Sure, Fallout, Far Cry, CoD and Gears of War may have all been great games, but how many sequels can you make before you hit the quality level of the Police Academy series?  Are we doomed to see games reduced to several family lines that dominate, with a small selection of independent games done on the cheap?  Story line replayability and conversion mods can keep an older game alive, so you could always just replay it with a completely different outcome or with a completely different take on the game entirely. 

On the other hand, some of us love the familiar and want to revisit sub-plots and meta-stories that were never wrapped up in the first go around.  For the Xbox 360 gamer, the flagship game was Gears of War and now the second installment has come out.  Join Ars Technica on a romp through the newly expanded world, with new weapons and new beasties to use them on.

“Unfortunately, the verdict on Gears of War 2 isn’t quite as clear cut as one would hope. Gears 2 manages to simultaneously amaze and disappoint, enthrall and bore. Epic has done a great job tweaking what was a great experience in the original, but it’s clear that there are still some areas where the original mechanics have been left unrefined, and even clearer that creativity in the campaign setting may be waning in spite of the clear advance in technology. That said, Gears 2 still stands as the single best Xbox 360 title due out for the holiday season, and an exceedingly well-made game.”

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