Microsoft E3 Conference Liveblog: Halo 5 Better Be GOOD

Waking up at 1:30am is never, ever fun, but I’m here! And if you’re reading this you’re here too! Congratulations, we’re all in this together!

The Microsoft conference is about to start, oh… any time now. Supposedly 30 minutes but you can never tell with these things. Click here to watch it.

Let’s get this thing done. What are we all looking forward to? For me it’s Halo 5.

But really, I’m hoping to be surprised with this one.

2:06
Alright, just getting a few things set up and now I’m good to go. Man, it just doesn’t feel like E3 unless I’m up at some ungodly time with my headphones cranked drinking tea. I can’t decide whether this is awesome or part of some weird compulsion. Either way, I’m kinda excited for this.

2.08


I don’t know old friend. I just don’t know.

2:11
Random thought. I’m working from home. Absolutely no reason why I can’t write this liveblog on the toilet. Cut out the middle man.

2:20
And yes. For those asking at home (no-one) I made a massive batch of E3 porridge. Gonna microwave that bad boy up after the EA conference I think. AW YEAH.

2:26

Surprise! It’s all a bit green!

2:29
Mate, come on mate. I cook my oats in water AS SHOULD ALL OF YOU.

nexi
Rural NSW reporting in. Don’t have porridge out of laziness and lack of milk (need that for coffee) and it just isn’t the same cooked in water.

2:31
Alright, we’re cracking. Let’s get it going.

Awessssome. Kicking off with Halo 5. GOOD CALL MICROSOFT.

2:42
Well that was certainly the prototypical E3 opening. Not sure about the squad stuff. That said, I’m keen for this. I thought 343 nailed the single player in Halo 4 and have little doubt they’ll do a good job here.

Also — Warzone looks nuts. Hopefully this will work for the Big Team Battle crowd.

2.45
Alright a second to catch breath. Recore — had me at the makers of Metroid Prime. Seriously.

No idea what that is or what it’ll be like, but man. I’m down.

2.49
See, man. I’m going to sound like Mr Grumps, but I’ve never, ever understood the fascination with backwards compatibility. I’ve never used it.

Actually I used it for Metroid Prime. But that’s Metroid Prime!

I like new games on my new consoles. Maybe it’s just me.

2.52
Man, has a platform holder ever used E3 to debut a new controller. Like just a fancy upgrade? Either way, it looks cool.

OH LOOK TODD’S CHEEKBONES!

Todd’s cheekbones. Exclusively on Xbox One.

2.55
Honestly though, it’s good to see Fallout 4 working in the wild a bit more. Really great to watch actually. Confirms to me that it looks pretty goddamn great.

2.58
Holy crap. Mods on the Xbox One. That’s pretty insane when you think about it to be honest. That’s a brave move for a platform holder.

This is going really well so far to be honest. Microsoft is just ripping through this conference.

3.00
Ah spoke too soon. EA Access nonsense. Actually really enjoying the time to breathe and type stuff! SNACK BREAK!

3.02
I can’t believe EA is making a sequel to an average idea like Garden Warfare. This is a weird world we’re living in. There it is I guess. Anytime I get to hear Kenny Loggins is a plus though.

3.05
This is hilarious. THEY HAVE A HENRY FORD ON THE STAGE AND A CAR CAME FROM THE CEILING.

Oh it’s the new Forza btw. Car porn incoming.

3.10
BREATHE MARK BREATHE. Dark Souls III. BREATHE.

Man, not much shown. Still. It exists. YASS. Ready for that game. Ready for anything From Software makes to be honest.

3.12
Holy shit this man is gonna be super French isn’t he. Yes. He is.

Still keen for The Division. Feels like we’ve been waiting for ages for this one. Oh, exclusive Beta. Cool. I want to know how all this works. Honestly, a slowed down, real world Destiny is good for me, it really is.

Rainbow Siege still looks hot as all hell btw.

3.17
Gigantic looks great, and I want to play it, but that team must have been soooo shitty the day Blizzard announced Overwatch. Shame.

3.20
Oh man, Tacoma looks absolutely amazing. I need this.

3.22
I was about to whinge about Microsoft just giving indie games a montage, and there you go. They go ahead and do just that. All of these games look super interesting. Ashen is being made in New Zealand. Totally going over there to annoy them and try and play that game.

3.25
Cuphead looks bonkers. That aesthetic is phenomenal.

3.27
Xbox Game Preview and mods? Man, Microsoft is just being so open with its platform and that is great. It’s awesome.

3.28
Dean Hall is on-stage and has a NZ accent as strong as my Scottish one. Hahaha! He’s announcing Ion, which is pretty vague and I have no idea what’s going on there. Is it a No Man’s Sky thing mixed with Day-Z thing? That’s my guess. I think it’s a good guess.

3.33
NO NO NO. ICE CLIMBING DOES NOT WORK LIKE THAT LARA.

I smell another climbing article.

(All jokes aside, really liking the change of environment. I really like snow levels in video games. I don’t know why.)

3.37
Man, that Rare Replay thing is really over-delivering. I am down for that, especially for all those super old Spectrum games. Wait, was I whinging about backwards compatibility again? Nah, forget that shit.

3.41
Um, Sea of Thieves? A goddamn Pirate MMO like Black Flag with pirates doing piratey shit? This is pretty much me dream game. Seriously. This is awesome. Microsoft is just knocking this out of the park really.

3.44
And pretty sure that last game had a Cersei Lannister voice over, swirling wine like a motherfucker while delivering those lines.

3.46:
Those VR announcements seem super huge. Not quite sure what they mean just yet and no time to go into detail yet.

3.51
Jesus wept, that Hololens demo was spectacular. Trying to not get caught up in the hype, but I’m truly blown away. How will we integrate this into games? Will it work? Will it be another Kinect? I hope not. I hope this is as good as I want it to be.

Another note: if it wasn’t for Kinect, I’d be freely losing my shit about Hololens. As of right now, I’m gonna wait and see.

3.59
Seriously, Gears of War was super underwhelming I thought. Boring, flat, looked like a last generation game. Probably the lowlight of the show so far. And I’m a huge fan of the series.

4.03
Well that was a pretty good showing from Microsoft that fell a bit flat at the end with Gears being MEDIOCRE[/immortanjoe].

Thanks for joining me!


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