Sometimes, E3 can be quite difficult to follow, what with all the news stories and opinion pieces flying around. That’s why we intend to summarise each day’s action into one handy article, for your reading pleasure. Hopefully, this will serve as a handy primer for E3, with all the need-to-know information gathered into one neat little guide. Here are the highlights for Sunday the 12th.
With the first day of E3 press conferences, two of the biggest publishers in the business set out their agenda for the coming months, with swathes of new games and announcements. EA and Bethesda both came out swinging, so we’ll start in chronological order and deal with EA first, who were the first out of the starting blocks.
Titanfall 2 Details Dropped
Titanfall 2 was hardly a secret, but these are the first solid details we’ve received for EA and Respawn’s mech shooter. Firstly, a single player trailer was leaked before the conference itself, then at the conference we were shown a multiplayer trailer, featuring some new abilities and, the developing gaming trend of recent years, a grappling hook. Titanfall 2 will release October 28th 2016, and will be available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC.
Mass Effect Andromeda Trailer – The Mako Returns
The long-awaited Mass Effect Andromeda finally had an official trailer which showed off some of the gameplay. Details were scarce, other than the game will be running in the Frostbite engine (as does everything from EA these days), and the much-maligned Mako will be making a return. As someone who actually liked the Mako in the original Mass Effect, this is pretty good news.
To be honest, this trailer didn’t give a whole lot away, and seemed more interested in showing the creatives at Bioware working hard on the game. As lovely as that process is, it does obscure the fact that there isn’t a whole lot to see here.
EA Originals Presents Fe
Trying to steal Ubisoft’s thunder after they released a string of indie-like hits, EA are trying to do the same with their EA Originals scheme. Fe has been unveiled under this banner, which appears to be a distinctive 3D platformer. EA promises that 100% of the profits will go back to the developer, which sounds like such a nice gesture from a money-making monolith that you can’t help but be skeptical. What’s in it for EA? Who knows, but Fe looks like it has the potential to be a neat game.
Jose Mourinho’s FIFA 17
EA spent a significant chunk of their press conference showing off closeups of Arsene Wenger’s face in the Frostbite engine, much to the upset of the crowd watching the official Twitch stream. Perhaps a fully-rendered Alan Pardew would have calmed them down. Then, Jose Mourinho was wheeled out on stage, and we got to see firsthand why those all-important image rights held up his contract negotiations with Manchester United; his visage has been rendered in game, and his digital face looked like he was trying to spot the seagull that did a shit on his car. The whole thing was generally awkward.
More importantly, FIFA 17 will feature some sort of career mode, which looks like a slightly better take on Tony Hawk’s Underground’s career. You can watch the trailer below:
Battlefield 1 – Celebrities Are Allowed To Play Games Before You
After the conference ended, EA allowed privileged people to play Battlefield 1 on a live stream for an hour. The celebs involved included Snoop Dogg, Zac Effron and Jamie Foxx. The wonderful Jamaal Ryan wrote up a short summary of the vehicles and systems in play right here.
And with that, EA was spent. However, Bethesda was on hand to keep the hype rolling with their own, better, news conference.
Quake Champions – The 90’s Are Officially Back
With Wolfenstein and Doom getting their modern reboots, it was highly speculated that Quake would return in some capacity. The trailer didn’t show any gameplay, but made a point of showing rocket launchers, railguns and lightning guns. It also seemed that there would be character abilities, making it seem a little like a certain character-based shooter by Blizzard that is doing really well at the moment. id Software have described it as an arena shooter, so we’ll have to wait and see more at the next QuakeCon.
Prey Reboot
So, perhaps not the announcement of Prey 2 that I predicted, but it is a new Prey game. The game was shown off with an intriguing trailer, but none of the footage shown seemed to be actual gameplay. Instead, Bethesda teased that more of the game will be shown off at QuakeCon, an event which Bethesda seems to be treating as if it’s E3-Lite. After the show, a number of details were confirmed such as Zero-G environments and absorbing powers from enemies.
As a fan of the first game, this was rather exciting news to me. If you’d like to see more about Prey, you can check out our Past Mortem article on the original game, which also features an interview with developer Paul Schuytema who worked at 3D Realms.
Skyrim Special Edition Confirmed
There isn’t much to say about this. You already know if you want it. It’s Skyrim, and it’s a very good game.
Dishonored 2 – Release Date And Details
The devil is in the detail, and with Dishonored 2’s release date being announced (November 11 2016), the details came thick and fast. Abilities were shown off, stealth gameplay was featured, and the addition of “The Outsider’s Time Piece”, which allows you solve time-travel based puzzles and gaze into the past.
That’s all for now. However, if you’d like to see all of this information in video form, you can so by watching our wrap up videos of EA and Bethesda’s conferences. Check back tomorrow for another write up of the day’s E3 antics.