So I had a previous engagement to this evening, and I missed the Sony press conference and left just as the Ubisoft press conference was ending. I'm hoping to get the Sony summary up tonight. At the same time, I decided I'm probably going to skip the PC Gaming conference for 2 reasons. First, the conference failed to end before the Ubisoft presser started. So I couldn't give a summary if I didn't catch it in it's entirety. Second, that conference was more of a live show floor stage demo. Dev shows up and talks up their product in a 10 minute window. Then onto the next dev. I wouldn't have much to say about my thoughts with this shotgun style conference. Nothing wrong with it, just not the hype I expect out of an E3 press conference. So now with that out of the way, my summary of the Ubisoft press conference.
The Good Stuff
Oculus was on site at the Ubisoft presser. Mildly surprising that they were at E3 and didn't make an appearance at the Microsoft press conference. Was actually somewhat impressed with the Eagle Flight game. Looks like a fun casually competitive game to play while on the road with friends. Seemed to have enough depth to be enjoyable.
For Honor was a title that I was really interested in at last E3. No new multiplayer gameplay, but they showed off some single player campaign. Was basically what I always wanted Dynasty Warriors to be. I can't wait to see more and hope that we get to see more multiplayer this week.
https://youtu.be/YuuJZ2m2x0k
I feel bad liking the most recent Watch Dogs 2 gameplay. After how bad the first one was, Ubisoft is still shoving it down everyone throats for reason I don't really understand. They even pointed out they are working on a movie for the franchise. I don't think I've ever seen a developer pushing an IP this hard that just fell over and crashed on its release. But I'll give them credit. This looked MUCH better than the previous game. Seemed much of the story and universe was taken straight out of USA's Mr. Robot series and other issues brought in the current political climate about how much control individual have. As Law & Order has proven, real life is a great inspiration. But I digress, watch the gameplay video. Much better. Less aggression and more fun. Taze all the things bro.
https://youtu.be/243NzPs0vG4
The Meh Stuff
Ghost Recon Wildlands made a new appearance. Super open world with much more dynamic gameplay than what I expect. I typically scoff at open world games, as it being open world is often a crutch for not putting in significant gameplay or story. We'll see where that goes. Very disappointed no multiplayer gameplay. They have really moved away from their roots in Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter. My guess is sales on Ghost Recon: Future Soldier weren't that good and they felt the need to change the formula.
[embed]https://youtu.be/uqoX0WSE-SE[/embed]
[embed]https://youtu.be/BhopQUFkvy8[/embed]
New South Park game riffs on the entire superhero genre. You are going to get what you get here.
[embed]https://youtu.be/IBP3dC8VAVU[/embed]
https://youtu.be/wcdrMJYrm7E
The Bad Stuff
Just Dance is still taking up a slot in an E3 press conference in 2016. Did no one pick up the failures of the Microsoft presser 3 years ago? Your market is not watching this press conference. Stop revealing casual games at E3. Only the hardest of cores are paying attention right now. At least it only took up a minimal segment of their presser.
For something that comes out in a month, there really was very little shown on the new Division expansion. Just talk of more PvE content. There was more shown on the FOLLOWING expansion. Not to mention that it's a time exclusive. Which is dumb. This needs to die.
https://youtu.be/De-x3xxG1bU
That Star Trek game, Star Trek Bridge Crew, looked bad. It looked like table top RPG bang ala Dungeons and Dragons in a Star Trek universe taken literally. I bet I could watch a Twitch stream of a band role playing this and match the demo frame for frame. Not impressed at all. Way too much was spent on this.
https://youtu.be/romB8e5nMp8
Really. You are going to show clips for the Assassin's Creed film? I don't know why I expect better from Ubisoft. I guess they didn't know what to do since they were taking a break from releasing a new Assassin's Creed game.
Your #NextBigThing is an extreme sports game? Seriously? That is all I'll say about Steep. Not sure how I feel about a new SSX game being labeled #NextBigThing.
https://youtu.be/t32yR-SNW6s
https://youtu.be/Do5d4PAz4rA
Other Notes
This deserves more than a bullet and is more of a rant than anything else. Very early in the conference Ubisoft said Just Dance 2017 is coming to all systems including Nintendo NX. This is likely the most we will hear about Nintendo NX this E3, and it came for a casual game in a NOT Nintendo presser. But rather than rage about that, I want to point out because it suddenly hit me that next year will likely be the release of THREE new consoles. This is an incredible fast hardware cycle. The sixth console generation (Dreamcast/Xbox/PS2/GameCube) lasted nearly 8 years. The seventh generation (XBox 360/PS3/Wii) went 9 years. The current eighth generation (Xbone/PS4/WiiU) looks to only last 4-5 years. As a consumer, this looks really freaking bad. From what I've heard, developers are really pissed at the current consoles and that their hardware is not up to snuff of what they want. I can't blame them. They are the ones taking all the hits for not being able to make games at 60 FPS, a basic benchmark made by publishers to developers. This is on the console engineers for not designing the systems to last. And now we the consumers are going to have to pay for a new hardware cycle. They can talk about the how they will continue to support the previous consoles and that all games will support both the old and new consoles, but we gamers know the score. We know how this works. Just look at Destiny. They aren't going to provide the next content expansion to XBox 360 or PS3. How long until Sony/Microsoft says, "You developers don't need to handicap yourselves with development on older systems. Go with the new systems." It's all platitudes right now. Just remember who really got screwed here.
https://youtu.be/Zuv5dil0d9Y
https://youtu.be/yEBtCHk8_YA
In Conclusion
So, for being the longest of press conferences, this didn't feel like it had the depth to support 2 hours. Particularly since I've watched the Sony press conference. It had it's hits, and it had it's misses. Overall I'll give it a B-. It's misses really missed big and lacked new titles that really pulled my attention.
The Good Stuff
Oculus was on site at the Ubisoft presser. Mildly surprising that they were at E3 and didn't make an appearance at the Microsoft press conference. Was actually somewhat impressed with the Eagle Flight game. Looks like a fun casually competitive game to play while on the road with friends. Seemed to have enough depth to be enjoyable.
For Honor was a title that I was really interested in at last E3. No new multiplayer gameplay, but they showed off some single player campaign. Was basically what I always wanted Dynasty Warriors to be. I can't wait to see more and hope that we get to see more multiplayer this week.
https://youtu.be/YuuJZ2m2x0k
I feel bad liking the most recent Watch Dogs 2 gameplay. After how bad the first one was, Ubisoft is still shoving it down everyone throats for reason I don't really understand. They even pointed out they are working on a movie for the franchise. I don't think I've ever seen a developer pushing an IP this hard that just fell over and crashed on its release. But I'll give them credit. This looked MUCH better than the previous game. Seemed much of the story and universe was taken straight out of USA's Mr. Robot series and other issues brought in the current political climate about how much control individual have. As Law & Order has proven, real life is a great inspiration. But I digress, watch the gameplay video. Much better. Less aggression and more fun. Taze all the things bro.
https://youtu.be/243NzPs0vG4
The Meh Stuff
Ghost Recon Wildlands made a new appearance. Super open world with much more dynamic gameplay than what I expect. I typically scoff at open world games, as it being open world is often a crutch for not putting in significant gameplay or story. We'll see where that goes. Very disappointed no multiplayer gameplay. They have really moved away from their roots in Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter. My guess is sales on Ghost Recon: Future Soldier weren't that good and they felt the need to change the formula.
[embed]https://youtu.be/uqoX0WSE-SE[/embed]
[embed]https://youtu.be/BhopQUFkvy8[/embed]
New South Park game riffs on the entire superhero genre. You are going to get what you get here.
[embed]https://youtu.be/IBP3dC8VAVU[/embed]
https://youtu.be/wcdrMJYrm7E
The Bad Stuff
Just Dance is still taking up a slot in an E3 press conference in 2016. Did no one pick up the failures of the Microsoft presser 3 years ago? Your market is not watching this press conference. Stop revealing casual games at E3. Only the hardest of cores are paying attention right now. At least it only took up a minimal segment of their presser.
For something that comes out in a month, there really was very little shown on the new Division expansion. Just talk of more PvE content. There was more shown on the FOLLOWING expansion. Not to mention that it's a time exclusive. Which is dumb. This needs to die.
https://youtu.be/De-x3xxG1bU
That Star Trek game, Star Trek Bridge Crew, looked bad. It looked like table top RPG bang ala Dungeons and Dragons in a Star Trek universe taken literally. I bet I could watch a Twitch stream of a band role playing this and match the demo frame for frame. Not impressed at all. Way too much was spent on this.
https://youtu.be/romB8e5nMp8
Really. You are going to show clips for the Assassin's Creed film? I don't know why I expect better from Ubisoft. I guess they didn't know what to do since they were taking a break from releasing a new Assassin's Creed game.
Your #NextBigThing is an extreme sports game? Seriously? That is all I'll say about Steep. Not sure how I feel about a new SSX game being labeled #NextBigThing.
https://youtu.be/t32yR-SNW6s
https://youtu.be/Do5d4PAz4rA
Other Notes
This deserves more than a bullet and is more of a rant than anything else. Very early in the conference Ubisoft said Just Dance 2017 is coming to all systems including Nintendo NX. This is likely the most we will hear about Nintendo NX this E3, and it came for a casual game in a NOT Nintendo presser. But rather than rage about that, I want to point out because it suddenly hit me that next year will likely be the release of THREE new consoles. This is an incredible fast hardware cycle. The sixth console generation (Dreamcast/Xbox/PS2/GameCube) lasted nearly 8 years. The seventh generation (XBox 360/PS3/Wii) went 9 years. The current eighth generation (Xbone/PS4/WiiU) looks to only last 4-5 years. As a consumer, this looks really freaking bad. From what I've heard, developers are really pissed at the current consoles and that their hardware is not up to snuff of what they want. I can't blame them. They are the ones taking all the hits for not being able to make games at 60 FPS, a basic benchmark made by publishers to developers. This is on the console engineers for not designing the systems to last. And now we the consumers are going to have to pay for a new hardware cycle. They can talk about the how they will continue to support the previous consoles and that all games will support both the old and new consoles, but we gamers know the score. We know how this works. Just look at Destiny. They aren't going to provide the next content expansion to XBox 360 or PS3. How long until Sony/Microsoft says, "You developers don't need to handicap yourselves with development on older systems. Go with the new systems." It's all platitudes right now. Just remember who really got screwed here.
- So, Ubisoft is going to development on Nintendo NX for a release? Considering it's pretty much assumed by everyone that this mess was ZombieU by Ubisoft, I'm mildly surprised. Then again, it was a silly casual title. Not a major AAA game.
- The Trials fanbase is insane. Almost as much as its developers. That was so much hype for the new expansion. RELEASED LIVE.
https://youtu.be/Zuv5dil0d9Y
- Grow Up showed up. Literally all the time it got.
https://youtu.be/yEBtCHk8_YA
In Conclusion
So, for being the longest of press conferences, this didn't feel like it had the depth to support 2 hours. Particularly since I've watched the Sony press conference. It had it's hits, and it had it's misses. Overall I'll give it a B-. It's misses really missed big and lacked new titles that really pulled my attention.
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