If there is one annoying aspect of playing Gears of War 2 its the horribly slow match making.  On occasion I was waiting up to five minutes to join a match.  This all changed when I decided to stop playing the Player's Choice variant and decided to try out the Classic Maps Player's Choice option.  It seems that most people playing Gears of War 2 multiplayer are hanging out in that area playing on the remade Gears 1 maps that are available to all that bought the game at retail.

As an incentive to buy a new copy of Gears of War 2 Epic stuck a code to download a set of maps from the first game.  These maps are just relighting or weather modification to the original map.  All the weapon placements are the same as the original maps.  What seems to be happening is that people are more comfortable playing the old maps so they aren't playing any of the new maps.  I'm sure there are some people playing the new maps but it's clearly easier to party up and join a match playing the classic maps.  I just hope everyone who bought the game remembered to download those maps. 

Unfortunately if you rented the game or bought it used your screwed.  These maps are only available to people that bought the retail game.  These maps are not available for purchase so even if you bought a used copy you won't be able to get these maps.  I tend to think that is a crappy way to do business.  A lot of people rent  a game to see if they should buy.  Some people just can't afford the price of a new game.  Epic has already sold 3 million copies of Gears of War 2, how many more do they really need to sell?  When you limit the availability to content it just makes the consumer less likely to buy....especially if they are waiting forever to join a party and play a match.