I actually don't expect to find Gears 3 that impressive, visually. I think it's pretty obvious by now that the PS3 (alternatively its attached second/first party devs) has surpassed the 360 in that regard, and once you've been wooed by stuff like Uncharted 2 and God of War 3, the Unreal Engine is definitely a few notches below that in both visual ambition and execution. Until I saw GOW3, I blamed the palette of Gears for its similarly muted impression on me - and it's true that games with more colour immediately look a lot more vibrant, Batman/Mass Effect 2 style - but it's really a lot more to do with the fidelity and animation of models and the lack of impressive post processing effects that make UE3 inhabitants rigid and awkward in comparison.

Until UE3, and specifically Gears 3, proves to have some lifelike animation and some natural, organic textures/post processing effects, I think it's prolly hopelessly stuck in clay golem/puppet mode. Marcus' facial animation always reminds me of Goro from the first MK movie.

I don't particularly mind though, I think it'll be a superb game. Provided they keep stepping it up the way they did with Gears 2 in terms of gameplay bits and bobs, it should pretty easily be the premium shooter experience again.

Why would it get praise left right and center if the UE3 is showing its age? That's precisely my point.

Rage and Crysis do the same things as Gears, dismissing character animation for visual fidelity, but they, granted, have more visual oomph than UE3 at this point, that's undeniable.

I think the PC mentality of protagonist you can't see and antagonist you're supposed to shoot has played down the importance of character animation and organic "humanity" for so long that it's a distant priority in crafting an engine. Only Valve showed interest in actually creating believable characters, but they haven't really made an engine in 7 years at this point.


Editation:
The graphics whore comment is a fun one though because in my time here I've probably covered everything by now. I am impressed by things very much outside of any measurable graphical standard. I play Wii games that genuinely fires up my chest region because they're beautiful, and likewise a game with buckets of zany visuals on an HD console sometimes irks me by being stupid about where it focuses those efforts.

My stance on Gears has a lot to do with that game focusing everything on its scenes, and nothing on the guys you control. That was fine for one and a half game, but the genre has shown how much you can do to create a more interesting and intense visual impression. Gears 2 adapted some of the contextual animation of Nathan Drake from Uncharted 1, Marcus ducking as bullets zip around his head, but it's still on a miniscule level compared.

Third time out, even the "scenes" it paints may well be surpassed by scenes from other games, and unless they've upped the animation it's pretty much surrounded by things that makes my heart race faster in that particular regard.

Ultimately though it's of little consequence, since Gears is absolutely brilliant as a game, and that's sort of the dealmaker for me, so to speak.

If Gears' animated less I don't think they'd even animate. "More than good enough" I have to wonder what you're even comparing them to.

I mean I am comparing them here, to where games are heading with that stuff. Inverse kinetics and contextual animation. Nathan Drake seamlessly transistions between animation based even on the elevation of the ground beneath him. Arcs forward when running uphill, placing his feet on solid objects running over a small stream.

That's what I call more than good enough. It's superfluous for sure, but other games are adapting that stuff and it has been setting a bar since the first Uncharted. That's almost three years ago soon.

I hate to keep bringing up PS3 games because I realise that irks a lot of people in this thread, but I think if anything, Uncharted and Infamous both show that you can "decorate" things with dynamic, flowing animation and not sacrifice playability at all. You just need it to seamlessly happen during normal movement.

Marcus trots along identically at all times, and while some of that is attributed to the panhandle controls (you can't turn towards the camera) they could still do tons to make him seem less like a piece of machinery and more like a human being.

Using an example that isn't controversially tied to a competing platform, Alan Wake incorporates quite a few of the techniques that Uncharted and Infamous use, and Wake pretty convincingly darts around the place, shifts his weight, contextually places his feet when walking up and down stairs. None of this is essential, clearly, but it does rocket Alan Wake to - in my opinion - the clear top of visual powerhouses on the 360 just by borrowing a few minor presentational elements from Sony's character action games.

There just doesn't seem to be a desire to pursue those techniques with Gears, and it's kinda stuck just polishing the surfaces of everything to be a marginally prettier *picture*. You can do loads for a game's feel and intensity by infusing the characters with more believable weight and volume and subtle behaviour patterns.

I'm not contesting that Gears plays great, of course. I still think Gears 2 trashes TPS'es to left and right, but it's frustrating that they seemingly have no interest in upping their game in the areas where other "premium" games blow it away in turn.

If I may, I'll call attention to Uncharted 2's spectacular building complex/helicopter fight. I wager 50% of its percieved intensity is just seeing Nate BARELY stumble into safety, BARELY grab a hold of ledges, DUCKING WILDLY as he dives into safety behind cover and the distraught look on his face and his body language as bullets rain around him. All of that is just layers on top of controls that are as responsive as ever, never once impeding your sense of complete agency. It's remarkably produced, and even though it doesn't mechanically play as well as Gears, that's not an inherent problem of those production values.

Gears could be competing on that level if Epic gave that aspect of it some thought and poured effort into it.

I hope none of this paints me a fanboy, because it's really just a general observation of games. It just happens that I really do think Uncharted 2 is an astonishing achievement with its relentless ambition, presentation wise, in every area. Much to my "colleague" Dominic's chargrin, I wasn't quite as evangelic about the game itself. But hey, that's another matter entirely.