where do i start...
first of all we know it's gears 3 and not gears 1, however after epic admitted with gears 2 that mistakes were made u would think they would want another gears 1 not a gears 2 again, so lets start with the basic core element of the game, now it does play at the speed of gears 1 which is a big plus, nothing worse than the lumbering players of gears 2 which looked like they were carrying a rucksack of bricks, the reason gears 1 worked is because it was a fast paced tactical shooter, everyone had their favourite weapons whether it was the shotgun, sniper, chainsaw, frag tagging. now it looks like it's DBS and retro's for nearly everyone.
gears 1 had moments that got the adrenalin going if u were 1v4 u had a chance of winning against 4, not now as it's just instant death without any real chance of survival in that situation, plus there are no little battles going on like in gears 1 like on mausoleum with the sniper or boomshot for example.
weapons.
DBS. hate this gun, no aiming no skill required weapon, cheap kills when used with mantle kick or smoke stun, maybe it should be a 1 bullet gun only, ammo pickups are only 1 bullet too.
retro lancer. way too powerful imo and is used far too much by not aiming and spraying bullets everywhere at close quarters, as for the charge, worse than the chainsaw as u can hear the chainsaw coming but the charge isn't loud enough, plus i saw a 1v4 and all 4 charged at the guy in question, he had no chance.
digger. now this weapon is decent, not over powered and is used more as a defensive weapon, plus u can impale someone at close range.
lancer. again like the retro too powerful but the retro is more powerful in dropping players too quickly.
shotgun. should be decent but overpowered especially from long range, in gears 1 it took about 6 shots or more on average to down someone from distance but on gears 3 it take 2 at the most, it's supposed to be a melee range weapon which it isn't at the moment.
hammerburst. i don't know what's happened to this gun but it's the weakest of the lot on gears 3 apart from the snub pistol, it used to be a decent weapon on gears 1 as a supressing gun, i have seen more power with a plastic nerf gun.
torque bow. so many people were using the DBS or retro that i hardly saw people using the torque bow, again on gears 1 it was a weapon like the boomshot people always went for.
sniper. no downing with active reloads so that's why no-one used it much, i think it's not bad if placed on certain maps.
boomshot. splash damge seems better than gears 1 but it still suffers with hitting people direct, both on gears 1 and 3 the boomshot bullets still seem to pass through people sometimes.
boltok pistol. still a decent gun, does quite a bit of damage too, maybe 3-4 shots will down someone which works well.
gorgon pistol. decent gun and more like an SMG now which i think is better than the old gorgon pistol, good for medium fire.
one-shot. not keen on this as it needs a zoom function because it zooms out to the full extent in 1 go rather than be controlled, trenches was a bad map for it to be on too, maybe thrashball would have been better.
hammer of dawn. never got a chance to use it on the beta due to everyone nicking it, trenches was an awful place to put 2 of them on, great weapon on gears 1, rubbish on gears 2.
flamethrower. powerful, everytime i saw it used it was like someone was waving an hosepipe everywhere, close range weapon imo.
mortar. still a decent weapon, should be placed better though, thrashball just had them spawn camping and using it to contain players trying to get out.
mulcher. powerful but it should be as it does what it should, tear players to pieces, should have replaced the one-shot on trenches at the nest though.
snub pistol. more like a potato gun now, really poor in power, pretty sure a lot of people never used it much.
boomshield. used to be a good item to have and thought it would be an advantage to have it when playing CTL as a defensive item, DBS can kill u in 1 shot even behind the boomshield though which is pointless having it, in gears 2 only grenades would kill u holding the boomshield.
no-one got to use the turret gun so can't comment on that.
grenades.
smoke grenades. why epic after u had smoke stun removed in gears 2 due to so many people complaining about it do u now have stun back again? cheap kills aplenty with this grenade.
ink grenades. are decent to clear players out like on KOTH for example, they seem better than on gears 2.
incendiary grenades. more of a case of having to hit them direct to kill rather then within distance, players seem to run through the fire on the floor so best used to hit direct for instant kill.
frag grenades. still the favourite but still the most annoying when planted next to weapons.
planting of grenades. is awful still, u would think epic would remove the ability to plant grenades next to weapons, really unfair as they can't always be spotted, radius of the KOTH circle should be implemented around a weapon where u cannot plant a grenade imo.
grenade damage. radius far to wide, again KOTH circle radius needed, in gears 1 u could evade the blast from a grenade but on gears 3 it's too powerfull, it's a grenade not a nuke warhead.
holding X. having to hold X for picking weapons up i can understand to stop the weapon sliding that went on in gears1 but surely it needs changing when picking ammo up, last thing u want is to have to wait to get ammo when u are being shot at.
mantle kick. gimmick for cheap kills nothing more, shouldn't have been added imo.
maps.
trenches. would be a good map but far too may power weapons on it, the map is too small to have so many on it.
thrashball. not bad, don't like the scoreboard in the middle dropping, needs to have maybe a switch to drop it and lift it instead.
old town. great map, this reminds me of a gears 1 map, plenty of ways to flank people.
checkout. i like this map, very compact but good flanking options, good power weapon layout too.
modes.
CTL. is far better than capture the meatflag which i hated, seems no guardian mode which is a shame but i think capture the leader is a mix of guardian and capture the meatflag.
KOTH. not a fan still of KOTH, don't know why but i just never liked it, i did like annex though on gears 1.
TDM. not a fan mainly due to the spawn camping that went on, if it's altered then it may be better.
summary. i still enjoyed the beta i do think epic need to alter a few things, the power of the weapons, the range, the grenade damage and range, removal of planting grenades next to weapon pick ups, grenade damage radius reducing, smoke stun removing, power weapon layout altering. the game needs to go back to what made gears 1 one of the most played mp games ever and i think if they change a few things here and there which i do think they will then they will have a great game on their hands, we don't want a game with just everyone dying with 1 shot kills we want to have the old battles that we used to have on gears 1 and with battlefield 3 and modern warfare 3 out not long after gears 3 they need to get it right.
again this is only my opinion.