• By Tor Thorsen, GameSpot
• Posted Mar 13, 2009 12:00 am PT

Q&A: Exec. producer Rod Fergusson outlines update's brand-new ranking system, auto-balancing, and achievements; add-on features frosty remake of Fuel Depot, trio of all-new arenas.

Three months after the second Gears of War 2 map pack was announced, Epic Games has taken the wraps off its successor. The Snowblind Map Pack will arrive on Xbox Live on March 31 bearing four new maps: Grindyard, Under Hill, Courtyard, and a remake of Fuel Depot from the original Gears game. No price has been announced, but the last add-on for the game, December's three-map Combustible Map Pack, cost 800 Microsoft points, or $9.99 in real-world currency.

Though exciting for Horde mode addicts, the Snowblind map pack will be preceded by something far more ambitious. The week prior, Epic will launch its third and most extensive title update, which implements an all-new experience-based ranking system. The old TrueSkill system ranks will become hidden, but will still be used under the hood to "set up the most competitive matches possible."

Under the new system, players will earn experience points for scoring in public matches, advancing all the way to level 100. Upon attaining certain levels, they will be rewarded with the following Xbox achievements: Rookie Gear (level 5), Seasoned Gear (level 15), Battle-Tested Gear (level 25), Battle-Hardened Gear (level 50), and Veteran Gear (level 100). (The last two achievements will also require that players download and achieve feats in the Snowblind Map Pack.) Four other unnamed achievements will be added as part of the update, with a total of 250 GamerScore Points.

In addition to the new experience system--which will only be based on games played post-update--Gear of War 2's Title Update 3 will also feature new auto-balancing features which will swap in bots for players who drop out mid-match. (Those same dropouts will suffer an experience point penalty.)

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http://www.gamespot.com/news/6206057.html?tag=latestheadlines;title;1

The actual interview's at the link, but that's the relevant portion. My heartfelt condolences to you, Munkeh.

If they can punish the droppers that gets things done right.

What needs to be done is something about lag switchers dammit. They are even in SFIV!

I can't wait.

I gave up on the online multiplayer. Laggiest game I've ever played.

I like that bot idea for dropped players. They should implement something like that more often.

I really hope this helps. I'm tired of being a "rank 2" but always playing people with a million more skill points than me. I hope they make the matches more even because that may be just what I need to actually come back to the Gears multiplayer. I tried it the other day and it is still "host shotgun rules all" so I quit it after a few rounds.

I missed this thread, and you are right, I am very annoyed

Firstly I don't have gold
Secondly, I have no money

So I am going to loose my platinum, and will no longer hold the honour of being in the top 150 to get 100% (after 1st DLC achievements). I will get 3 months of gold over the summer and I will get it then (as well as DLC for PoP, Fable II and ME)

What also annoys me is that I have put 30 hours into that game, and if the ranks are not retroactive, which they won't be, so I will have to put even more time into this game and I don't even like it that much....

Anyway, the end result will be that I will end up with 1425g in this game (hopefully...)

cool

yes, more map goodness, and i still have 1000 MS points, yay!

I LOVED GEARS 1. I hate gears 2. The online was complete crap. I havnt played the game since november but stupidly downloaded the combustable map pack. Havnt even tried those maps yet and probably wont because im playing halo wars and Gears 1.