Gears of War: Reloaded Second Beta Extended With More Game Modes and Maps

Developer The Coalition has announced that it is bringing in more features to its second multiplayer beta for Gears of War: Reloaded. In a post on X, the studio has revealed that, alongside the Social Team Deathmatch and Competitive King of the Hill modes, players will also get to to try out the Competitive Execution mode.

Along with this, the studio has also confirmed that the Canals map will also be part of the beta. The second beta will be kicked off on June 20 at 12 pm PDT, and will go on until Sunday, June 22, 9 pm PDT. Cross-play is also expected to be enabled for the second beta as well.

“We heard you,” posted the studio on social media. “More maps. More modes. More time. This weekend’s Multiplayer beta has been extended and Execution will now be playable along with KOTH.”

The first beta took place over the previous weekend, from June 13 to June 15, and was available to anyone who had pre-ordered Gears of War: Reloaded. The beta is also available to those who have subscribed to either Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass, as well as those that already own a digital copy of Gears of War: Ultimate Edition.

Gears of War: Reloaded was originally announced back in May, and will be coming to PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on August 26. The title, priced at $39.99, has been described by Xbox Game Studios as a “celebration” of the seminal shooter that first made its debut on the Xbox 360 all the way back in 2006. It is also worth noting that players that already own Gears of War: Ultimate Edition will get Reloaded as a free upgrade.

In a podcast earlier this month, technical director Kate Rayner and studio head Mike Crump spoke about the development of Gears of War: Reloaded, including things like how much of an improvement it offers over the original in terms of visuals, as well as how much work has gone into improving the infrastructure required to support its multiplayer modes.

“It’s fully remastered and enhanced to take advantage of modern hardware,” said Rayner. “Going back to the original, we’ve increased the resolution by 900 percent, 9x, and doubled the frame rate. Campaign running at 60 frames per second now, and multiplayer supporting 60 as well as 120 frames per second. We support variable refresh rate, we support native high-dynamic range lighting, and we’ve also unlocked 4K assets and ultra-resolution textures that were not in the original console versions of the game.”

“We have 7.1.4 3D spatial audio, and we’ve improved the lighting, the shadows, and reflections, and really have pushed the quality of this title to be a full remaster on every device that it’s shipping on.”

When it comes to multiplayer, Rayner confirmed that Gears of War: Reloaded will have dedicated PvP servers in more data centres all over the world, which will all poll for data at a frequency of 60 Hz to make gameplay feel more responsive.