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Gears of WarWhy a derivative sci-fi gorefest is the best video game of the year.

By Chris SuellentropPosted Wednesday, Jan. 17, 2007, at 2:30 PM ET

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Chris Suellentrop explained why he loves the Nintendo Wii, and Erik Sofge explained why he hates it. Suellentrop also reviewed Sony's PlayStation 3 and ventured into the wilds of Xbox Live with Seth Stevenson. James Surowiecki wrote that the Xbox 360 shows what happens when video games get too real. Clive Thompson marveled at how Halo 2 takes players inside the mind of the enemy. Steven Johnson and Dana Stevens debated whether pop culture, including shoot 'em-up video games, is making us smarter.

Despite the clarity of this logic, those who are fiercely attached to gaming convention have moaned that they can't make Fenix bop up and down like Mario. In part that's because anyone with a certain amount of "gaming literacy" expects that "A" equals "jump." When that doesn't happen, it can be frustrating. It's like driving a car that has the brake and the accelerator reversed.

To compensate for tweaks such as no-jumping-allowed, Bleszinksi made the rest of the game hew pretty closely to the conventions of the shooter genre (see the aforementioned sniper rifle). In that sense, the game is intentionally derivative. But while the gameplay is repetitive enough to allow for a pleasing feeling of mastery after some practice, it also has surprising variety. It never feels like you're just plowing through a level to get to the next one. Each successive "scene" is a discovery.

In a 2000 Game Developers Conference lecture, Bleszinski called this element of game design "pacing." "Constant scares dull the senses," he said. "The scariest horror movies are the ones that lull the viewers into a false sense of security and then spring something scary upon them, and a great level is no different." Good pacing, I would argue, is what gamers really want, rather than plot. Pacing can feel like plot, because we're accustomed to thinking of games as narratives, even when they're not. Gears has only the thinnest of stories drizzled over its gorgeous visuals and addictive mechanics. The pace is what makes it great.

In another blog post at 1up.com, Bleszinski acknowledges the derivative nature of much of Gears of War. And that's what people like about it, he suggests. He points to the innovative, critically acclaimed, and commercially disappointing game Psychonauts, whose designer recently complained that game publishers aren't interested in originality. (He might have added that many gamers aren't, either.) "I don't think it's always a good thing to be 110% unique," Bleszinski wrote. "Sometimes, the more unique your game and universe design the more difficult it can be for millions of gamers … to latch onto your game mechanics and characters." He added, "The most original and unique films are often not commercial box office hits. They're the groundbreaking ones that other more mainstream flicks draw from in years to come as the larger audience evolves with them."

That's a good analogy. Bleszinski and his team at Epic Games set out to make Gears of War as the gaming equivalent of a top-notch popcorn movie, and they succeeded. It's a blockbuster, not a revolution.