Gears of War And F.E.A.R. Now Gold On Xbox 360

A couple of high-profile shooters just went gold on the Xbox 360 this week, and I'm pretty sure that most of you are familiar with (if not drooling over) them by now: Gears of War - the game that cost Microsoft "a billion dollars"; and F.E.A.R. - the game that cost PC gamers an equal amount of heart-attacks. Not that Epic's shooter will be any more soothing, mind you.

If you're with the "drooling" club, you must already know that Gears of War's highly publicized "Emergence Day" is November 12 for North America, and November 17 for Europe. However, you might be able to find the game at some US retail stores as soon as November 7, according to Microsoft, who also announced that development on Gears of War is now completed and the gold master disc is on its way to duplication. Various promotional events will be held by Microsoft as soon as Emergence Day kicks in, and if you want to know more about them, I suggest you pay a visit to GameSpot, as they has some details in place.

As part of their final PR push, Microsoft also released a touching ad for the game, described on Xbox Live as an "exclusive Gears of War commercial that will run in Cinema and on TV". Well, it's not so exclusive anymore, now is it?.

Finally, as we said in the beginning, the Xbox 360 version of F.E.A.R. also went gold, and Monolith's freaking shooter will be available in stores on October 31. How fitting for Halloween. Both games are rated "M" for Mature, but curiously enough Gears of War will be cheaper ($49.99) than F.E.A.R. on Xbox 360 ($59.99).

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)