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Gears of War: Hivebusters
Prepare for the Gears 5 game with this pulse-pounding mission and a whole new squad!
All first printings include a download code to access the "Hivebusters Bundle," which contains the Mechanic Mac skin as well as a banner of the Hivebusters cover art.
After successfully busting a Swarm hive on the remote island of Pahanu, this suicide squad will face their most dangerous mission yet--going after the Swarm that decimated the home settlement of one of their own! As Mac seeks to take revenge against the monsters that wiped out his hometown, tempers rise as Keegan and Lahni try to keep the team on track, but are they on a collision course with certain death?
Set on the fictional planet of Sera, the Gears of War series charts the story of humanity's struggle against an army of monstrous, fearsome, and brutal adversaries through a captivating tale of hope, comradery, and survival.
All first printings include a download code to access the "Hivebusters Bundle," which contains the Mechanic Mac skin as well as a banner of the Hivebusters cover art.
After successfully busting a Swarm hive on the remote island of Pahanu, this suicide squad will face their most dangerous mission yet--going after the Swarm that decimated the home settlement of one of their own! As Mac seeks to take revenge against the monsters that wiped out his hometown, tempers rise as Keegan and Lahni try to keep the team on track, but are they on a collision course with certain death?
Set on the fictional planet of Sera, the Gears of War series charts the story of humanity's struggle against an army of monstrous, fearsome, and brutal adversaries through a captivating tale of hope, comradery, and survival.
- GenresGraphic NovelsComics
120 pages, Paperback
Published August 25, 2020
9 people are currently reading
47 people want to read
About the author
Kurtis J. Wiebe
182 books768 followersKurtis Wiebe is a Vancouver, Canada based author. The founder and CEO of Vast Vision Publishing, he comes from a two decades long career in comics and games. He is the co-creator of over ten original comic series and a content creator spanning podcasts, live streams and other digital media. His stories have garnered multiple industry awards including two coveted Shuster’s for best writer.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 28, 2020
Great art with so-so story.
May 16, 2024
Gears of War: Hivebusters is a mixed bag. On the one hand, its five issues are absolutely beautiful to look at (especially when scenes are taking place outside) and the concept of hivebusting is interesting -- if absolutely insane. On the other, the story and thin characters fell a little flat for me.
Hivebusting is, in short, allowing the enemy locust swarm to capture you and take you back to their base, so that you can locate the base and destroy it. I can't quite believe that anyone would actually undertake this sort of assignment, and I wish we learned more about how our protagonists decided to even try hivebusting in the first place, but it's pretty cool nonetheless.
This series is visually striking as Mac and his team make their way through the destroyed beauty that has made Gears of War stand out since the first game launched (although, notably, Hivebusters takes its color palette from the newer games instead of the brown filter of the earlier ones). Unfortunately, these visuals are the series' high point. The character interactions aren't memorable and it feels like we only get part of the story, with very little introduction to anything or context that would make me care more about what's going on. The only real notable piece of story is seeing what Colonel Hoffman from the games has been up to lately. (If I had to guess, other context for the story will be in the Hivebusters downloadable expansion for Gears 5.)
Once our characters get into a hive, everything falls apart. For one, action scenes are presented abruptly (all is quiet in one panel and there's a whole horde of enemies right next to the heroes in the next panel) and there aren't a lot of transition panels to help me visualize movement during battles (it's like you're looking at screenshots of a battle and piecing it together rather than watching it unfold in your mind's eye). And the dream sequences that accompany Mac's journey after being captured before he arrives in the hive aren't adequately explained and are confusingly presented.
Overall, Gears of War: Hivebusters is a passable introduction to hivebusting and the one-note characters from the Hivebusters expansion for Gears 5 and a great piece of eye-candy for fans of the lush destroyed beauty look of the recent games. But there is no great action set piece or narrative hook here.
Hivebusting is, in short, allowing the enemy locust swarm to capture you and take you back to their base, so that you can locate the base and destroy it. I can't quite believe that anyone would actually undertake this sort of assignment, and I wish we learned more about how our protagonists decided to even try hivebusting in the first place, but it's pretty cool nonetheless.
This series is visually striking as Mac and his team make their way through the destroyed beauty that has made Gears of War stand out since the first game launched (although, notably, Hivebusters takes its color palette from the newer games instead of the brown filter of the earlier ones). Unfortunately, these visuals are the series' high point. The character interactions aren't memorable and it feels like we only get part of the story, with very little introduction to anything or context that would make me care more about what's going on. The only real notable piece of story is seeing what Colonel Hoffman from the games has been up to lately. (If I had to guess, other context for the story will be in the Hivebusters downloadable expansion for Gears 5.)
Once our characters get into a hive, everything falls apart. For one, action scenes are presented abruptly (all is quiet in one panel and there's a whole horde of enemies right next to the heroes in the next panel) and there aren't a lot of transition panels to help me visualize movement during battles (it's like you're looking at screenshots of a battle and piecing it together rather than watching it unfold in your mind's eye). And the dream sequences that accompany Mac's journey after being captured before he arrives in the hive aren't adequately explained and are confusingly presented.
Overall, Gears of War: Hivebusters is a passable introduction to hivebusting and the one-note characters from the Hivebusters expansion for Gears 5 and a great piece of eye-candy for fans of the lush destroyed beauty look of the recent games. But there is no great action set piece or narrative hook here.
September 22, 2020
This was a pretty fun read. I'm a fan of the Escape mode in Gears 5 and this book did a good job properly introducing it's leads; Lahni, Mac and Keegan, to the world of Gears of War. All three were decently expanded upon, with their backgrounds characteristics and motivations explored a fair deal.
The real star of the show however, especially for those who don't care about minor plot points and characters from a shooter game, is the art. The vistas and meadows; the towns and rivers are all gorgeous to look at. The fight scenes are well drawn too.
I hope we get more of these character in the future, to give them a little more depth, but as an introduction to them Hivebusters is a good start.
The real star of the show however, especially for those who don't care about minor plot points and characters from a shooter game, is the art. The vistas and meadows; the towns and rivers are all gorgeous to look at. The fight scenes are well drawn too.
I hope we get more of these character in the future, to give them a little more depth, but as an introduction to them Hivebusters is a good start.
June 3, 2020
Overall not a had series! But it just didn't feel like old gears, but i will try and become more used to a new generation of gears stories, which is fine, as long as there good and give more lore!
April 1, 2021
Scorpio Squad hitting you right in the feels. Mac, Lahni, and Keegan are a treat.
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February 12, 2022Great
It was a very good story. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The ending part of the story is heart wrenching and so whole some
It was a very good story. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The ending part of the story is heart wrenching and so whole some
August 9, 2025
There's a paradox at the heart of Gears that I don't think the series will ever shake. That on the surface, it's got over the top violence, while below the surface, you have solid storytelling, worldbuilding, and characters. To me at least, it's the OTTness that has always been window dressing. I bring this up because this comic kind of embodies that tension in that I found myself bored with the action scenes, but more invested in the character dynamics. Having started reading Gears: Bloodlines, I'm further reminded of how the series's strongest narrative strengths are pretty segragated from its strongest gameplay strengths. But that aside, I'll give my take.
The Swarm is boring, narratively. Or at least, this comic makes them as such. There's no Swarm characters, and throwing hordes of Swarm at the protagonists might make for nice artwork, but for me, it's tedious. Again, great from a gameplay standpoint, but this isn't a game, so in terms of narrative, it's lacking. But, getting into the dynamic of Team Scorpio, things are slowly revealed over the course of the graphic novel, so that by the end, I was indeed experiencing "the feels."
It's not perfect though, since of the three, Mac gets by far the most character development, whereas Lahni and Keegan get much less. This isn't bad on an objective level, but if you have a trio of characters, one of which gets more development than the others...well, okay, Harry Potter got away with that, but here, I dunno, it's just noticable. But as his backstory is slowly opened up, a lot of it is done through visual storytelling and slights of hand, making full use of the visual medium. And that's at its best in the comic's quieter moments.
So, yeah. Comic's at its best when it slows down, and at its worst when the characters are going pew-pew-pew against the monsters. In other words, kind of what Gears is best at, at least in its EU.
The Swarm is boring, narratively. Or at least, this comic makes them as such. There's no Swarm characters, and throwing hordes of Swarm at the protagonists might make for nice artwork, but for me, it's tedious. Again, great from a gameplay standpoint, but this isn't a game, so in terms of narrative, it's lacking. But, getting into the dynamic of Team Scorpio, things are slowly revealed over the course of the graphic novel, so that by the end, I was indeed experiencing "the feels."
It's not perfect though, since of the three, Mac gets by far the most character development, whereas Lahni and Keegan get much less. This isn't bad on an objective level, but if you have a trio of characters, one of which gets more development than the others...well, okay, Harry Potter got away with that, but here, I dunno, it's just noticable. But as his backstory is slowly opened up, a lot of it is done through visual storytelling and slights of hand, making full use of the visual medium. And that's at its best in the comic's quieter moments.
So, yeah. Comic's at its best when it slows down, and at its worst when the characters are going pew-pew-pew against the monsters. In other words, kind of what Gears is best at, at least in its EU.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews