Space Marine "Rips Off" Gears of War

Atmos Duality

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So what does the actual argument state:
Is it a strike against the setting/source material?

Or

Is it a strike against gameplay?

Work from there.
 

DesertHawk

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It's largely up to the bias of the reviewer whether or not they will praise a title for being "inspired by", or accuse it of "ripping off" some predecessor title. I wouldn't get too hung up on it. The bottom line is that both titles occupy the same genre, and comparisons between the two are inevitable.

As to the argument of "yeah, well, Warhammer came first!"....that is completely irrelevant. The property of Warhammer 40k may predate the Gears of War franchise by a fair bit, but this is Warhammer's first foray into the Third Person Chunk-Head Shooter genre. A genre which Gears of War is numero uno of, and currently sets the standard for (for better or worse...). Again, keep in mind the whole of the gaming industry, and try not to get bent out of shape when someone connects those dots.
 

repeating integers

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Zhukov said:
Uh... yeah, it does exactly that.

Sure, WH40K obviously beat GoW to the whole grunty-men-with-no-personailty-killing-aliens-while-dressed-as-trucks thing. But the gameplay? Yeah, it's blatantly obvious that they were looking over Epic's shoulder.

Whether you consider that a bad thing is another matter. Games grabbing ideas from one another is hardly knew. Hell, the whole industry basically runs on inspiration/plagiarism.
What are the similarities other than a) CHAINSAWS (!!!) and b) 3rd-person gameplay, exactly? I've seen the demo played, but this means nothing as I've never even seen any videos of Gears of War.
 

AzrealMaximillion

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SmashLovesTitanQuest said:
U mad bro?

Seriously though, the reviewer gave it a 7/10 and all his points were more than valid. Could you point me to the place where he said, literally, that its a "gears ripoff"? Maybe im missing it. Because all I can find is this:

At its simplest, Space Marine is a Gears clone with a hair-raising health system which sees you healing by performing execution kills. Given how flagrantly Relic apes the Epic juggernaut elsewhere - weapons are swapped via the same D-pad system - being unable to stick to cover feels unnatural at first, but you soon acclimatise. New cannons and a Fury mode unlock at half-hourly intervals as you progress through corridors and arenas, nabbing Servo Skulls (Warhammer's audio diary of choice) to flesh out the plot's few secrets.
Which is... Well... PERFECTLY VALID AND COMPLETELY FUCKING RIGHT.

TL;DR: Stop whining, write your own review if you disagree, dont write off a reviewer just because he doesnt like a game you do, or rather, just because he doesnt like it as much.

Fucking hell, he gave it a 7/10 for fucks sake. If you seriously think that Space Marine deserves more than that... Jesus.
Tell me, how is this a Gears of War clone when Gears is a cover based shooter whereas this is clearly not? There is no cover system in WH 40K (as explained in the little snip[pet you yourself posted) so I don't know where the whole "clone" comment comes into play. If the reviewer is talking about the art direction of Space Marine, than he is indeed an idiot. Sorry but 40K was here first. That`s like calling a Dungeons & Dragons Video game a rip off of The Elder Scrolls...
 

Weaver

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I felt the games played remarkably different.

Really, what did you expect Relic to do? It's not like they invented space marines and chainswords and a lot of the 40k mythos has existed since 1987 and has a huge fanbase. They wanted to make a third person action game and they wanted shooting and melee to blend together as it does so often in 40k, and they accomplished it.

They needed a huge hulking space marine because that's how they have been defined since their inception. They needed a chainsword because it's one of the most iconic weapons in 40k along with bolters.
 

Kukakkau

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Yeah all that was said was that it plays/controls like Gears, but in a poorer fashion

So this translates to "zomg he is saying it's ripping it off!!!" how exactly? Reviewers use Gears as an example for how tons of cover based games play (Army of Two had that said about it for example)

Seriously I came here expecting an article on someone going: "it has chainsaws and man mountains they copied gears!!" but no, it's someone reading too much into a minor nitpick
 

MrLumber

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SmashLovesTitanQuest said:
Soviet Heavy said:
SmashLovesTitanQuest said:
U mad bro?

Seriously though, the reviewer gave it a 7/10 and all his points were more than valid. Could you point me to the place where he said, literally, that its a "gears ripoff"? Maybe im missing it. Because all I can find is this:

At its simplest, Space Marine is a Gears clone with a hair-raising health system which sees you healing by performing execution kills. Given how flagrantly Relic apes the Epic juggernaut elsewhere - weapons are swapped via the same D-pad system - being unable to stick to cover feels unnatural at first, but you soon acclimatise. New cannons and a Fury mode unlock at half-hourly intervals as you progress through corridors and arenas, nabbing Servo Skulls (Warhammer's audio diary of choice) to flesh out the plot's few secrets.
Which is... Well... PERFECTLY VALID AND COMPLETELY FUCKING RIGHT.

TL;DR: Stop whining, write your own review if you disagree, dont write off a reviewer just because he doesnt like a game you do, or rather, just because he doesnt like it as much.

Fucking hell, he gave it a 7/10 for fucks sake. If you seriously think that Space Marine deserves more than that... Jesus.
You don't think that the review complaining about a controls setup isn't being even a little petty?
He mentioned it in passing. Fucking wow. Thats exactly what I expect from a written review, small flaws tend to get pointed out. But I guess because its precious fucking Space Marine thats simply not right anymore, is it? Look at the end of the review, where he actually gives it a score. No word of controls.

Also, I love the guys who are saying HURR WARHAMMER WAS THERE B4 GEARS DERP. That not the point. Are you guys really incapable of forming a coherent thought? Hes saying the gameplay is similar. Which is also a completely fucking valid point.

Ah, fuck it, everyone here is determined to blindly hate on any reviewer who doesnt welcome Space Marine as the second coming of Christ, what can you do. Is the Escapist review out yet? I bet they score it somewhere in that range too, make the same points and everyone praises them for the fair an unbiased critic.
While I could personally could care less about Space Marine, and GoW for that matter, I don't like the word 'valid' being slung around like your own feces. To put it simply, he actually never makes a valid argument. He simply says 'its a Gears clone' and leaves it at that, no supporting arguments whatsoever. While this may or may not be true is beyond me, my point is he never actually makes a VALID argument.

Also, you should probably calm down, you sorta look like a douche cussing and calling people out like that.

Anyway, carry on with this inane argument over a game that probably won't even be a footnote on the history of gaming.
 

ace_of_something

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I've played GoW and only the demo of space marine. I didn't think they were any more similar than any other two 3rd person actions games... cover, weapons, enemy behavior seem different. Though i haven't played GoW2 maybe that's where it is.
 

lucaf

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considering cover is one of the most important gameplay mechanics in gears, and space marine has none, I don't see how it can be copying

the only similarity is that they are burly guys who use chainsaw weapons, and warhammer got that first
 

Phenakist

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HAH, such complete bullshit, it's gonna look like Warhammer, and play like Darksiders, simple as that.

DesertHawk said:
As to the argument of "yeah, well, Warhammer came first!"....that is completely irrelevant. The property of Warhammer 40k may predate the Gears of War franchise by a fair bit, but this is Warhammer's first foray into the Third Person Chunk-Head Shooter genre. A genre which Gears of War is numero uno of, and currently sets the standard for (for better or worse...). Again, keep in mind the whole of the gaming industry, and try not to get bent out of shape when someone connects those dots.
The fact that Gears "occupies this space" is completely irrelevant, there's no dots to join, it's the Warhammer universe, it's chain swords, bolters (big guns) hack slash, blood and guts, that's who the Space Marines are and have done for many years and have made no apologies for it. Just because Gears got it's foot in the 3rd person door first doesn't mean they can cock-block a space marine game and have it dragged to the ground for comparisons against it... and lets not forget what the lancer reminded everyone who had seen a Space Marine before of.

SO yeah, stupid comparison, it's glorified trolling really.
 

Ayjona

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I only tried the demo of Space Marine quickly, but as far as I could see, it had very little elements of a cover-based shooter, a genre to which I believed Gears belongs, and had more than one metal-clad hand in propagating. Or is my recollection faulty? If not, it would seem the two games have rather little in common in terms of gameplay mechanics, apart from being third-person shooters.
 

Jandau

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Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't remember my playthroughs of Gears of War involving charging into crowds of enemies with massive melee weapons and slaughtering them wholesale. I seem to recall a lot of crouching behind walls, and while you do some of that in Space Marine, it's hardly the main focus of the game (as is the case with Gears).

Also, insert a comment about every modern military FPS game today ripping off every other modern military FPS game.
 

RuralGamer

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How is it a rip-off? We don't accuse Battlefield of ripping-off Call of Duty or vice versa, yet here they are accusing Space Marine of ripping of Gears, yet;
1) Gears is a cover-based shooter, with brutal melee attacks
2) Space Marine is a visceral hack-and-slash, with some gun-play and no cover system

1 does not equal 2!

All they have in common is gory combat and third-person perspective

Sure, maybe they do use the same controls; notice how effectively the Call of Duty Controls work first and then count the number of games that have copied them; if it works, don't change it. Ultimately though, I suppose most of their arguments are valid (admittedly I haven't played the game and can't be convinced to splash out £40 on it), but for goodness sake, stop using the 'clone' moan; I'm really annoyed when its used to blanket every game remotely similar to a game someone likes.. urgh...
Basically, saying Space Marine is a GoW rip-off is like saying my neighbours cat is exactly like a tiger, when its the wrong size, shape, hates water, is the wrong colour and prefers to sneak up close and watch them like some kind of peeping tom (pun not intended) rather than kill and eat them; same family, but different.
 

Lhianon

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well, wh40k first made a quick buck with the idea of overly muskular man in power armor, there were persons who came up with similar ideas before (heinlein for instance). 40k also borowed heavily from other franchises, the catachans are essentially the team from "predator" 1, the tyranids, while being the spiritual ancestors of the zerg, are essential the aliens from, well, "aliens" and the the name eldar is derived from tolkiens "lord of the rings". i could go on with this, but i think you get my drift.
now, to the gears/space marine-"problem", i actually don't see why it is wrong to adapt a good idea. if blizzard and westwood had not ripped of each others strategie games, we probably would have still played dune 2- or warcraft 1-style games in the early 2000's, perhaps with the exception of homeworld. what IS exactly wrong with copieing good ideas while discarding bad ones?
also, technicaly, "chaos gate" had cover, so one could claim gears ripped of "chaos gate" xD
 

Simeon Ivanov

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Except Space Marines aren't gay, you don't have a cover system, Warhammer came first (and it's more awesome) ... so yeah.
 

mexicola

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This reminds me of the similar situation when WH Online came out:

http://art.penny-arcade.com/photos/215543608_oPsC3-L-2.jpg

but I haven't played Space Marine so I can't judge one way or the other and frankly don't care, people always compare games one to another.
 

TerribleAssassin

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Not trying to incite a Fanboy rage, but the OXM more than likely gave the Halo's a 90% rating, yet complain about something being generic?

But still opinions are opinions, yet it does seem unfair considering Gears of War has obvious roots in Warhammer.