Welcome to What’s Up, your weekly update on all the latest news, game updates and more in Gears 5 and beyond.

Here’s What’s Up in Gears this week:

Title Update 2 releasing Thursday

Ranked Improvements

Anniversary Event and Free Boost + Boost Bonus Stars Weekend

Gear In The Machine Podcast

Weekly Hive: The Clock

Weekly Supply Drop and Store Content

Title Update 2

Update: Confirmed date is now November 7th at ~8am PT.

Our next Title Update is on the way releasing later next week!

As this Update follows just two weeks after our rather large TU1.5 fix list, this Update is a little smaller but contains some key fixes we know you’ve been waiting on – including improvements to the Boomshot and Flashbangs.

We have plenty more updates and improvements in the works – some server side, some client side – as we work towards our biggest update yet coming in December with the launch of Operation 2.

Improved the consistency of the Boomshot with changes to the behavior of the secondary ‘bomblets’

Flashbangs will no longer affect players through cover

Full fix for the drop weapon exploit, including re-enabling weapon drops

Fixed a bug that could cause players to be perma-flashed in a match

Fixed a bug that could cause Enemies in Escape to sometimes be unaffected by Flashes

Fixed a bug causing the Weapon’s Locker to eat weapons in certain circumstances

Added a new check to prevent players using certain low covers to shoot through walls, ignoring muzzle block

Resolved an issue causing the Gnasher to have bullet magnetism while ADS when Aim Assist is disabled

If no users vote for a map in Quickplay, the next choice will now default to a different map on the same mode rather than the same map

Fixed a bug that caused players to have to wait a couple of seconds before being able to reload when Hijacking a Boomshot Scion

Power granted at the start of the Horde match is no longer applied as Power Gained in Tour

Sarah Connor: Enemies can now be gibbed when in one-shot range using her Ultimate

Fixed an issue that could cause enemy AI to teleport and ‘double vault’ if their vault is countered

Fixed an issue that could cause Scions to have a fully black model after being killed in Escape

Players can no longer share Power with AI teammates

Total Enemies Killed stat for Campaign now tracks correctly

Escape Leaderboards no longer show ‘Top 0%’

Resolved a state where audio could be lost in Act 4 in 3 player co-op

Additional miscellaneous bug fixes

Ranked Improvements

In case you missed it on Friday, Title Update 2 also brings improvements to our Ranking System that will be accompanied with a reset and a free Blood Moon Imago skin to show our gratitude for bearing through the issues. Here’s all the info from our announcement last week:

One of our top priorities for the studio, as outlined on our Status page, has been to dramatically improve the Ranked experience. We know Ranked in Gears 5 has been a frustrating experience so far, and we’ve been working hard to rectify the issues as quickly as possible.

Earlier this week, we found an issue that cause a discrepancy between a player’s Skill Points rating and their actual Skill Rating, which resulted dramatic point swings seen in the post-match flow.

We now have a fix for this issue ready to deploy next week in conjunction with the launch of Title Update 2. However, in order to ensure that the changes rollout correctly, we are doing a mid-season reset of all ranks.

Unlike our last deployment, where playing matches would often move you towards where you ‘should be’ in dramatic fashion, this is a full blown reset – which means all Skill Points will be wiped and everyone will need to replay the 5 placement matches in any playlists before gaining a Rank.

We know this move may upset some of you, but it’s necessary in order to achieve the long-term positive experience we all expect from Ranked. This is a critical step in our ongoing work to make Ranked the best it possibly can be.

Since we’re having to reset Ranks mid-season, we want to show our gratitude to all our players for your understanding and patience by granting the Blood Moon Imago Character Skin for free. All that is required is for players to log in between the deployment of Title Update 2 and the end of the current Operation.

You can track all ongoing developments around key issues at Gears5.com/Status, and we’ll be closely monitoring the results of this change – as well as your feedback – to determine its success.

Gears Anniversary Event

This week will mark thirteen years since the release of the original Gears of War. INSANE.

To mark the occasion, we’ve got a couple of activities planned in Gears 5 to help celebrate:

Golden Gun Is Back!

The hectic gunslinger Versus mode is back for Anniversary Week, complete with oversized Marcus and RAAM heads!

If you missed Golden Gun later into the life of Gears 4, Golden Gun gives everyone a 6 round Boltok that insta-gibs anyone it hits. The catch? You can only hip-fire.

Hit an enemy, and you’ll immediately get a bullet back in the chamber, no reload required. Miss and you might want to go make a coffee with how long you’ll be waiting for that reload. Moral of the story? Don’t miss!

Free Boost and Boost Double Star Weekend

From Friday, November 8th until the morning of Monday, November 11th, we’ll be turning on Boost Double Stars in Tour! If you’re trying to hit General before the launch of Operation 2, there’s no better time to grab those bonus stars from Objectives.

Anyone who logs in on November 8th will be awarded 3 Days of Boost for free along with the event-exclusive COG Tag Bloodspray so everyone can get in on the action. Remember you MUST log in on November 8th to get your free Blood Spray and Boost for the weekend. This is the only day these rewards are available.

Gear In The Machine Podcast

Last week, we released our first ever Gear In The Machine Podcast!

In order to continue providing as much clarity as possible around our ongoing work to improve the game, our Gear In The Machine Podcasts will bring you inside the issues on a topic-to-topic basis as we answer your questions and explain the improvements being made in more detail.

In our inaugural Gear In The Machine Podcast, Ryan Cleven (Multiplayer Design Director) and Dana Sissons (Director of Communications) from The Coalition sit down to discuss Gears 5 matchmaking and answer community questions. Watch it in the video above!

Weekly Escape Hive

This week’s Escape Hive is The Clock.

In this two Act Hive, you’ll be racing against doors that close off after a set period of time has passed.

The Hive is packed with Heavy Weapons behind these timed doors, so every second counts. For those of you looking to top the Leaderboards, one of the exits will offer you a whole load more COG Tags for better leaderboard times – but only if you can make it in time!

Supply Content Drop

Supply Drops are another way to earn rewards in Gears 5, dropping you content from the Supply Pool every time you fill your Supply meter just by playing the game!

Here’s this week’s drop of Supply content available on Wednesday ~4 hours after the release of Title Update 2:

Weapon Skin: Relaxed (Torque Bow)

Weapon Skin: Relaxed (Claw)

Mark: Stars

Mark: Arrows

Banner: Bunker

Banner: Dam

Banner: Exhibit

Weekly Store Items

Weekly Store Rotation

Winter Marcus Character Skin

This week’s Weekly Store Items features a new Winter-themed Marcus Character Skin and another classic Curbstomp – this time from Gears 2!

Weekly Store Rotation

Winter Marcus Character Skin – 1000 Iron

Foot Tap Expression (Global) – 500 Iron

Museum Power Weapon Skin Set – 800 Iron

Chicken Blood Spray – 200 Iron

Update: The Gears 2 Curbstomp will no longer be in the Store next week. Stay tuned for more information.

NOTE: the Store refreshes ~4 hours after the release of Title Update 2 and not at the usual Tuesday reset time.

Don’t forget, next Tuesday will see a brand-new collection of content available in the store while this week’s collection goes away.

Signing Off

That’s it for this week’s What’s Up. Our team are continuing to work on further improvements to the game based on our priority list found on Gears5.com/Status, including Phase 2 of our Matchmaking rollout later this week.

See you online,

TC