Why Gears of War 3 should release in November

The conventional wisdom regarding Gears of War 3’s recently announced release date is that it’s a good move. By moving the release date back from the traditional October/November slot, the game will avoid big hitters like Call of Duty and Skyrim, as well as a slew of other high calibre games, including PS3 exclusive Uncharted 3.

This conventional wisdom is indeed correct, from a business standpoint. But we here at X360 aren’t a bunch of suits sitting around in our ivory towers with our ties done up to 11 and spending the gross domestic product of Africa on materialist nonsense.

No, our aims are far nobler than that. We care not for the numbers. What we do care about is putting an end to the greatest and most devastating war in human history: the 360/PS3 fanboy flame war.

It’s a war that has already claimed countless (social) lives, as citizen soldiers line up to do battle across the frontlines of the internet about which console is ‘best’. Reputations have been lost, mothers have been libelled and billions of dollars have been spent in a futile effort to prove which console or game is better.

So I propose that MS stop ducking the issue and put an end to this once and for all. Launch Gears of War 3 on the same day as Uncharted 3. To the victor go the spoils (and Metacritic scores). Let’s see those NPD numbers after the dust has settled. In direct, head to head combat, which of these partisan champions will shift more consoles? Which will sell more units? Which will generate more forum threads?

We could even televise it! With a counter showing each copy sold, and roving reporters at various sites to cover each side of the story, sort of like Michael Buerk in Ethiopia, but only much, much more important than that.

What about pundits (the most vocal forum-dwellers) in the studio talking about it, saying things like ‘Well Ken, the NPD’s are looking good, but the problem is that the shipped to sold ratio still hasn’t been resolved’, as if they understand any of this nonsense.

And special guests! We could have ‘analyst’ Michael Pachter, who would probably start telling us that Uncharted 3 wasn’t actually out, much to the bemusement of everyone involved.  What about could have CliffyB on one side, and Naughty Dog’s Creative Director Amy Hennig fighting it out in a live debate or, even better, in a fully-fledged Gladiators re-enactment, with the travelator and everything.

Oh, sorry, I forgot. Got carried away. These are just games, aren’t they? Not war. Games we should all enjoy for their respective merits. Sorry. Got caught up in it all there.