Cole Train Returns on Gears of War 4

We’ve heard nearly nothing about the next installment of the Gears of War series, not even at E3 where many thought Microsoft would at least hint at a new game. Rather, the show closed with the revelation of Crackdown instead.

As such, any time we get even a morsel of information about the next Gears, it’s cause for celebration. Such is the case today as voice actor Lester Speight responded to a fan that yes, he had been called on to reprise his role as one of the game’s supporting characters, Augustus “Cole Train” Cole.

That would imply that there’s no sort of grand reboot in the works that would eliminate the other main characters of the game, including Marcus Fenix, Damon Baird and Anya Stroud. The Gears franchises recently slipped a bit with spin-off game, Gears of War: Judgement, starring Baird in the titular role, selling less than 1.5 million copies while all three numbered installments sold over six million.Gears of War is arguably Microsoft’s second most important and iconic series after Halo. But like Halo, it’s out of the hands of its original creators now. Bungie handed over Halo 4 and all future games to 343, while Epic Games sold the Gears IP directly to Microsoft, meaning it will forever remain an Xbox-exclusive franchise. The new game is being developed by Black Tusk as Epic moves on to other projects.

The Gears series has always been a solid performer for Microsoft, and each installment seemed to push the limits of what the Xbox 360 was capable of graphically. Ask most anyone who owned the console, and they’ll list one or all three of the Gears of War installments as examples of the best-looking games on the system, or really of the entire console generation.

That’s exactly the sort of thing Microsoft could use now, a good game, but also a beautiful one, to put to bed rumors that the Xbox One is underpowered compared to its rival, Sony's PS4. Technically it is somewhat less powerful given the hardware, but Gears has always pushed Microsoft’s systems beyond what was thought to be possible in terms of their graphical capabilities. A gorgeous Gears title for Xbox One could help to shift the narrative surrounding that system.

Again, we know very little about the new Gears of War, other than who’s making it and now that at least one old favorite character is returning. But it’s a game that the Xbox One very much needs to be a hit, as Microsoft needs all hands on deck to create must-have exclusives for the system in the face of stiff competition from Sony and Nintendo.

Now You Know.