Gears of War

Gears of War is a video game franchise created by Epic Games, developed and managed by The Coalition, and owned and published by Microsoft Studios. The series focuses on the conflict between humanity, the subterranean reptilian hominids known as the Locust Horde, and their mutated counterparts, the Lambent. The franchise consists of four third-person shooter video games, which has also been supplemented by a comic book series and five novels.

The first installment, titled Gears of War, was released on November 7, 2006 for the Xbox 360. The game follows protagonist Marcus Fenix, a soldier in the Coalition of Ordered Governments tasked to lead a last-ditch effort to destroy the Locust Horde and save humanity. Two subsequent titles, Gears of War 2 (2008) and Gears of War 3 (2011), continued Fenix and humanity’s ongoing conflict with the Locust Horde and Lambent forces. In 2013, Epic Games and Microsoft released Gears of War: Judgment, a prequel to the series’ first title, which instead focuses on Damon Baird, one of Fenix's squad-mates. At E3 2015, Gears of War: Ultimate Edition was announced for Microsoft Windows.

Gears of War 4

Gears of War 4 is an upcoming third-person shooter video game developed by The Coalition, and published by Microsoft Studios for Xbox One. The game is set to be released in 2016. It will be the sixth installment in the Gears of War series and the fourth main installment. It will be the sequel to Gears of War 3.

Development

During E3 2013, Microsoft Studios vice president Phil Spencer said he thought more Gears of War games were possible.

On January 27, 2014, Microsoft announced that they had purchased the rights of the franchise from Epic Games, and a new game will be developed by The Coalition for Xbox One.Rod Fergusson, former Director of Production at Epic Games on the Gears of War franchise, joined Microsoft and plays a key studio leadership role at The Coalition on the development of the franchise going forward. On April 1, 2015, The Coalition's eSports, cinematics, and weapons producer, Allie "JackFelling" Henze, confirmed that Gears of War 4 will not be available for the Xbox 360.

Gear

A gear or cogwheel is a rotating machine part having cut teeth, or cogs, which mesh with another toothed part to transmit torque, in most cases with teeth on the one gear being of identical shape, and often also with that shape on the other gear. Two or more gears working in a sequence (train) are called a gear train or, in many cases, a transmission; such gear arrangements can produce a mechanical advantage through a gear ratio and thus may be considered a simple machine. Geared devices can change the speed, torque, and direction of a power source. The most common situation is for a gear to mesh with another gear; however, a gear can also mesh with a linear toothed part, called a rack, thereby producing translation instead of rotation.

The gears in a transmission are analogous to the wheels in a crossed belt pulley system. An advantage of gears is that the teeth of a gear prevent slippage.

When two gears mesh, and one gear is bigger than the other (even though the size of the teeth must match), a mechanical advantage is produced, with the rotational speeds and the torques of the two gears differing in an inverse relationship.

Coalition (Australia)

In Australian politics, the Coalition is a formal alliance of broadly centre-right parties, which has existed in various forms since 1923. The partners in the alliance are the Liberal Party (LPA), the National Party (formerly the Country Party and the National Country Party), the Country Liberal Party (CLP), and the Liberal National Party (LNP). Notable previous partners were the Nationalist Party and the United Australia Party, both predecessors of the current Liberal Party. The extent to which these parties are in alliance varies at state and territory level. At one extreme, the National Party of Western Australia and The Nationals South Australia currently compete alongside the Liberals, while the CLP and LNP, contesting elections only in the Northern Territory and Queensland, respectively, were formed from mergers of Liberal and National state branches. A Liberal–National merger at national level has been proposed on several occasions, without much progress.

When in government at the federal level, the Liberal Party leader usually serves as Prime Minister of Australia and the National Party leader as Deputy Prime Minister, as is currently the case with Malcolm Turnbull and Warren Truss, respectively. This situation derives from the Liberal Party's consistently superior numbers in the Parliament of Australia, and is usually reflected at state level, with Liberal Party leaders of state branches generally serving as Premiers (or Chief Ministers). The most notable exception to this rule was in Queensland, where the National Party was generally the stronger coalition partner, and also occasionally in Victoria and Western Australia. At all levels of government, the Coalition's strongest opponent is most often the Australian Labor Party. Based on the traditional definition of what a Coalition is, it currently only exists in federal, New South Wales and Victorian politics.