Gears design director Cliff Bleszinski took some time to talk to Destructoid about Gears of War’s iconic armor design.

Bleszinski was realistic when I asked what the space armor said about the characters or world it’s based in: “The armor on the characters in Gears of War implies that they’re incredibly strong, resilient, and that they’re shot at on a regular basis,” he said.

But it’s not all about bullets and brutishness. After several iterations, the Epic team settled with armor they felt was “iconic,” and did more than make the men look tough. It was used to reinforce the need to use the game’s cover system.

“We cycled on the armor designs a fair amount until we came to rest on the iconic ‘rounded chestplate/blue emissive’ look,” Bleszinski said. “As with all things in game development, it required many iterations until we found something we all felt was iconic. Above all, it made the characters feel ‘heavy’ so that when the player took cover he really felt like he was slinging a massive entity against a wall.”

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Siliconera has a brief interview with Gears design director Cliff Bleszinski on the recent Japanese launch of Gears of War 2…

How do you feel about the Japanese version of Gears of War 2?

Cliff Bleszinski, Lead Designer: They actually did a really good job casting the voices. Marcus sounds like, you know, how a Japanese version of Marcus would sound like and Cole Train always translates hilariously into other languages. [In an impression] It’s Cole Train woo!

It’s fun to play. It’s fun to see the subtitling and everything like that. We do have a share of Japanese fans out there and we’re glad we could fill the promise of letting them play Gears 2 in their local language.

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The word on the virtual street is that Cliff Bleszinski has made some cryptic remarks regarding a possible female playable character in a possible future Gears of War game. Will gamers finally be able to play as a female in the Gears of War series? That’s the question Epic Games’ Cliff Bleszinski was asked by 1 vs. 100 Live host Chris Cashman during a game this past Saturday, according to Binge Gamer.

Bleszinski danced around the question and said he couldn’t comment on ’possible aspects’ of a game that ’may or may not’ be in development.” He then followed up on his comment by saying the female character sitting on top of a dead Brumak from the comic series “’may or may not’ be involved in any ’as-yet-unannounced’ video game projects.”

Of course, what should probably be focussed on here is the fact that Cliff’s statement pretty much boils down to a standard “no comment” response given by developers when asked a question about any possible unannounced title. While it’s pretty likely we’ll see another Gears game in the future, Cliff is a long way off actually “hinting” at any possible Gears of War 3 characters.

Will gamers finally be able to play as a female in the Gears of War series? That’s the question Epic Games’ Cliff Bleszinski was asked by 1 vs. 100 Live host Chris Cashman during a game this past Saturday, according to Binge Gamer.

Bleszinski danced around the question and said he couldn’t comment on “‘possible aspects’ of a game that ‘may or may not’ be in development.” He then followed up on his comment by saying the female character sitting on top of a dead Brumak from the comic series “‘may or may not’ be involved in any ‘as-yet-unannounced’ video game projects.”

The GameSpy guys had a chance to sit down with Epic Games design director Cliff Bleszinski at the recent San Diego Comic-Con. Topics of discussion included the upcoming Gears of War movie, as well as how to make it into the games industry.

GameSpy: Can you elaborate on what kind of talent will help get you [into the industry]?

Cliff Bleszinski: You have to be honest about the level of talent that you have. Whether you’re a programmer or an artist, you need to get on websites, like CGtalk.com, and you need to start posting some of your images for critiques. You have to be willing to throw away the first thousand images you do. Your portfolio is only as strong as your weakest link. You need to network on the Internet and eventually get to GDC, show up with copies of your work, run into people, like me, Molyneux, whoever. This industry is a lot more open than a lot of other ones, you could come to events like this and see us hanging out and say “hello,” and kick and scream and claw your way in. I think it’s kind of a self-regulating thing: If you’re that determined, and you’re that hard-working, you’ll get in.

Up to date on your Gears trivia? This Saturday, August 1, Epic Games Design Director Cliff Bleszinski joins Chris Cashman live on 1 vs 100 for Xbox LIVE. Cliff will be appearing in-game to talk all things Gears—including the newly released Dark Corners—and answer questions from the Xbox.com 1 vs 100 forum, all in front of thousands of players competing for fame and fortune in gaming’s first interactive console game show. The event kicks off at 5:00 P.M. Pacific Time (8:00 P.M. Eastern Time), so don’t be late! For more info, check out the official 1 vs 100 page.

Cliff Bleszinski has suggested that the future of shooters lies in the direction laid out by the likes of BioShock and Deus Ex, hinting that his next project will be taking a similar path.

In an interview with Develop, Blesinzki expressed his admiration of Ken Levine’s BioShock and Harvey Smith’s Deus Ex, and went on to say how the ideas put forth in both games might influence the next Gears of War title.

‘When I first saw Bioshock I thought, “how is this going to sell?”‘ said Bleszinski. ‘As a nerd I thought it was amazing but I was worried that a fifteen year old kid would pick it up and think “what the f**k am I looking at”?’

‘But it pleased me to no end that the game did so well. I had a conversation with Harvey Smith – one of the lead designers on Deus Ex – and said to him the future of shooters is RPGs. He said he completely agreed.’

When pressed on how such elements might be manifest in the future of the Gears of War franchise, Blesinzki remained enigmatic. ‘I mean, one could wean that from the comments I made earlier about the future of shooters is RPGs and see where things are going with us,’ he said.

Develop Magazine recently sat down with Epic design director Cliff Bleszinski to talk about all things Unreal, Gears and Epic, as well as future projects and current industry goings-on.

There’s also the idea that a game engine is best explained by games from its creators. In that sense, despite their critical and commercial successes, do you ever blame Unreal Tournament 3 and Gears of War for initiating the current era of space marine action heroes?

Not really, I don’t have regrets. We ultimately set out to make a game we wanted to play, and the tech ultimately winds up being formed around that.

I do know that we’ve set off a certain visual style. Sort of blown out, desaturated, war-torn universes that seem to be all the rage right now. 


Actually if you look at Gears of War 2 we actually tried to get away from it a little bit by doing things like letting the colours breathe and come through a little bit more. 



Stylistically though, I’d love to play in a different field in the near future in regards to what your typical expectation of a Gears of War game actually is.

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OXM UK sat down with Cliffy B. himself to talk about Gears of War and all things gaming….

Do you feel shackled by the franchise at this point?
No. There’s only been two Gears games, man. There’s still plenty of opportunities for things you can do in a cover-based shooter and there’s still a lot of stories to tell in the Gears universe. I’m not burned out on that at all.

But there are tradeoffs. With an established IP, you’re not saying “Are we going to do cover?” and “Who is this Cole Train guy?” It’s all there – the writer writes and it’s a known entity. But with a new IP, it’s raw and wide open – you don’t know and you’re playing in the sandbox and feeling out. “Is this feature going to work? Is this fun? Who’s this character, how does this fit into our fiction? How does this all come together” It’s like solving a giant puzzle in your head, and it’s great.

Whenever I talk to people in the business, I ask “What are you working on?” and when they say “I’m working on a new IP,” I say “Good for you!” Because I swear to god, if tomorrow someone came to Epic and forced me to do a licensed IP – “you have to make the new video game for the new Mummy movie” – I would go out back and put a shotgun in my mouth.

Original IPs are the best-selling and the strongest titles in the industry because they generally don’t have to adhere to rules or limitations. You can say “Can we do a flamethrower? That will fit into the fiction.” It’s the wild, wild West in the business right now. It’s like the comic book industry back in the day.

The interview continues…

Are you a douchebag?

I’m a giant douchebag.

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