Forget the nuances of preference and the pointlessness of starkly dividing subjective events into overly-simple categories. E3 demands winners and losers, so it is glory and blood that it shall receive.
Day Zero, so called because the show doesn’t actually begin until June 10 (there were only press conferences today, the showroom floor was closed), got off to a slow start before quite the ending. In between there were ups and downs. Here is what the Emperor Lucius The Indifferent thinks at the end of the day’s events.
LOSERS
STAR WARS & MASS EFFECT
If you don’t have anything constructive to show, don’t show anything at all. Such vague, early glimpses give fans so little of what they actually want to know that they’re cause for more frustration than excitement.
SONY (THE FINAL THIRD)
Sony’s press conference started so well, and ended on a pretty cool note too. So many games! Vita TV! Then came the numbers. And the TV shows. Nobody wants to hear about either of those things. This is a place for spectacle, not business recaps.
FUCKIN’ PRESS CONFERENCES
This one stings a little, since she’s so enthusiastic and for the most part does such a fantastically composed job of hosting. But at the risk of sounding like my Dad, did Aisha Tyler really need to go dropping so many Fucks and Shits into proceedings? It wasn’t offensive, just…it felt off.
WINNERS
SUNSET OVERDRIVE
We haven’t seen a game like this since the Dreamcast. And I mean that in the nicest way possible. Was the one real highlight of Microsoft’s presser.
SONY (THE REST OF IT)
When your press conference can span a HD remake of Grim Fandango, Uncharted 4 and the show-stopping No Man’s Sky, you have had an excellent press conference.
FAR CRY 4
I’d like to think by now that we’ve all learned not to trust Ubisoft’s video demonstrations, even when they appear to be 100% gameplay. Still. If the prospect of flying through the Himalayas in a wingsuit and elephants blowing up jeeps leaves you cold, then I feel deeply sorry for you.
NO MAN’S SKY
If you’d asked me in 1994 what my dream game was, it would have sounded a lot like No Man’s Sky. Would have looked a lot like it, too. Video games can be wonderful for so many reasons, but seeing a dream on the verge of becoming a reality is right up there with the best of them.
TWO TRAILERS
I know, they’re just cinematic trailers and have little to do with the games we’ll actually be playing, but I’ve long argued that this is irrelevant to our ability to enjoy them as, essentially, short films. We saw two excellent clips today, one at each end of the emotional spectrum: The Division’s went for the heartstrings, while Dead Island 2’s went for a more light-hearted approach to the zombie apocalypse than its predecessor.
LET THEM EAT CROWDS
The first (and one of the only) games last-gen to feel truly unique and modern was Dead Rising, and that was because of the crowds. So it’s somewhat fitting that one of the first true next-gen games we saw this year – Assassin’s Creed Unity – wowed me for the same reason. While much of its gameplay demonstration was familiar to fans of the series, the sense of scale the large crowd sections provided was breathtaking.
Note that while my judgement on these matters is final, I am open to passing sentence on more topics (and adding them to this list) should they be raised in the comments section below.
Comments
13 responses to “E3 Winners & Losers: Day Zero”
So much that was shown was either leaked, already announced, or was from E3 last year. 75% rehashed and 25% new? Have they shown that FF cinematic again yet?
And all that play it first on this platform, play it first on that platform crap. The crash cant come soon enough.
The presenters expecting heavy applause, pausing for it, only to get none, or the standard clapping. they pushed through it though, ill give them that.
“Have they shown that FF cinematic again yet?” Hah! Sums up the state of the industry nicely really.
Square Enix start tomorrow I think. You will see a rehashed FFXV trailer soon… They have already announced that there will be no new news on that game.
SUBJECTIVE OPINION JOURNALISM.
Edit: lol, I did not see the ‘opinion’ tag.. Well played sir, well played…
far cry used to be such a good game, number one
The boring part of sonys E3 conference was not a “third” and it want the last of the conference it was in the middle ish area.
based on everything I seen from E3 so far, if I only could buy one game, it would be Witcher 3. Im a huge dark souls fan but im not sure how close bloodboune will be to souls gameplay.
I think Sony didnt need to prove much this year and they also have more hardware and services to cover than the rest. I dont know why destiny just doesnt look like a winner to me. and a big shout to sony for giving some time to thoses guys who are making intwine.
Assassin’s Creed looked like more of the same to me (I guess literally, with the increase in population). That may not be a bad thing, but I wouldn’t call it a “win”.
I’m only hoping The Division, Uncharted and most of all Tomb Raider aren’t crap. Everything else, meh.
Assassins creed and call of duty advanced war fighter looked like the worst games IMHO. Sunset Overdrive trailer had me LOLing – so funny. But the game play looks like I would get bored quickly. Like PvsZ garden warfare.
The Division looked like fun. But No Mans Sky was the winner. I really hope this comes to Xbone.
And that was about it IMHO. Wish someone would make a MMO space sim… sigh.
> Wish someone would make a MMO space sim… sigh.
There’s this thing called EVE Online…
Also, probably more what you’re after, EVE Valkyrie currently in development, plus several Kickstarters in progress.
I respectfully disagree about Mass Effect being a loser. I mean, it’s a tad overenthusiastic being like “ME4 announced!” when it was more like, “ME4 and new IP confirmed”. But there was art to enthuse over, and for diehard fans, that’s a lovely thing.
Would you list something like Call of Duty a loser if they showed concept art?
So many whingers. Just because you’re not particuarly excited about something, doesnt mean other people arent. Everyone seems to use language that would imply their opinion is the only one that existed.
I liked the Battlefront presentation. I hope they release a longer documentary style video that shows the whole process with the release of the game, I love that stuff.
Im excited for the new Assassins Creed, Farcry 4 and Project Cars (not at E3 as far as Im aware)
The Division looks really interesting, but Ive never been a fan of cover based shooters. I might hunt down a cheap copy to have a look when its released.
Everything else Im not really that interested in, therefor I have nothing to say about them.