E3 2021: Digital Edition, TGA's 2021 & other 2021 events

[Glen-i]

Just now, Aperson said:

Well, Capcom pretty much just said to start with what they're going to be showing in this show...

I'd be surprised if that was all that's shown.

[darksnowman]

5 minutes ago, Aperson said:

Well, Capcom pretty much just said to start with what they're going to be showing in this show...

Yeah, I was going to watch it but bailed at that point. Capcom don't do stuff I play anyway. 

@Julius can you @ me with a link to a summary of it in the morning?  If they announce Ducktales for Switch and/ or Breath of Fire then you have my attention. 

Edited June 14, 2021 by darksnowman
@ correction

[Julius]

3 minutes ago, Aperson said:

Well, Capcom pretty much just said to start with what they're going to be showing in this show...

Honestly, I'm kind of glad they did to temper expectations just a little bit. 

Still a chance for some surprises (that Village DLC confirmation just being text really makes me think it's only just started), but I'm not expecting much out of this. More curious to see if they can present it well, because the how the conferences have been actually presented so far has been very hit and miss. 

[Glen-i]

Mokong can finally shut up about that Monster Hunter Armour now.

[Hero-of-Time]

E3 continues to deliver. This is a fine example of a publisher not needing a show. They could have easily just dropped most of this info in a tweet or blog post.

[Dcubed]

Well that’s something new! Haven’t ever seen an E3 conference where they literally announce nothing new!

Edited June 14, 2021 by Dcubed

[Glen-i]

2 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

E3 continues to deliver. This is a fine example of a publisher not needing a show. They could have easily just dropped most of this info in a tweet or blog post.

It's amazing. 4 games! All of which were revealed already!

I stopped playing Smash Bros for that!?

Edited June 14, 2021 by Glen-i

[Aperson]

In reality we all know that Nintendo might just prop up their own Direct with the next Smash Bros. character.

 

I hope not though...

[Aperson]

In reality we all know that Nintendo might just prop up their own Direct with the next Smash Bros. character.

 

I hope not though...

[Julius]

Capcom. 

Positives: at least it was only 25 minutes? Re:Verse (for anyone that's actually going to play that) got a mention as releasing next month, there's going to be a trial for Monster Hunter Stories 2, and Village for DLC production announced as starting. So I'm sure some people are happy. Host was very energetic, and the actual presenting side of this event was well done, I think it moved at a decent pace and didn't drag, however...

Negatives: unfortunately, as others have said, none of that stuff they moved onto was a new game announcement, the only new things being updates for games already released or that we knew were coming. And why do I get the feeling we might see some of those games tomorrow night at Nintendo, too? The eSports segment was nice but just went on too long. 

Inoffensive is how I'd probably describe it. Feels like if there is anything new to come from Capcom, it will be at Nintendo tomorrow or PlayStation later in the summer. So yeah, even though presented well, it was a total non-starter and didn't need to be here. Genuinely feel that Capcom let that presenter down, they did a good job and deserved to have something of substance to announce. 

My Totally Official Score: 4.5/10

 

Nintendo up next tomorrow, trying to keep my hopes in check, honestly I feel like they'll have done the best out of everyone at E3 if we get a good trailer for the Breath of the Wild sequel (probably a title too) and one nice surprise. Unbelievably low bar. 

Then there's Bandai Namco tomorrow at 22:35 BST, the actual last publisher event at E3 this year, which is quite a late one, especially considering that Bandai Namco have said zilch about the event themselves. No seriously, the only game we know is going to be there is House of Ashes, and that's because they tweeted it out - Bandai Namco have said nothing! Do they even know it's happening? Obviously the hope would be more Elden Ring, but there's a less than 1% chance of that happening in my eyes. I imagine it'll be a focus on anime licensed games, Scarlet Nexus, and Tales of Arise, if anything. 

Edited June 14, 2021 by Julius

[Glen-i]

I mean, I joke about how all I need is a new Smash Character and I'm satisfied.

But I can honestly say this time that will actually get them to second place. The standard is that pathetic!

At least Capcom's wasn't as flat out insulting as Square's. Silver linings, I suppose.

[Dcubed]

I’m glad I didn’t bother making Bingo cards this year... Even if I managed to predict everything perfectly, I still wouldn’t have had enough there to complete a line!

[Julius]

Well it took them until 20 hours before the event to confirm, but at least now we know that Bandai Namco is closing E3 with an event seemingly dedicated to House of Ashes:

Apparently there's a Japanese stream on the 18th for Tales of Arise, but not getting Scarlet Nexus out there one more time this E3 is an odd decision (it releases today if I'm remembering right). Par for the course for this year's E3 I guess. 

[bob]

10 hours ago, Aperson said:

In reality we all know that Nintendo might just prop up their own Direct with the next Smash Bros. character.

 

I hope not though...

Only if it's Waluigi.

[RedShell]

So far I've watched the Xbox and a bit of the Capcom event (really couldn't handle the "enthusiasm" of the presenter on that one though so stopped it immediately after the MH segment), gave everything else a miss. By the looks of things, I haven't missed much as a result.

Here's hoping Nintendo have a decent (yeah, let's go with decent ) showing later on, although I'm probably the least excited I've ever been for an E3 Direct.

[Hero-of-Time]

5 minutes ago, RedShell said:

So far I've watched the Xbox and a bit of the Capcom event (really couldn't handle the "enthusiasm" of the presenter on that one though so stopped it immediately after the MH segment), gave everything else a miss. 

So it wasn’t just me then.  

[Aperson]

Think it's fair to say Obsidian had the right idea about the current state of E3 with that Outer Worlds 2 trailer!

[Ganepark32]

1 hour ago, Julius said:

Well it took them until 20 hours before the event to confirm, but at least now we know that Bandai Namco is closing E3 with an event seemingly dedicated to House of Ashes:

Apparently there's a Japanese stream on the 18th for Tales of Arise, but not getting Scarlet Nexus out there one more time this E3 is an odd decision (it releases today if I'm remembering right). Par for the course for this year's E3 I guess. 

Scarlet Nexus is out in June 25th, so in a week and a half. I guess Bandai Namco think that with a demo available for people to try, they're not too fussed to get the word out there more for the game and think their job is done there. Personally, I'm not 100% sold on the game myself. The demo was fine but thats about it, seems like it could be good but also looks like it could fall on its face very quickly with all the systems in play. I'm waiting on reviews myself, though if that rumour that it was coming to Gamepass had been true (the devs have debunked it sadly) then I'd have been in for giving it a try but I just feel little lack the polish of Astral Chain and even then that's saying something (should point out that I liked Astral Chain but it also got in over its head with throwing too many ideas at the wall I feel).

Anyway, curious to see how Nintendo will do. While I did enjoy Microsoft's conference, I personally think its indie games that have come out of E3 looking the best this year and I'm more than happy with that as I've been heavily invested in the indie scene since the 360 so I've been well and truly catered to with Day of the Devs, Guerrilla Collective 2, Tribeca Games and Wholesome Games Direct. Even the likes of Somerville and Replaced in the Microsoft showcase looked better than most of everything else that we've seen on show this year.

Not really sure what Nintendo can bring to the table that would make me take notice. I've tried with the Switch twice and felt burned both times despite a healthy indie scene (and even then, I'd argue that the balance between good/great indies vs. shovelware/awful indies was well and truly tipped in the first year of the console). I'd love to see something new from them, something risky that they've not tried. Hell, get Mercurysteam involved with one of their IPs again to give it a Western style or partner with another Western dev team to try something new and exclusive. They've done we'll working with Ubisoft on Mario + Rabbids and they've managed to get good/great games out of partnerships with Japanese studios but I do feel they're missing that big Western style game that would appeal to the wider audience over in North America/Europe. Not saying Zelda doesn't but Metroid Prime isn't a big seller (though 4 should buck that trend if it makes good on the originals) but yeah, I'd just like to see them take on the WRPG genre or something like that, some kind of sprawling, narrative and lore rich world that isn't hung out with the melodrama that seems to permeate a lot of JRPGs that turns me off somewhat.

[Aperson]

Don't care what else was in that Direct, Metroid Dread single handely won E3 for Nintendo for me.

[Dcubed]

On 13/06/2021 at 9:08 PM, Dcubed said:

This E3 has been absolutely shite so far (save for Mario & Rabbids SOH)

Save us Nintendo! For Fuck’s Sake!!

Edited June 15, 2021 by Dcubed

[Ronnie]

So what's everyone's five favourite games from this year's E3? For me I'll go with:

- Starfield - very intriguing, love the look and tone
- Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope - looks hugely expanded from an already amazing first entry
- Metroid Dread - never been a massive Metroid fan but this looks loads of fun
- Death's Door - hadn't spotted this game before, looks like the next big indie gem
- Breath of the Wild 2 - obv

Honourable mentions to Somerville and Replaced, definitely picking those up.

[Dufniall]

• Metroid Dread was the biggest surprise and my most anticipated title.
• It was great to see an update on Axiom Verge 2 and that is high on my wishlist as well.
• Another surprise was Metal Slug Tactics, Dotemu is on fire with Streets of Rage 4, Turtles coming up and now this!
• Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope looks amazing, it made me finally start the Donkey Kong DLC and yeah I want more.
• Not much was shown of it, but I thoroughly enjoyed the first Jurassic World Evolution so seeing a sequel getting announced was good news.

[Julius]

Five favourite games of this E3 (yes I'm counting Summer Game Fest in this, don't @ me!) for me would have to be, in no particular order: 

• Elden Ring - fantastic trailer and the thing I'm most hyped for from this E3, looks incredible and it comes out in January! 

• Starfield - thought what was shown of it in the Xbox & Bethesda Showcase was pretty underwhelming, but the behind-the-scenes video with the concept art and Inon Zur's music more pronounced than in that trailer, as well as Todd Howard's interview with The Telegraph, got me really excited. Will wait until next E3/summer, when I assume we will get a deeper dive, but assuming no delays, I think I'll be picking up a Series X a few weeks ahead of this next year. 

• The sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - sucks that it's probably coming the second half of next year rather than the first, but I thought the trailer was fantastic for getting your mind racing, the new mechanics and items they showed off were super cool, and I really enjoyed the music. Still one of my most anticipated! 

• Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising - I backed Eiyuden Chronicle on Kickstarter last year, ahead of playing the first two Suikoden games this year, just because I had a hunch I would get on well with those games and because it felt like it was worth supporting something like this. Having now played the first two Suikoden games, both of which I loved dearly, I cannot wait to see what Murayama and Rabbit & Bear have in store for us with the game! And it still looks fantastic. So, why the hype for Rising? Because it's the first we've seen of it, and I can't wait to hopefully get a bit of a peek behind the curtain into this world next year! 

• Replaced - love pixel art, love the backgrounds, it was a pretty high octane trailer and I can't wait to see more. 

Somerville looks great too, I personally don't have any real investment in Metroid Dread but was hyped just because I know so many here were hoping for it and will absolutely be picking it up, and Advance Wars 1+2 is something I'm definitely interested in. A bunch of indies I like the look of, perhaps too many to mention! Oh, other than Trip to Yomi, that's probably level with Replaced for me! 

Some other topics for discussion I'd like to throw in the mix:

• Favourite Trailer - Elden Ring. Release date earlier than I think anyone was really expecting, yes it used the same music as before but I don't care, the crescendo of the choir at the end as The Tarnished leaps towards 16-armed dude gives me goosebumps every single time. It also really gets the mind racing with possibilities, actively is pushing me towards playing my next From Software game, and I'm very excited for it, or course! I've watched this trailer back a lot, as you might be able to tell! 

• Worst Trailer - Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin. Absolutely horrendous trailer which did absolutely nothing to inform you of what the game itself will be like, instead focusing on being edgy to the point of cringe. CHAOS. Urgh. And it sucks even more because the shadow dropped demo was corrupted and the update didn't take place until a day later, but when it did, the gameplay was actually good! 

• Best Presentation - Nintendo. It's unfunny just how easily they walked away with E3 off the back of three of their relatively smaller IP (Metroid, Advance Wars and Warioware) and a trailer for the Breath of the Wild sequel. There were a couple of things I took issue with from a presentation perspective, but overall it was incredibly well paced for its length and there were some really smartly curated moments too, but I'll get to that in the Direct thread as I'm still catching up on some of Treehouse! 

• Most Disappointing Presentation - Square Enix. Look, Gearbox was objectively the worst E3 conference I've ever seen, but I had no expectations going into that, and nothing riding on it. Capcom was underwhelming, sure, but it was pretty inoffensive. Square Enix crushed dreams during their presentation. Final Fantasy I - VI Collection I've been begging for for years? Steam and Mobile only. Final Fantasy Soulslike rumour? A trailer that does nothing at all to interest you in the game, promotes everything Final Fantasy has done wrong after doing so much right the last few years, it's rough. Babylon's Fall? Looked rough. Final Fantasy XVI? Complete no-show, guess we're waiting for a State of Play for that. 

• Greatest Presentation Moment - Geoff Keighley's over-the-top introduction for the Elden Ring trailer and then declaring he was free afterwards. Did so incredibly well to keep it under wraps, and though Summer Game Fest was far from being the best show this last week, I'm grateful that he holds it. 

• Most Awkward Presentation Moment - Randy Pitchford interviewing the cast of the Borderlands film, it's been a while since I've felt this awkward watching something on a stream. Runner-up would be Deviation Studios being announced at the tail end of Summer Game Fest -- not because of the guys themselves, thought they were a little nervous, but because it just felt so out of keeping with having a somewhat neutral space and didn't need to be there. 

• A Presentation Moment That Hit a Pet Peeve - "We have an amazing show: 30 titles, 27 on Game Pass" - Sarah Bond during Xbox & Bethesda Showcase. They need to stop doing this, shut up and let your games sell themselves, damn it! Runner-up would be every "Exclusive" mentioned, legitimately think they added a good 10 - 15 minutes to their show with that and "Day 1 on Game Pass". Urgh! 

• Most Disappointing Moment - Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters. I refuse to talk about this further. 

• Biggest No-shows - Final Fantasy XVI not being at Square Enix hurt. Was really hoping for something on Playdead's or Fumito Ueda-helmed genDESIGN's next games too. 

• Overall E3 score - 5.5/10. As has already been said before, most of these publishers and studios didn't need their own events based on what they brought with them, and I think the lack of things to fill in the gaps (impressions from the show floor, interviews, demos) just made it a thing I tuned in for when it came to particular presentations, rather than normally having something on in the background, as was the case during previous E3's. Nintendo boosted it by an entire point for me, this wasn't a good E3 on the whole, but they at least managed to drag it out of the grave. 

Edited June 16, 2021 by Julius

[Glen-i]

Gonna jump on @Julius and his extra categories, but here's my top 5 announcements.

Age of Calamity: Zelda's Sick New Ride - Yes, I'm counting DLC here, you can't stop me! That trailer was a rollercoaster that only I was enjoying! A Guardian was not the character I was expecting (Was putting my money on Purah), but I dig it. There was a twinge of disappointment when I saw Link's new Flail toy. It's neat, but I was really wanting the Master Cycle.

But wait! There it is! The Master Cycle! But if Link's already got a new weapon, then who...?

Wait! It's Zelda!?

OK, they somehow made the Master Cycle more hilarious then I could've imagined. Zelda continues to hog the fun weapons in this game!

WarioWare: Get It Together! - It's new WarioWare! It's completely stupid! There's a Fire Emblem: Three Houses microgame about a tea session! WarioWare Gold is up there in the "Ninty's best voice work" category with Kid Icarus: Uprising, so I'm looking forward to hearing more full sentences from Wario!

Mario Party Superstars - Super Mario Party is a great game, a great game hampered by being forced to use drifting Joy-Cons. That's not an issue anymore! So I'm all in! Even if it seems that the best Party character has been dropped for the sake of being accurate to the source material. Unless they replaced Boo with King Boo? That'd work.

Mario Golf: Super Rush - I always had faith that the Golf Adventure aspect of the game was looking like a return to GB/GBA form. But seeing it here, it's great! I'm ready for some stupid golfing escapades with my stupid-voiced Mii as it kills a stupid sacred phoenix with the power of stupid golf!

Kazuya in Smash - I'm not the biggest arcade fighting game fan. Which is why I like Smash. I'm always hyped for any new character, but there's always something special when that new character is from a series that's new to Smash. I'm quite surprised that it's Tekken, especially after Heihachi was Mii costume'd! My only experience with Tekken was messing around with adorable Dinosaur Gon in Tekken 3. Either way, Smash taught me how to Hadoken and how to Buster Wolf someone in the face, so I'm looking forward to becoming an ultimate Tekken master now.

That said, if High School Love isn't a song here, I'll be very disappointed in Sakurai.

Favourite Trailer - Kazuya in Smash - It's fun seeing the various Smash characters interact, and this trailer didn't disappoint in that regard. Seeing Kazuya just chuck loads of Nintendo characters into a volcano like that infamous Tekken scene was funny (Especially Min Min and her noodly arms complicating the matter).

Then there's the gameplay which really captured the feel of Tekken, even the dramatic camera angles that happen when you grab someone. Bound to be loads of references that flew over my head, but it was still a good time. And of course, Kirby survives the volcano drop. You can't kill the most powerful being in video games with that pathetic attempt!

Worst Trailer - Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin - Don't get me wrong. I certainly enjoyed this trailer, but not because it was any good. The memes that have come from this have had me cackling for the past few days. But yeah, that trailer was Terribad. @Julius already summed up why.

Best Presentation - Nintendo - Normally, this question is where my bias shines, but this year? DUHHHHH! It's not even a contest! Microsoft and Devolver were the only ones who had decent showings this year, it was an incredibly low bar and Nintendo were already over it 15 minutes into their presentation! I don't even like Advance Wars and even I was blindsided by it's sudden appearance. There were some heavy hitters in there!

Most Disappointing Presentation - Square Enix - Technically speaking, Capcom had far less to show, but at least they didn't throw middle fingers at long-time Final Fantasy fans! I swear, you'd think they were embarrassed by the first 6 FF games! Absolutely insulting!

Greatest Presentation Moment - Devolver's in-between sections - I'll be honest, I don't watch Devolver for the games (Although Death's Door looks pretty great), they're the last bastion of fun at E3. I'm certainly a subscriber to Devolver MaxPass Plus, whether I actually wanted to be or not.

Most Awkward Presentation Moment - N/A - I can't really choose a moment for this, nothing stood out to me, so just gonna skip that.

Presentation Moment That Hit A Pet Peeve - No Forza Car on Microsoft's Stage - I always find it funny when that happens. Microsoft seem to be ditching it because of that. I want them to lean into it more and show that they can poke fun at themselves! Without that silly car, it's just "Oh, it's a Forza game... Yawn!"

Most Disappointing Moment - Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters - Julius might not want to talk about it, but I bloody will! How effing tone-deaf do you have to be to mess up such an easy slam dunk of an announcement!? This "remaster" assumes that taking three SNES games and making them look worse qualifies as such! And even if you look at the NES titles. Two of them have already had lovely looking Remasters in the past. But no, instead we get whatever the hell this is!

What is this crap!? When the GBA is outperforming you in 2021, that's proper embarrassing!

And then for the cherry on top of the crap cake, they're individual purchases only available on Steam and Mobile phones! Those platforms already have 4 of those titles! Insulting!

Biggest No-Shows - Sony - Self-explanatory, really. But given the standard of this year, maybe that was for the best.

Overall E3 Score - 7/10 - Yeah, I guess that's kinda surprising. But I don't have much investment in most of the Non-Nintendo conferences, and Nintendo did very well. So I can overlook most of the nothing presentations anyway.

Edited June 16, 2021 by Glen-i

[Ganepark32]

Its not been a banger of an E3 this year but there's definitely been a lot across the board thats grabbed my attention, and I've certainly filled out my release schedule for the rest of the year. Looks like there'll be a lot of games to play across my Xbox Series S and PS5, my poor wallet.

My favourites from E3 though were:

Forza Horizon 5 - I absolutely love the Forza Horizon series. I love the simplicity of it for just bombing down roads and taking in the scenery but also for being technical when it needs to. I'm not much of a sim racer fan so the more arcadey nature of these games has always suited me more and I've played all but the original up to this point, with Forza Horizon 3 being my favourite so far. 5 looks absolutely stunning and while most are sad its not Japan, I'm happy that will get such a varied landscape as Mexico to drive through. Cannot wait to jump in on November 9th, already itching to get my hands on it.

Replaced - I've not really taken a shine to these 2D-HD titles that have come along sporting the look so far but this really stood out. I love the Cyberpunk vibe in that art style and it looks like it'll be great to play.

Trek of Yomi - This one is another that came out of nowhere and blew me away. Its obviously aping that Kurosawa film style with the black and white visuals but it works so well and just genuinely looks phenomenal. Another indie darling in the making but like Replaced, sad I'll have to wait till next year for a release date but hoping for great things from the game.

Death's Door - This looked great when Devolver announced it during a recent ID@Xbox showcase and it continues to look fantastic now. The art style is great, the combat looks to be tight, taking from the Zelda titles and dungeon crawlers with possibly a splash of Soulsborne in there perhaps. Its an instant buy for me when it releases this month and I can't wait to get my hands on it.

Somerville - It might have been leaked that it would show up at E3 but I didn't know what to expect from Jumpship's first title since the split from Playdead. But the game looks like it'll build upon the foundations of Inside and take things that bit further, bringing in a sci-fi story that looks to be intriguing (that baby in the trailer can clearly sense/communicate with the aliens or whatever they are) and it once again looks phenomenal in its art style. I'd say Inside is as close to perfect as a video game has come in the medium and if this hits anywhere close to that then we're in for a treat.

Those were my top 5 from the E3/Summer Games Fest showings. There's loads of indie games that have really stood out on top of these, like Sable, Harold Halibut, Vokabulantis, 12 Minutes and Planet of Lana to name a few. Far more indies have stood out than bigger games, though I will say that even I as someone who hasn't really gelled with any of the Soulsborne/Sekiro titles thought that Elden Ring looked fantastic. Stalker 2 is one to watch for me; even though I've never played the originals its tapping into that Metro vein for me and has me very interested. Getting a sequel to A Plague Tale was always going to happen off of the back of the success of the original so I'm so happy we'll see that next year. Very excited for it.

As I've said a few times, indie games won E3 for me. The variety and quality of what these smaller studios is offering is amazing and them getting the push everywhere was so good to see. At the end of the day, gamers won with all those titles, not Microsoft, not Nintendo, not any particular publisher. When there's a wealth of unique and interesting games spanning every conceivable genre and art style, I think at the end of the day we as gamers should feel lucky to have such ingenuity in the industry. I know a lot will say Nintendo won or this or that but really, as I say, gamers won with the shear amount of quality indie titles coming to all platforms.

And we've still got Annapurna's showcase on July 29th and themays sure to be fantastic too.