Space Marine "Rips Off" Gears of War

mirasiel

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Inkidu said:
Soviet Heavy said:
Of course, given that the review is from Official Xbox Magazine, the bias would be apparent.
http://www.oxm.co.uk/33345/reviews/warhammer-40000-space-marine-review/

I get that people are allowed to dislike games for their own reasons, but there is a difference between that and making every comparison in your review to an exclusive title for your respective console.

Yeah, I'm bitching, but it is bullshit reviews like this that barely account for anything the game offers in favor of trashing it in comparison to your latest cash cow that is hurting the way games are judged. Space Marine is supposed to be the anti Gears of War, yet that is all OXM can be bothered to talk about.
You're right. Space Marine does ripoff Robert A. Heinlein's military science-fiction masterpiece Starship Troopers. See you on the bounce!
It can be hilarious to run that line in a Games Workshop sometimes..."Oh look they even stole the Bugs (Tyrannids) and the Skinnies (Tau/Eldar depending)" ...Its all fun and games until someone spills his Irn-bru all over "THE FIELD OF GLORY!"

Though I do admit to joining in the mass scorning of some poor child who tried to claim that his "internet research" proved that WH40k tabletop was a rip-off of GoW :)
 

shootdown

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Are they kidding? the demo played nothing like Gears Of War. Combat is completely different with all the melee, not sticking to cover and being rewarded for executions (or pretty much being
required to complete a ton of combat executions on hard).

Moving around feels vaguely similar which isn't reason to call it a clone, a lot of different games have you move around in almost exactly the same ways (esp shooters) and no one draws up similarities there.

The D-pad for weapon selection looks the same but with the differences in how weapons work it doesn't feel all that similar in play.

Aesthetically it does look quite similar but I feel forced to say that aesthetics-wise, the whole 40k came first thing IS a valid argument.

Anyway, calling Space Marine a Gears clone is akin to calling every fps a DOOM clone. (may have exaggerated a little on that last point but the analogy still stands)
 

Riff Moonraker

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Good gravy. To everyone going berserk about THE GAMEPLAY being compared to Gears, you need to relax. I mean, it could be compared to crappy games versus one that is as popular as Gears.

They arent saying anything about the game lore, just the controls and gameplay. Also, Warhammer was traditionally an RTS, wasnt it? I do believe this is the first time they are stepping into the TPS realm, and if that is the case.... Gears was there before they were. Just saying..
 

TheKramers

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No matter how many people say that Warhammer came first, the simple fact is that I played Gears of War first, the Gears of War video game came out first. The game will always seem like nothing more than a Gears rip-off to me.
 

Sonicron

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Mar 11, 2009
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Not sure I can take a review that's so ridiculously short and superficial seriously.

However, speaking as a massive fan of W40k who (unsurprisingly) enjoyed Space Marine, I support the final score of that review (NOT all of the arguments behind it). The game is fun, but it certainly has its flaws in both campaign and multiplayer, and I wouldn't score it differently (if I were one to use scores, that is).

As for the rip-off argument... eh. We all know that Warhammer came first, but even though the gameplay differs in a number of ways I couldn't help but feel reminded of Gears. Why the hell does that have to be a bad thing, anyway? The OXM reviewer seems to (in part) pick on Space Marine for a lack of originality, which is hilarious enough considering the magazine he writes for, but using a tried-and-tested template and build your game on top of that foundation is no reason for condemnation; I say this as someone who was immensely entertained by games such as Dante's Inferno and Transformers: War for Cybertron (which were also clobbered with the rip-off stamp).
 

NickCaligo42

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If anything it's more like a knock-off of Ratchet and Clank. :\ Even that's not a very accurate description.

Ayjona said:
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.
Yeah. There's no cover system and the chainsword functions completely differently, more in a hack-and-slash style. The weapons are a lot crazier, too. The Xbox guys evidently didn't actually play Space Marine.
 

Jacob Haggarty

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I wouldn't go as far as to call it a clone, but yeah, they're very similar.

It doesn't even say that in the article. If anything, the closest it gets is praising it for a "Proven shooter design". As well as that, the score is seven. Thats not actually that bad.

It's quite clear you're just a little bit upset that not everyone shares your sparkling view of the game, and that seems a little bit childish to me. They've judged it in a manner that's perfectly fair; They pointed out that it shares some close similarities with gears, but never says that it's a clone. Spacemarine is judged on it's own merits, and demerits, more so than just how it looks like another game. As i just said, they PRAISE the fact that its like gears. Its one of the positive aspects according to them.

And although i DO agree that oxm can be biased with some games, for instance i just read the deus ex: HR review, and its given a sparkly ten out of ten, with nary a mention to some of its shortcomings that many of other reviewers managed to get to (bosses). I just don't think that spacemarine has any sort of bias, in either harmful or beneficial flavours.
 

The Forces of Chaos

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Versuvius said:
bjj hero said:
Versuvius said:
Psychoconditioning, training, brutal execution in some initiates training for that kind of thing. Now they -could- have been gay before they were marines, but afterward it...just isn't viable. It might be true in some chapters, Salamanders are encouraged to live with normal human families but this is Ultramarines. They are perfect, flawless. Perfect and flawless in a facist, xenophobic, slave driven empire wide society. Since it is run by a CHURCH based heavily on christianity, preaching purity, restraint, piety (Not freedom, love and peace, those happen when you die and only if you die in service of the emperor) it is just so highly unlikely. That and to make them super soldiers they have their urges either buried or outright turned off. Understand the background of Warhammer before making assumptions.

Ps. Emperors Children don't count.
You say that but ancient spartans had a similar structure and ethos. In ancient sparta intimacy common amongst males.

As far as the piety and having urges turned "off", Im sure you are aware that there is not a single gay priest in existence and they are all celibate. I'm not aware of any mention of sexual preference included in the space marine fluff.
Spartans don't have 22 new organs implanted specificially to chemically alter their bodies and brains and days hooked up to mind altering brain machines pumping information, opinions and State-Approved conceps into their minds.

Also the church is as corrupt as hell but still holds a totalitarian grip over the imperium of man.
Versuvius is correct, also if you consider most are transformed at the start and throughout puberty. This is a child solider breeding program. Hell they take the most lethal kids they can find (rapists, murderers, serial killers, gang members at a young age) and put them though a brutal process to turn out elite warriors.
 

bjj hero

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Versuvius said:
Spartans don't have 22 new organs implanted specificially to chemically alter their bodies and brains and days hooked up to mind altering brain machines pumping information, opinions and State-Approved conceps into their minds.

Also the church is as corrupt as hell but still holds a totalitarian grip over the imperium of man.
I dont see how and extra spleen would change my sexual orientation. Also reprogramming of homosexuals has been and in some places is still being tried. Never been overly successful though.
 

shootdown

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NickCaligo42 said:
The Xbox guys evidently didn't actually play Space Marine.
My thoughts exactly, to anyone surprised at how many people sound so outraged by this I think it's because of how ridiculous the claim is.
 

Versuvius

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Can't believe i argued a corner that space marines can't be gay unless there are some terribly extreme circumstances (like slaaneshi influence). The day must be -really- slow

bjj hero said:
Versuvius said:
Spartans don't have 22 new organs implanted specificially to chemically alter their bodies and brains and days hooked up to mind altering brain machines pumping information, opinions and State-Approved conceps into their minds.

Also the church is as corrupt as hell but still holds a totalitarian grip over the imperium of man.
I dont see how and extra spleen would change my sexual orientation. Also reprogramming of homosexuals has been and in some places is still being tried. Never been overly successful though.
This is 38,000 years into the future where mass control has been put to an artform. I don't see how attempts at anything done in the past has any impact on FUTURE SCIENCE OF BRAINWASHING.

And it's not an extra spleen. It's a genetic overwrite.
 

Grospoliner

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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.
Gears of War and Epic do not hold the trademark on third person action shooters. To call it a clone of Gears of War is frankly fan-boyishly egotistical. There are a long line of TPS games that have come before GoW, and it would be far more valid to say SM is derivative of those works, as is GoW.
 

PrototypeC

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If you're getting mad about when they call it a "Gears clone", I can understand that. They wouldn't go around saying that their console-exclusive title is perhaps a "clone" of a better game, but Space Marine isn't their baby so they can market it as not worth buying as much as they want. It's kind of sad, really.

If you're getting mad about the whole review, don't. It's not nice, but that doesn't matter when it's all opinion. That's what reviews are, remember. It's almost like you're mad at this guy for not liking the game as much as Gears... that's something he's allowed to do. Sure it's biased, but there's no law that says it doesn't have to be. There's no sense getting mad at him for it.
 

Not-here-anymore

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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.
I've not played it, but if you're having to use similar controls as a justification for claiming one game is similar to another, it's a fairly flimsy argument. Control systems are remarkably standardised nowadays to stop people getting confused when they start playing your new game.
Or is this just the usual 'all third person shooters are gears clones' argument?
 

Terrara

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I agree with some of the guys points, although some of his criticism is like.. ehem
"All RTS clone each other as they have a resource system" (c)
You know, like that.
 

thiosk

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I think the important thing here is that since release, I have been reveling in the glory of liberating orks from their physiology in a way I never thought possible.

And will continue to do so.

Terrara said:
I agree with some of the guys points, although some of his criticism is like.. ehem
"All RTS clone each other as they have a resource system" (c)
You know, like that.
call of duty is just a duke nukem 3d clone.
 

ZZoMBiE13

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Oct 10, 2007
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Jandau said:
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.
No offense, but if that's true, you played Gears of War the wrong way my friend. You can play it prairie dogging the whole time if you like, but Gears shines brightest when you play it as an up close and personal melee Chainsaw-O-Rama. Which is how I played both of them. Taking every opportunity to Roadie Run up to the Locust and deliver a Chainsaw Colonoscopy. It's the ONLY way to Gears in my book. ;)