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The Gears of War: E-Day campaign is divided into Acts, and each Act is subdivided into Chapters. That much is settled: the campaign preview build shown before launch opened at the start of Act 2, and Chapter 2 of that same act takes the squad to Oria Stadium. Past those two references, very little of the structure has been published. The campaign itself is covered on Campaign.
The Act 2 Beats
The preview build ran roughly an hour, covering the whole of Act 2 Chapter 1 and the opening stretch of Chapter 2. It is the only run of campaign beats published in any detail: one act, seen partway through, not a table of contents for the game.
Beat | What Happens |
|---|---|
Assembly at City Hall | Bravo Squad reports for duty at Kalona's City Hall, converted into a COG base that is part triage and part command centre, and gives details and next of kin to Captain Akila Grey. |
Strategy briefing | Kalona's exhausted mayor and Colonel Trench clash over priorities, the mayor fighting to protect the city's civilians, Trench taking military command. |
The tourist map | The squad grabs a tourist map of Kalona as a makeshift guide. The pamphlet becomes the player's actual in-game map. |
Securing the bridge | An early objective is access to a bridge. Wretches rush across its underside and an adjacent squad nicknames them Crawlers on the spot. Boomers turn up too, hulking artillery carriers that can devastate a Gear in one shot. |
Oria Stadium | Chapter 2 moves to Oria Stadium, a landmark turned forward operating base, where the squad links up with Tai Kaliso and Theta Squad and the Chainsaw Lancer prototype changes hands. |
An optional detour | Chapter 2 carries an optional side mission where the squad can stop to help another team. |
The rail station | The objective after the stadium is a nearby rail station, ending in a brutal multi-level fight. |
Chapter Titles
Two chapter titles have circulated as readouts of the cards shown on screen: Act 2 Chapter 1 as "Bravo Squad", and Act 2 Chapter 2 as "Hold the Line". Neither has been officially confirmed, and no chapter title outside Act 2 has surfaced at all.
How Many Acts
A three-act structure has been described, which would sit neatly against a campaign covering one city over three days. It is not officially confirmed, and no total act count has been published.
Nothing at all has been published about Act 1 or Act 3. The build started at Act 2 and stopped inside Chapter 2, so the campaign's opening and its ending are both blank.
Difficulty
Difficulty is customisable by adjusting individual gameplay settings, and changing certain settings shifts the current tier to match. That system is confirmed. The four tiers below were read off the preview build's screen and are not officially confirmed.
Tier | Description Shown |
|---|---|
Casual | A forgiving experience for players who want to focus on the story and exploration. |
Normal | A balanced challenge. |
Hardcore | Every skill will be put to the test. |
Insane | Punishing difficulty leaves no room for error. |
The same screen was described as exposing the components behind a tier, each adjustable on its own: player health, player damage, active reload difficulty, recoil strength and the number of lives. Those are unconfirmed as well. Documented menus are on Settings and Controls.
In co-op each player's difficulty can differ from everyone else's in the same game, so a mixed group need not settle on one setting. Player counts are on Co-Op and Split-Screen. Boot Camp, the short training course that is one of the two onboarding modes, has been described as reachable from the same screen, which is not officially confirmed either.
What Is Not Confirmed
The total act count, and anything about Act 1 or Act 3.
A full chapter list. Only two titles have circulated, both unconfirmed.
An official campaign length. No figure has been published by the developer.
How collectibles work. Off-path rewards exist, but no system is described.
Whether the difficulty tiers and components are final.