Gears 5 was a decidedly ambitious foray for the Gears of War franchise, with the defining Microsoft-led IP opting for a more open and diverse narrative experience. Releasing in 2019, the game offered lots in the way of featuring intertwining storylines that culminated in a seriously important player-led decision.
With Gears 5 now approaching four years since its initial release, it is no wonder that rumors are beginning to form around The Coalition supposedly pooling resources into a potential Gears 6. While this would be a fascinating prospect for long-term fans of the franchise, it remains that the aforementioned optional decisions that the player had to make in Gears 5 may have created a tough environment for the story of Gears 6 to carry on from.
Warning: This article contains spoilers for Gears 5.
The Branching Narrative Choices of Gears 5
When thinking back on Gears 5 and its campaign, one of the boldest decisions that the game made arguably lied within the huge level of narrative control that the player is afforded during the game's closing events. This decision leads to multiple possible endings for the title, concerning some extremely influential figures within the wider franchise.
The final boss of Gears 5's campaign is the Queen of the Swarm, who is the corrupted mother of Kait, the primary protagonist of Gears 5. At the end of this particular fight, the Queen has both JD and Del at her mercy, and offers the player an ultimatum to choose which one should be spared.
Crucially, JD is the son of longtime franchise protagonist Marcus Fenix, while Del is a close friend of JD and tri-tagonist of both Gears 4 and Gears 5. One of these two characters is then killed depending on the choice made by the player, making for an extreme narrative twist involving two massively important figures from the more contemporary storylines of the Gears of War franchise.
How Gears 5 Could Impact Gears 6
Discourse surrounding Gears 6 has recently skyrocketed thanks to rumors that The Coaltion has cancelled two games to make way for the long-anticipated sequel, with The Coaliton being in charge of the franchise since 2014. With this in mind, it is more than likely that Gears 6 would narratively build off the foundations set by the likes of Gears 4 and Gears 5, with many of the core characters of these games and even the older franchise installments still having many unfinished character arcs and plot points.
The characters of JD and Del were both massively important to the franchise's overall story, which is why the decision to save one of them over the other in Gears 5 held so much weight. While this was a fascinating narrative decision in the short-term, The Coalition now finds itself facing the difficult task of potentially having to weave the story of Gears 6 around these two branching storylines. Because of this, Gears 6 may have to have two different campaigns that follow the same general framework, with one having JD in a pivotal supporting role and the other having Del.
Not only would this lead to conflicting player experiences, it would also place a lot more strain on The Coalition to produce two forms of the same campaign to a consistently high standard. Adversely, The Coalition could choose to move away from the characters of the recent Gears games, of course then running the risk of making the narrative build-up of the past few titles essentially redundant. While the prospect of a Gears 6 would of course be welcomed by the franchise's fan base, it remains that the events of Gears 5 are very hard to follow-up on.
Gears 5 is available now for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.