For the past few weeks, rumors have been flying around the internet speculating that smash hit Gears of War would eventually be released for the PC–despite denials from developer Epic Games. Yesterday in an interview with TeamXbox, Epic’s Mark Rein said that Gears of War will head to the PC… eventually.
Rein was asked if Epic Games would "formally acknowledge other version[s] of Gears?" Rein maintained that Gears of War is an Xbox 360 exclusive, but that it wouldn’t remain one until a sequel is released. This led to Rein saying that sometime in the future, Gears will be released for the PC. He used Halo as an example–it was initially released for Xbox in November 2001, and then two years later, Gearbox Software ported it to the PC. In his words, "Halo was a big seller on PC long after it kind of peaked on the original Xbox, and they’re doing the same thing now with Halo 2. We work at the pleasure of a publisher who thinks both of those are their platforms, so I think it’s ultimately inevitable, and obviously we’re a PC company."
With the upcoming release of Unreal Tournament 3 for both the Xbox 360 and PC, the game will be a test of how the Unreal Engine 3 can be further optimized for cross-platform game development. "The big challenge is to make a game that was designed solely for the console… and make it run well on enough PCs to be worth releasing," said Rein on why it’ll take some time for Gears of War to finally head to PC.
If–or rather, when–Gears of War makes the move to PCs, the multiplayer that’s currently featured on the 360 won’t be on par with the average PC shooter. Since the multiplayer maps are limited to just 8 people, Epic Games may opt to alter these maps to support more players. However, some would argue that the 8-person limit has its advantages over a 64-player game of Battlefield-, so gamers will just have to wait and see.
