When comparing Don't Starve Together vs Gears of War 4, the Slant community recommends Don't Starve Together for most people. In the question“What are the best shared/splitscreen local multiplayer games on Xbox One?” Don't Starve Together is ranked 5th while Gears of War 4 is ranked 19th. The most important reason people chose Don't Starve Together is:
Getting together a group of friends to play Don't Starve Together adds a lot of enjoyment to the game. If you're all first timers, learning how to survive as you go along is amazing, since you get to share in the learning process and the experience together. As you craft and build your own forts, farms, and more, you find more and more ways to learn how to survive, making things less daunting than if you play the game alone.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Couch co-op makes the game even more fun as you all learn together
Getting together a group of friends to play Don't Starve Together adds a lot of enjoyment to the game. If you're all first timers, learning how to survive as you go along is amazing, since you get to share in the learning process and the experience together. As you craft and build your own forts, farms, and more, you find more and more ways to learn how to survive, making things less daunting than if you play the game alone.
Pro Pleasantly twisted sense of humor
There's a dark sense of humor that pervades the game. There's a humanoid spider boy who can grow a beard of silk. There's a living chest called Chester who acts like a dog. There's also silly info text, werepigs, trees that retaliate when you chop them, and many other things.
Pro Deep and varied crafting system
The crafting system has a lot of depth to it and there are tons of items to make. Starting with the recipe for a torch and a pickaxe. You can also make weapons, armor, and various laboratories that enable new technologies. Building new stuff and advancing is the key to surviving the coming winter.
Pro Tweak the gameplay settings to fit any skill level
The game gives you a lot of customization options. You can change the length of day, weather patterns, and spawn rates for resources and monsters. This allows you to adjust the difficulty level to suit your skill and preference.
Pro Unique mix of 2D and 3D art offers a change of pace
Don't Starve Together has a very unique art style that places two-dimensional characters in a three-dimensional setting. Even the waves in the sea look like cardboard cutouts used in a puppet show. This look and feel to the graphics is a nice change of pace from ultra-realistic games.
Pro The further you get, the more you will learn
Starting out you'll only be gathering twigs and grass, maybe chop a tree. You'll also gather basic food such as mushrooms and carrots. Then you'll start building your encampment, learning how the day/night cycle and the seasons work. Later on you'll start building massive farms, refridgerators, fortifications, and many other things. All of this is done for the sake of not starving.
As the game progresses, you will encounter mechanics such as drought, forest fires, the rainy, season, the cold and many others. To counteract these you need to plan properly and will probably die the first time around. Once your knowledge reaches a certain level, you'll be able to survive indefinitely.
Pro Great replay value
Don't Starve Together has randomly generated (customizable) levels, unlockable characters, a story mode, and you can also play it with up to 5 other friends. All of this helps keep subsequent attempts/playthroughs fresh.
Pro Local splitscreen multiplayer
Nowadays, some titles tend to exclude local multiplayer, focusing primarily on online play but Gears of War 4 is an exception. You can play both the campaign and all multiplayer modes with your friends via splitscreen.
Pro Really fun horde mode
Horde mode is a multiplayer co-op mode where up to 5 players try to survive against waves of enemies. It features regular combat and allows you to build fortifications, which you can do by collecting resources from killed enemies and using the fabricator. This allows you to build blockades, sentries, and various other defenses, giving it a very tower defense-esque feel, which is also a lot of fun.
You can also choose between 5 classes with each class being better at something different. For example, the Engineer can build and repair defenses much faster than others and the Heavy uses stronger weapons that allow him to kill large enemies much faster. As a result, teamwork is very important, so when your squad is co-operating like a well-oiled machine, it just feels incredibly satisfying.
Pro Exciting gameplay
In Gears of War you and a squad of several other soldiers fight against the enemies of humanity, using various weapons such as rifles, a shotgun, and even a weapon that fires saw blades. It's very fast paced and a lot of fun, rewarding not only effective use of cover and accurate shooting, but also quick decision making on when to charge your enemy and take them out with your knife or your chainsaw bayonet. This leads to a lot of very intense, sometimes brutal, and always satisfying battles, making Gears of War 4 a really enjoyable ride.
Pro Excellent visuals
Gears of War 4 has some really outstanding visuals with high quality textures, great lighting, and excellent shadow mapping. This makes all of the armored human characters, monstrous lizard-like enemies, and the various lush landscapes filled with ruins look especially good. All of this is turned up a notch with the help of excellent weather effects, such as rain, lighting, and gusts of heavy wind that carry massive objects over your head, giving Gears of War 4 a very cinematic feel.
Cons
Con Steep learning curve
The first few attempts will last only a couple of in-game days. This is because the game has various punishing mechanics, which you can only learn through trial and error. One such mechanic is the darkness, which will kill you in under a minute if you don't have a light source. Followed by packs of hounds that randomly spawn to kill you. In most cases preparation is key and you can't prepare without knowledge.
Con Can get repetitive
You'll have to repeatedly collect a lot of basic materials like twigs, grass, and ore. This is because most of the starting recipes share the same required materials. Even later in the game you'll be doing many repetitive tasks. Gathering enough firewood for winter is especially bad because you have to chop down dozens of trees. All of this is made worse by the limited inventory space, causing you to make the same trip multiple times.
Con Poorly done story
The story has some cool moments, but it mostly focuses on pointless drama and issues that end up feeling like filler because they have no real impact on the story or character building. This coupled with a few plot holes will make you want to press the skip button and just get back into the action.