I'm not sure what Halo has to do with it? Also from what I remember Gears was a huge franchise back in the peak Xbox 360 days so of course it got sequels
They really did do a great job on gameplay. About half way through I realised that increasing the difficulty level, not using vehicles and barely using weapons was the perfect way to play DS. Items what were rarely used actually become useful (eg, sandalweed and repair sprays), building/upgrading structures becomes meaningful and appreciating other players more because of the connection I felt. I would walk across the entire snowy mountain pulling 2 carriers of packages and it would take me like 90 minutes for one journy but it went by so quickly. Also you find points of interest like the giant cryptobiote corals and the Japanses torii style gateway.
I've avoided DS2 like the plague but actaully bought it today for a christmas present to myself :)
I'm not a fan of the genre either but this is one of the few exceptions. I started a play through (fairly) recently and it holds up very well graphically but does fail in other areas as I would say it is racist in it's depiction of different cultures. So along with that I also think it one of the games where source code is patchy at best so I doubt a remake/post will ever happen.
The only reason I bought it was to play the FusionFix mod that was released last month as it looks amazing and fixes and improves so much. I haven't played it since the Xbox 360 release so really looking forward to it!
I really liked my 3DS and especially StreetPass and getting all those puzzles pieces. I'd take it to work with me everyday but once I lost all my progress I eventually just stopped playing on it.
I'm keeping an eye on the new dual screen handhelds but will wait a bit longer and see how it fares.
For a recommendation, the Boxboy! games are great fun.
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