Gears of War E-Day needs to bring back Beast Mode to truly satisfy me

Xbox’s upcoming prequel Gears of War: E-Day is an incredibly exciting return to one of Xbox’s most iconic franchises. Taking us all the way back to the beginning with Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago’s journey during Emergence Day, the upcoming prequel is exactly what many hardcore fans of the series have been craving.

While the campaigns of the Gears of War series have always been standout (even Gears of War: Judgment had one hell of a story mode), its longevity has always rested with its supplemental offerings.

The original Gears of War game survived on just its deathmatch multiplayer, but GOW2 succeeded with the addition of Horde Mode, a wave-based skirmish against the deadly Locust. For Epic Games’ swansong, Gears of War 3, the team made the biggest suite of supplemental modes with a massive PvP mode, Horde Mode 2.0 with base building mechanics and the addition of Beast Mode.

Gears of War Beast Mode was truly awesome

In GOW3, Beast Mode was the complete opposite of Horde Mode 2.0. Instead of playing as COG soldiers fighting Locust and building fortifactions, you control a host of creatures to hunt down human enemies. From the scurrying Tickers to the deadly Armored Kantus, this was an amazing addition that never truly came back to the series.

While Judgement did recycle some Beast Mode mechanics for the PvP, class-based OverRun mode, the true Beast Mode has never returned. Yes, Horde Mode has continued with Gears 5’s Horde Mode 4.0 being the best version of the wave-based mode yet, allowing players to fight Locust, Lambent, Swarm and DeeBee enemies all at the same time. But Beast Mode has never, ever returned.

With Gears of War: E-Day returning to the very start of the Locust War, The Coalition will probably be focusing on a much smaller lineup of enemies compared to the stacked Horde Mode of Gears 5. Yes, the Lambent are technically around at this point in the Gears timeline—check out GOW3 for information on that—but the COG won’t be fighting them during this story.

With a more limited line-up of enemies, Beast Mode 2.0 could be truly great. We could skittle around as a ticker or devastate the environment as a massive Brumak. The smaller the lineup, the more extensive each monster’s moveset could be. Imagine being able to dive under the map as a Corpser only to pop back up and snack on some faceless COG soldiers or even Stranded. It would be awesome.

I don’t expect Beast Mode to come back in Gears of War: E-Day, although I do expect Horde Mode to. But the experimenation of the Gears of War franchise is constant, even The Coalition has slapped brand-new modes such as Escape in Gears 5 to continue expanding the series. However, Beast Mode has been left on the cutting room floor for too long, and it would be amazing to see what the mode could actually be with some real effort put towards it.

Gears of War: E-Day doesn’t have a release date at the time of writing. However, the game will be coming to Xbox Series, PC and cloud gaming via Xbox Game Pass Ultimate when it launches.