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Gears of War: E-Day's early access launch introduced Advanced Shader Delivery (ASD), a PC feature that significantly cuts down the shader compilation wait common to modern games, and reviewers praised the campaign for successfully modernizing the classic Gears formula. However, developers on the project reportedly fear being laid off immediately after launch and before receiving due bonuses, following Xbox CEO Asha Sharma's July announcement of 3,200 job cuts across Microsoft's gaming division that hit studios including Activision, Bethesda, id Software, Blizzard, Mojang, and King.