battle, because chainsaws are awesome.