Is Gears Of War that good? Is it really that good? Most of us in the SPOnG office think so, although there is the odd naysayer.

“It’s clearly a highly polished game,” says Adam-SPOnG, “although, I almost feel bad in saying it, it’s not as good as everybody is making out though is it? I mean, I’d rather play Zelda…”

It is at this point that yet another pointless argument over the relative merits of Wii/Nintendo and 360/Microsoft breaks out. The fact of the matter is that both Gears and Twilight Princess are glorious games. Some of the greatest videogames ever developed, and both will no doubt be appearing somewhere near the top of SPOnG’s Games of 2006 feature.

While critical reception of both games has been laudatory, and despite the wildly differing subjective opinions among SPOnG’s staffers, the one sure-fire, clear-cut way of measuring success is sales. The purists might not like it, but it’s the bottom-line that counts to the publisher, and the news from Epic Games that Gears of War has just cleared two million copies worldwide, making it the fastest-selling next-gen game of 2006 and the fastest-selling exclusive Xbox game of all time is surely an indicator that Gears is a hugely successful game.

It doesn’t end there, with more than one million unique gamers already having taken part in 10 million online gameplay sessions on Gears, unlocking an impressive seven million achievements.

Epic president Michael Capps said, “We’ve always held high hopes for Gears of War, but we never expected such an overwhelmingly positive response from critics and gamers all over the world…I can't describe how stoked our team is right now. Our fans can absolutely count on Epic to keep delivering new gameplay through Xbox Live."

“Gears of War clearly has won the battle for the title of the must-have game of the year,” said Richard Teversham, Director of Platform & Marketing, Home and Entertainment Division EMEA. “Its phenomenal success is one of many reasons why Xbox 360 is the ultimate place to get together with friends to play this Christmas.”