Here’s 5 awesome things about Gears Tactics

Gears Tactics is a strategy RPG developed by folks with an insatiable love for the genre, and a single player story looking to expand on the world of Gears of War. Here’s 5 new things we learned about it during Xbox Inside.

1) Tactics was built from the ground up for PC, and despite being turn based, the fast paced action of Gears lives on in this side game. There are plenty of enemies in each map, and there is a three-action system where you can perform three actions per unit in a given turn.

2) The player character is Gabe Diaz, a “reluctant leader” who gets thrust into the motor pool with no control over the situation and must take control when monsters emerge from the underground to attack him. He is the father of Cade Diaz, the protagonist of last year’s Gears 5.

3) Gabe is on the hunt for an evil monster creating geneticist named Ukon. All of the monsters and bosses you see across the Gears of War series are the the product of Ukon’s experimentation.

4) The iconic series feature of executions now goes from a simple visual marvel to a bona fide gameplay mechanic in its own right. Executions grant bonus actions to your entire squad when performed, a clever way of keeping the flow of gameplay going. Think One Mores from the Persona series, but gory on a grand scale.

5) Gears Tactics is all about customization. You have 5 classes with over 30 unlockable skills each, a primary weapon for each class, and 5 mod slots for each weapon. Each soldier also has 3 slots for pure cosmetic customization. And the best part? There will also be no loot boxes or microtransactions- everything in the game can be earned with your skills alone.

And that’s 5 awesome things about Gears Tactics that we learned from the Inside Xbox showing. Gears Tactics launches for PC and Xbox this year!