Gears of War 4 has gone gold, Microsoft announced overnight. Following the release of the Gears of War 4 launch trailer, Microsoft made the official announcement via Xbox Wire. This event is also known as “Going Gold,”, and is a major milestone in development, marking the release of the gold master disc to Xbox replication facilities around the world.
The release is a big enough deal internally that Microsoft’s Board of Directors traveled to the Microsoft Canada Excellence Center in Vancouver, B.C. to celebrate with Xbox boss Phil Spencer and The Coalition leader Rod Fergusson.
The Microsoft community is more excited about Gears of War 4 than usual for Xbox One games, because this game in particular is the first in the series to simultaneously launch on PC and Xbox One. This is a good strategy to popularize the Windows 10 Store and what the Play Anywhere program aims to do.
Spencer did mention that the original Gears of War was extremely successful for Xbox 360, so he likely has the same aspirations for Gears 4. Supporting the cross play between two platforms is key, due to the popularity of the game’s multiplayer.
Gears of War 4 launches on October 11th for PC and Xbox One. It is the second game in the series to be developed outside of the core Epic Games team, but the first since Epic sold the IP to Microsoft.