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Post by dschroll on Jun 13, 2018 11:09:03 GMT -5
So, we've seen all the big conferences from E3 now:
1) EA
2) Microsoft
3) Bethesda
4) Square Enix
5) Ubi Soft
6) Sony
7) Nintendo
What did everyone think?
How would you rank the conferences? Any big surprises that won you over?
Any let downs?
Let's share what we loved/hated about E3 2018.
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Post by reaper on Jun 13, 2018 12:18:21 GMT -5
Some cool news from the press conferences over the weekend. I watched EA, MS and Bethesda. ES VI was announced... teaser only. So, don't get too excited. Beyond that, I thought Tunic looks a lot of fun: Also, Fallout 76 is a multiplayer game. So that could be cool for the group. Not an MMO. They said there could be dozens of real people int he huge world but not hundreds or thousands. The next Ori game continues to look great. They announced Halo 6 but also in a teaser form. They announced 3 new gears games... one of which is the traditional shooter, the others are some mobile looking game and a strategy game. Bethesda announced a new Doom game. I am still interested in playing the last one but haven't had time to just yet. Sekiro looks interesting if you liked Dark souls. Lots of other great games and announcements. Rage 2 looks fun, Bethesda announced that they will have a mobile elder scrolls type game that plays on your phone. Anyone else watch? See anything they like? I watched the Sony presser in a theater. That was kind of fun being surrounded by fans but I wasn't as enthused as they were  Ghost of Tsushima looked pretty cool to me. |
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Post by UsualNoise on Jun 13, 2018 15:35:42 GMT -5
I only watched Nintendo's conference (since I only have Nintendo consoles now ... PS3 doesn't count anymore) and despite not seeing the other 6 I can confidently state Nintendo finished 7th out of 7. It was atrocious. Over half the 43 minutes was spent on Smash Bros going into ridiculously unnecessary detail that would have been much better in a separate direct. No news about Metroid Prime 4 which was all I cared about, a new Mario Party game which I care nothing about, and stuff for random other games that I am pretty ambivalent about. They didn't even bother with 'easy' releases like, say, Mario Galaxy HD 1 & 2 remaster or Metroid Prime Trilogy HD remaster. Nothing cool at all. And no, I don't care about buying a $50 pokeball. Or playing Smash Bros with a GameCube controller (which I can ALREADY DO).
It was an astonishingly terrible presentation lacking in anything worthwhile; would have been fine in the Wii U days, but not for a company selling a bajillion Switches each month.
I have to stop talking about it now or I'll get too angry.
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Post by oldskoolboarder on Jun 13, 2018 15:43:03 GMT -5
I only watched Nintendo's conference (since I only have Nintendo consoles now ... PS3 doesn't count anymore) and despite not seeing the other 6 I can confidently state Nintendo finished 7th out of 7. It was atrocious. Over half the 43 minutes was spent on Smash Bros going into ridiculously unnecessary detail that would have been much better in a separate direct. No news about Metroid Prime 4 which was all I cared about, a new Mario Party game which I care nothing about, and stuff for random other games that I am pretty ambivalent about. They didn't even bother with 'easy' releases like, say, Mario Galaxy HD 1 & 2 remaster or Metroid Prime Trilogy HD remaster. Nothing cool at all. And no, I don't care about buying a $50 pokeball. Or playing Smash Bros with a GameCube controller (which I can ALREADY DO). It was an astonishingly terrible presentation lacking in anything worthwhile; would have been fine in the Wii U days, but not for a company selling a bajillion Switches each month. I have to stop talking about it now or I'll get too angry. Haven't paid much attention other than the main trailers but have to agree. W/ all the momentum that Switch is actually getting, the biggest deal was Smash Bros?! And we get it, you're getting either remasters or ports that already came on other systems. Ugh. Now Sable looks cool. THAT is a game that should go directly on Switch and not wait. And word of Telltale working w/ Netflix on Stranger Things?! Hell yeah. |
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Post by dschroll on Jun 16, 2018 12:45:03 GMT -5
This year was probably the first year I watched all of the E3 conferences. In fact, Jincman came over on Monday to watch the Sony conference, spent the night, and then we watched the Nintendo Direct on Tuesday. I will try and give a brief summary of my thoughts.
1) EA - this was absolutely the worst conference of E3. The 2 best games EA had to show weren't even made by EA, they were a couple of indie games that EA is publishing. The biggest shocker for me is the lack of Switch announcements with EA. After the banner year Nintendo is having with the Switch and the fact that 3rd party games are actually performing quite well on Switch, I thought for sure EA would finally jump on the bandwagon. Nope. The only Switch game they mentioned was Fifa 19. Seriously? That's it?!? Even the Yarny co op game isn't coming to Switch. Hell, the thing looks like it was designed for the Switch....family friendly, co op, and blue and red characters (the same f'ing color as Switch joy cons). If I were an EA shareholder I would be furious with their performance and the missed opportunities by not supporting Switch.
2) Microsoft - This was the conference MS needed to bring their A game because XB1 isn't selling that great compared to PS4, and Switch is rapidly catching up in term of install base. And that's exactly what MS did. They hit it out of the park and presented the best conference they have ever done IMO. They showed off 50 games throughout their conference and highlighted whatever exclusives they could (Halo, Ori, Crackdown, Gears, etc.). They showed off a ton of 3rd party games that were coming to XB1 and even demonstrated their commitment to the gaming industry by announcing all the new development studios MS acquired. Then they ended their conference with Cyberpunk 2077. It was everything you wanted to see in an E3 conference. Lots of games, a nice variety of games, and a few surprises. Home run by MS IMO.
3) Bethesda - I didn't think I would be all that interested in this conference, but I was pleasantly surprised. They really did a great job. They showed off some new games like Doom Eternal, new Wolfenstein DLC. They showcased the upcoming Fallout 76 and while I never played a Fallout game, this one looked to be kind of fun and interesting. Plus they at least released Fallout Shelter for the Switch. It's not the big Switch announcement I was hoping for, but at least it's something and shows Bethesda is embracing Nintendo's platform. Bethesda also teased some much later releases such as Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6. Not to mention Bethesda had some excellent humor in the presentation with Skyrim Very Special Edition. If you haven't seen that, I recommend searching youtube as it was pretty funny. Overall though, Bethesda put on a solid show and really showcased some great stuff without letting it get stale.
4) Square Enix - Square Enix was another conference I had little interest in and unlike Bethesda, I was pretty much right on the money with this one. It's not that their conference was bad, but it just felt very phoned in. One of the big games Square showed off was the new Kingdom Hearts game and that was already shown at MS's conference. Not only that but the trailer didn't have sound effects so it was just very odd to watch people talking with no sounds beyond the talking. The new Tomb Raider game looks solid, but again, we'd seen a lot about the game up to that point. The big game people were hoping to see was the Final Fantasy 7 remake, which was a no show as I guess progress on the game has been fairly troubled. Overall, Square gave little to get excited about and frankly, should not have their own presentation next year.
5) Ubi Soft - Ubi Soft did a pretty solid job this year. I didn't get to watch all of it as work stuff came up in the middle of the conference. But got to watch a fair chunk. To me, the big stand out was Beyond Good and Evil 2. The game has come a long way and is looking fantastic overall. I'm not sure what to make of the story as I've heard it's a prequel but it certainly doesn't look like a prequel. If you have not played the original BG&E, I highly recommend you add it to your list. It's not a long game, but definitely a solid one that got lost in all the noise form prince of persia and other big holiday titles. Ubi Soft showed off the new Assassin's Creed game, which takes place in Ancient Greece. That looks interesting, although I think Ubi Soft really needs to stop making Assassin's Creed an annual thing. This series is experiencing significant franchise fatigue IMO. The big surprise Ubi Soft announced was an update to their upcoming Toys to Life game called Starlink Battle for Atlas. This was a game I had zero interest in until Ubi Soft announced that the Switch version would be getting a story about Starfox. Now my interest was piqued and then they showed that the Switch version would come with the Arwing and Fox figure. Sold. I already pre ordered from Best Buy. Even Shiggy attended the Ubi Soft event. Overall, a solid showing by Ubi Soft.
6) Sony - Now we get to Sony. This was one I was very excited about. I've been playing my PS4 and PSVR a lot lately and I'm excited about many of the games Sony has in their lineup. So Sony starts their conference out in some weird venue that looked like a tent or church almost. Eventually it goes into showcasing The Last of Us 2. The game looks amazing and has very violent, but very cool gameplay. Great long gameplay demo. And then the conference cuts to a bunch of people sitting at a table talking about Sony in general. It was odd and they then said that Sony was changing venues and all the people in the original place were moving to a new theater. Really?!? Someone thought that after watching one trailer that they relocate to a different theater for the remainder of the conference? What a boneheaded move. It completely killed any momentum they had. Then finally when the conference is about to start, they had a musical number first before showing the next game. We were literally at like 40 minutes before we saw the second game in Sony's E3 conference. The next game Sony shows off is a game called Ghost of Tsushima. This game takes place in feudal Japan and it looks very pretty with these long blades of grass blowing all different directions in the wind. The thing that got me with this game though is that all the characters speak in English. I'm all for authenticity in the graphics and all, but I want it in the audio as well. Hearing some guy in a samurai outfit speak English just felt weird to me. One of the biggest surprises Sony had in their conference was the announcement of Resident Evil 2 Remake. It looks fantastic and seems to do the over the shoulder stuff like RE4 did. I never played the original RE2, so I'm definitely interested in the remake. The big game for me at Sony's conference was the new Spiderman game. This is one I am very excited about and can't wait to play. Not only that, but it comes out on my bday (Sept. 7) so I will be taking the day off and playing me some Spiderman this fall. Sony's conference overall was ok. They showed off some lengthy play sessions of some of their big games, but that initial venue change and then sudden end to the conference just made it feel very disjointed. I appreciate what Sony was trying to do, but they really need to do what MS did and just stick with showcasing a bunch of stuff (in one theater) with a few surprises sprinkled in for good measure.
7) Nintendo - This was the big one. This is the one I had been waiting for. To me, this was Nintendo's E3 to lose. The Switch has had a tremendous first year. Amazing first party games, fantastic ports of older games, and tons of indie support. I thought for sure Nintendo was going to come out swinging this E3 showing off some of the big games in development like Metroid Prime 4 and the new Retro game. I thought we'd hear about some new big 3rd party games coming out such as GTA5 or Metal Gear Solid The Phantom Pain. I thought we'd hear about Nintendo's upcoming online service and some more details. Just so much opportunity for Nintendo to really keep the momentum going. But did they? Nope. Nintendo's Direct was fairly mediocre. They basically said the new Fire Emblem game slated for 2018 was pushed back to 2019. They did announce a new Mario Party game but never gave us much info on it in terms of if it was online. They announced Fortenite was coming to Switch, which we already knew about because of leaks. They did a sizzle reel of many games that were either already out or we knew were coming soon, but one game that we didn't know about was Dragon Ball Fighterz. This game they literally showed for 5-10 second and moved on. Really? This is a pretty big game. It deserved more than a 10 second sizzle reel. Finally, after the that, they go into ridiculous details on the upcoming Smash Bros game called Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Don't get me wrong, I love Smash, but they talked about Smash for 25 minutes. To me, this is something best saved for a separate direct. The big announcement with Smash is that not only is every character in every Smash game in this new game, but that Ridley is now a playable character (we later find out Ridley will be getting it's own amiibo). And, as we are waiting for that one more thing announcement....we get the Nintendo logo and that's it. Seriously?!? That's it?!? a hand full of games and Smash? What a huge disappointment. When will Nintendo learn that E3 is a very visible time for the game industry and they need to bring their A game. The consensus seemed to be that Smash looked great, but wasn't enough for E3.
So, there you have it. E3 was fun, but the 2 conferences I was most interested in (Sony and Nintendo) were both disappointments. The conference I probably had the least interest in (Bethesda) had a great show and the one console I don't own (XB1) had the best conference.
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