Gears of War 2 picks up six months after the events of "Gears of War," and thrusts players back into a deep and harrowing story of humankind’s epic battle for survival against a nightmarish force of underground creatures known as the Locust Horde.

Players continue as Marcus Fenix, a reluctant war hero and leader of Delta Squad, six months after the events of “Gears of War.” The last cities on Sera are sinking, swallowed by a new Locust threat from below. A massive counterattack is humanity’s last hope for survival.

Gears of War 2 blends a best-in-class third-person shooter with unsurpassed high-definition visuals, all layered on top of an engaging story of survival, loss and retribution.

The following fixes and improvements are included in Title Update 5.

Improvements

• Adds the ability to view friendly-planted grenades in Tac/Com.
• Removes the cringe caused when a smoke grenade forces a player to drop a meatshield.
• Adds bonus points to the winning leader's score in the Guardian game mode if the leader successfully survives the winning round.
• Changes the postmatch Invite button to only invite former teammates, so a player can create parties more easily instead of trying to create a Private Match that includes both teams from the former match.
• Returns the roadie-run camera movements to the way they were in Gears of War 1 by decreasing the dampening values.

Exploit Fixes

• A player could modify the game's behavior due to a security vulnerability introduced in an earlier title update.
• A player could use a turbo controller to artificially maximize their rate of fire.
• A player could mantle a planted shield in competitive multiplayer to hide inside geometry or to travel outside of the map. The ability to mantle shields was removed in competitive multiplayer but remains in Horde and Campaign.

Title Update 5 also fixes a number of other, lesser-known exploits.

General Fixes

• An issue that contributed to the "sticky walk" problem, where a player's avatar could stutter after the player picks up a weapon.
• An issue that could prevent players from hearing the "boom" telegraph from Boomers.
• An issue that could cause looping audio to continue playing after the player who triggered that sound is killed.
• An issue that could cause multiple names to be highlighted yellow on the scoreboard instead of the name of the player viewing the scoreboard.
• An issue that prevented the game from granting the earned experience points from the fiftieth wave of Horde.
• An issue that caused players at level 100 to see the "congratulations" message after every match.

Title Update 5 also made additional small bug fixes.

Features:

• Gears of War 2 takes the award-winning gameplay of the original and improves upon it in every way. The genre-defining cover system is further refined, making the “stop and pop” gameplay more intuitive. Dynamic cover is given new meaning as downed opponents can be picked up and used as shields. The intimate violence of the battlefield is heightened when combatants engage in chainsaw duels. Destructible environments and vicious new finishing moves add to the over-the-top experience.
• Gears of War 2 continues to raise the graphics bar through its breathtaking visual effects, made possible through advances in Unreal Engine 3.
• Gears of War 2 takes deep and immersive storytelling in video games to greater heights. Players connect with humanity’s battle for survival on a personal level as they move through a story that introduces new characters and sheds light on the histories of familiar ones.
• Team up with a friend to fight through the harrowing story of Delta Squad in the enhanced campaign mode, now featuring drop-in/drop-out gameplay, as well as individual player difficulty options. Or recruit four friends to battle in the new game mode “Horde,” where you’ll fight together to fend off a seemingly endless onslaught of Locust forces to attain the highest score.
• Gears of War 2” features eight distinct multiplayer modes,2 including the new Wingman, Guardian and Submission modes, where up to 10 players choose a side and pit their courage and battlefield mettle directly against others. In addition, multiplayer bots are available to sharpen your skills offline or to fill out your online private matches on Xbox LIVE.
• New to “Gears of War 2” is a party system that allows players to form a full or partial team with friends and continue together from match to match without the need to reform after each game. “Gears of War 2” also supports a skill-based online matchmaking system, powered by TrueSkill, which groups players of similar skill level together in competitive multiplayer matches.