Gears of War 2 is getting Xbox One X enhancements, and all its DLC is free

Along with Red Dead Redemption, Portal 2, and more

There have been rumors in recent days that Gears of War 2 would be getting a remaster a la the Gears of War: Ultimate Edition. That’s not quite the case, but it’s not too far removed. Gears of War 2 will be looking better than it ever has before.

As a part of its Inside Xbox livestream, Xbox has revealed that it’s enhancing Gears of War 2 on Xbox One X. Other Xbox 360 games that have gotten this treatment mostly took advantage of a visual overhaul. As Microsoft has said in the past, this allows for: nine times the pixels as the original games had, a 10-bit color depth rather than 8-bit, increased texture details and anti-aliasing. Performance is optimized to some degree too with framerate smoothing.

However, the enhancements likely mean the idea of Gears of War 2: Ultimate Edition is dead — at least for now. Anyone who wants to play Gears 2 at its best needs to buy an Xbox One X, which is a much more significant investment than plopping down $60 for a remaster. But, anyone who already has an X stands to benefit.

Gears of War 2 (and all the other Gears) has been a part of the Xbox One backward compatibility program for a long time now, so the opportunity to play it is still there. Accompanying the announcement, Microsoft revealed that it’s making all of Gears 2‘s DLC free. That should help bolster the game’s multiplayer map count.

The Xbox One X enhancements went live today for Gears of War 2. Its upgrades aren’t launching alone, though. Alongside Gears 2, five more titles are getting the same treatment: Red Dead Redemption, Sonic Generations, Portal 2, Darksiders, and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.