The Coalition has confirmed that Gears of War: E-Day has officially gone gold. In practice that means development is finished and the game is ready to be pressed onto discs. Studio head Mike Crump called the milestone a major moment for the team as it enters the final stretch toward launch.
The announcement came through a post on the official Xbox site, which also brought two other pieces of information players have been waiting for: a pre-install date and the full PC requirements.
What going gold actually means for you
Gold status is a production milestone, not the end of the work. The build is complete and shippable, but it’s safe to expect The Coalition to keep polishing right up to release, and post-launch updates and balance patches are a given for a modern shooter of this size. For you, the practical takeaway is simple: the release dates are locked in and there’s no sign of a delay.
- Early access: October 1, available with the Premium Edition
- Global launch: October 6
- Pre-install: September 29 at 8 a.m. PT / 11 a.m. ET
Pre-installs will be open to anyone who has pre-ordered the game on Xbox Series X/S and PC, and to Xbox Game Pass subscribers. If you’re on a slower connection, that two-day head start matters – the PC install alone is a hefty download.
PC requirements: ray tracing is mandatory
The Coalition also published the full PC specs. For the Recommended preset the game asks for:
- NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 or equivalent
- AMD Ryzen 5 5600 or comparable CPU
- 8 GB of VRAM
- 16 GB of RAM
- 115 GB of storage – and it has to be an SSD
One detail worth underlining: a ray tracing capable graphics card is required to run Gears of War: E-Day on PC at all. Older GPUs without RT support are out, so check your hardware before September 29 rather than on launch day.
A prequel, not a sequel
Revealed at the June 2024 Xbox Showcase, Gears of War: E-Day is the first mainline entry in the third-person shooter series since Gears 5 in 2019. Instead of continuing the story forward, it rewinds the timeline: the game is set years before the original Gears of War and covers Emergence Day itself, the event that kicked off the Locust invasion of Sera.
If you want to keep up with everything around the release, we collect our coverage in the Gears of War section, and the editions and platforms are listed on the official game site as well as the Xbox store page.
FAQ
Early access starts on October 1 for owners of the Premium Edition, and the global launch follows on October 6.
Pre-installs go live on September 29 at 8 a.m. PT / 11 a.m. ET for anyone who pre-ordered on Xbox Series X/S and PC, and for Xbox Game Pass members.
An NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 or equivalent, an AMD Ryzen 5 5600 or similar CPU, 8 GB of VRAM, 16 GB of RAM and 115 GB of SSD storage.
Yes. The Coalition confirmed that a ray tracing capable graphics card is required to play the game on PC.
No. It’s set years before the first Gears of War and tells the story of Emergence Day, the start of the Locust invasion of Sera.