Official E3 2015 Topic

[Doctor Oak]

It's almost Gaming Christmas time again, which also means it's time for another round of E3 predictions!

First, let's sort out when the main attraction - the big press conferences - are set to be. Times are in local (Pacific Time) and UK (British Summer Time - or UTC+1) times, so work out where you stand from there. For the first time we have conferences from Bethesda and Square Enix in the mix, as well as a PC-focused conference put together by AMD and the PC Gamer magazine meaning it's the biggest ever E3 in terms of conferences and probably in terms of new game announcements too.

Sunday 14th June / Monday 15th June:

Nintendo World Championships - 3pm (14th) Pacific / 11pm BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/nintendo
http://e3.nintendo.com/

Not actually a conference, but Nintendo is reviving the Nintendo World Championships (last seen on the NES) live in LA at E3 and pitting fans against each other with classic Nintendo titles, such as the original Legend of Zelda. Last year's Smash Bros tournament was a huge success, so this is a good way to keep that bit of momentum - as well as giving Nintendo a live presence at the show despite not holding a conference.

Bethesda - 7pm (14th) Pacific / 3am (15th) BST
Twitch: http://twitch.tv/bethesda
Youtube: http://youtube.com/BethesdaSoftworks

Bethesda kicks the conferences off this year at an ungodly hour here in the UK with their first ever E3 conference. For a company that doesn't even attend E3 some years, this is a pretty major leap for them.

Microsoft - 9.30am (15th) Pacific / 5.30pm BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/xbox
Xbox One/360 Events App

Microsoft lead the platform holders as usual with a 90 minute show set to focus heavily on first party games and new IP - probably spurred on by the big third party conferences taking place elsewhere during the show.

EA - 1pm Pacific / 8.30pm BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/ea

EA's show is normally a pretty mixed bag, with a heavy focus on their big annual sports titles taking away a lot of their lustre. Probably the most skippable show of them all, but read on for some expected titles you may want to tune in for all the same.

Ubisoft - 2.45pm Pacific / 10.45pm BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/ubisoft

Ubisoft have had a lot more focus on their presenters than the games in the past few years - and that's unlikely to change as Aisha Tyler returns to host the show with her freakishly large hands for a third year running - but they've got a lot to play for with the fans and media after a bit of a PR mess throughout 2014.

Sony - 6pm Pacific / 2am BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/playstation
PSN on PS4/PS3

Sony wraps up the first day as usual with a show that usually somewhat reflects the fatigue setting in for its viewers by being a bit slow and dull. They remain the only platform holder that really bothers using the press conference for showing off numbers any more so the conference tends to get a bit dry. They usually have at least one massive reveal up their sleeves to go with it though, so it's usually worth powering through into the small hours for it.

Tuesday 16th June:

Nintendo - 9am Pacific / 5pm BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/nintendo
http://e3.nintendo.com/

Once again Nintendo is skipping a live conference in favour of a bigger-style Nintendo Direct and it's a strategy that's paying off really well for them as they quite easily were the most entertaining last year. There's a potential that new games might be a bit thin on the ground this year, but it's sure to be a good watch either way. Make sure you stay tuned after the show (at least until Squeenix's conference begins) for a return of Treehouse Live at E3 taking a more in-depth look at games revealed in the main show.

Square Enix - 10am Pacific / 6pm BST
Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/squareenixpresents

This is a brand new world for Square Enix, but with the breadth of games that they publish these days following their absorption of Eidos, it's actually surprising that they've not joined EA and Ubisoft into the fray before now. Hard to say how the show itself might unfold - particularly as they're the only other Japanese-based live conference beyond Sony - but as you'll see further down, the potential game line up isn't to be sniffed at.

PC Gaming Show - 5pm Pacific / 1am (17th) BST
Twitch: http://www.pcgamingshow.com/

As a general response to the console-focused nature of E3, AMD and PC Gamer have worked together to put on this show of their own to make up for the fact that there's not really a platform holder for PC to do it for them (unless you count Valve). Blizzard, Humble Bundle, Squeenix and even Xbox are participating in the 2 hour conference and all bets are basically off on this one. Ultimately they won't have much to say that won't already have been covered in the conferences preceding it, but it does give PC exclusive games a chance to get their name out there in the chaos. As it stands, there's a noticeable lack of support from Valve, though.

 

[Doctor Oak]

Bethesda Press Conference Predictions:

Well, we already know what's going to be the big focus for this conference: Fallout 4. We also already know to expect to finally see the new, rebooted Doom in action after this brief tease a few weeks ago and since they've scheduled in a few panels about it after the conference, a bigger look into Battlecry, their free to play multiplayer shooter/hack-n-slash game.

Beyond that the most likely big reveal at the show, now that Fallout is out of the bag, would be a sequel to 2012's Dishonored. Though an early reveal of the game's impending existence is more likely than any real gameplay. They are unlikely to have the resources for this to be in heavy development just yet. A fully-fledged sequel to Wolfenstein may also be on the cards, but is perhaps unlikely.

And what of the Elder Scrolls? Obviously, with Fallout on the go, we're probably unlikely to hear much about a follow-up for Skyrim right now - especially since one can only assume that the next Elder Scrolls game will be on a brand new engine rather than the upgraded Skyrim engine Fallout 4 is running on. We may hear about the next expansion for The Elder Scrolls Online, though. The game is free to play now, so even though the Tamriel Unlimited expansion has just hit consoles, it's likely to only actually help it if there's sight of more new content not too far down the line.

I think the conference in general will be about detailing Fallout and Doom more than revealing new games, so it's probably best to go into it expecting a decent amount of gameplay, but not much in terms of reveals. That's fine, but maybe it's not really worth staying up until 3am for...

 

[Doctor Oak]

Microsoft Press Conference Predictions:

Under Phil Spencer, Xbox has never seemed as strong as it does right now. With the promise of another E3 focusing its full 90 minutes on games, the Xbox conference is likely to once again feature the most new game reveals of them all.

Let's get the games we know about out of the way first:

• Rise of the Tomb Raider - announced last year as an Xbox One exclusive, it's pretty safe to say we'll see this at Microsoft's show despite Squeenix having their own.
• Forza 6 - We already knew the game existed and would be at E3, but we also got a good chunk of details about the game leaked online today. There'll be plenty of car porn on show for sure.
• Gears of War - the new Gears of War will be at E3, and it will very likely be joined with an HD update of the original - or even the original trilogy - for the Xbox One in advance of its likely launch next year.
• Quantum Break - as seems to always end up being the case with Remedy, we seem to end up seeing their game at E3 every year and it just never actually seeming to get any closer. Quantum Break once again isn't making it out this year, but it's supposedly because the end of this year is just too heavy for it, so we might not have too much longer to wait in 2016.
• Fable Legends - The closed beta for the game is currently underway, and the game is very likely coming out at the back-end of this year. I'd practically guarantee the announcement of an open beta and a release date during the show. A look into the single player content would probably be on the cards as well.
• Halo 5 - Due out at the end of the year, it's no question that a big part of this year's E3 will be centred around Xbox's crown jewel.

Microsoft have also pledged to put a bigger focus on PC gaming at this year's show, but they're participating in the PC Gamer E3 show the next day, so probably won't really cover it under their own. We can expect a little deviance from a barrage of game trailers, however, to focus on what the update to Windows 10 and DirectX 12 will mean for the Xbox One. Among them is the ability to stream from your Xbox One to your PC, as well as 'Universal Apps' that work across all Windows 10 (desktop, mobile, Xbox) devices. This unification of the Xbox and PC under the same Windows 10 banner will mean quite a lot for Microsoft and will likely mark the direction of gaming on both platforms in the future.

As far as rumoured titles go, Microsoft's probably got the most of those too:

• Banjo-Kazooie/Battletoads/Basically any RARE property - I'd think that the first one is probably out for now as Microsoft and RARE probably wouldn't want to step on Yooka-Lalyee's toes. Battletoads is something that Phil Spencer himself has stirred the pot on for a considerable while now, though, and there's been a lot of definite noise about making better use of the rich RARE IP they've got - so something will come from that I'm pretty sure.
• Viva Piñata? It could even be Viva Piñata that we see a revival of - though there are suggestions that the original deal with 4Kids for an animated series of the franchise have left it in murky legal waters. It doesn't appeal massively to the core demographic of Xbox One owners - but it was a particular favourite for a good number of other Xbox 360 owners all the same.
• New IP - it's not even a rumour really, but in the nature of it being brand new, we don't really have anything to go on for what it might be or how many new IPs we'll even see. Sunset Overdrive was a big, big hit for Microsoft earlier this year, though, so I think we might see some big name developers signing on for an exclusive new game or two this year as well.
• Phantom Dust - This game - revealed in a cinematic at last E3 and based on a cult hit from the original Xbox - is supposedly still alive following the collapse of its developer earlier in the year but there's a good chance Microsoft have since killed it off and will simply sweep it under the carpet.
• Scalebound - it's now been a year since Scalebound was revealed at the last E3 conference... and that's been it since - not a peep from Platinum or Microsoft about it until now. I expect it will be at this year's show, but it's possibly still so far off that we may not even see it in action.
• Third Parties! - Phil Spencer wants to focus more on first party and exclusive titles this year - which makes sense as most of the biggest third parties now have their own conferences. Activision notably don't, however, and they've got Call of Duty: Whatever one we're on now and a revitalised Guitar Hero Live to show off this year. They've got a very close relationship with Xbox and the new CoD games normally have a big gameplay demo during Microsoft's conference, so that's unlikely to change now. There'll probably be a live demo of Guitar Hero as well - and you can expect stage-based shenanigans to accompany it given the 'live' nature of the new game.
• Assassin's Creed??? - So, last year AC:Unity debuted in the Microsoft conference, despite Ubisoft normally favouring the Playstation side with its demos and exclusive DLC. That could happen again with AC:Syndicate, but it seems somewhat irrelevant since Ubisoft's own conference will focus on it further and Playstation will likely still have exclusive content either way. For the sake of time spent on more relevant titles, I'd kind of hope AC won't be there.
• Hololens? - Windows 10 will, eventually, bring with it Hololens - Microsoft's kind of VR/AR headset/black magic devil goggles. So far we've only seen it in actual use with some PC-based demos and no sign of how it will eventually work with the Xbox. The device is multiple years away from commercial reality at least, so I don't know if we'll see it here either - but it's a possibility we'll see it as a counter-point to Sony's Morpheus.

I reckon Microsoft may be able to scoop the big surprise of the night by throwing in a massive first or third party exclusive reveal. They've got a lot of the cards up their sleeves and are well positioned by leading the pack as well. It should definitely be a good show from them - though I do slightly lament the lack of direction the media side of the Xbox is getting in response to the beating they got for going too far that direction on the console's reveal. I'm not saying they should spend 20 minutes talking about how you can watch ESPN on your console, but as someone who uses their Xbox One daily as their major media centre, I'd be keen to see signs of that growing even more.

 

[Doctor Oak]

EA Press Conference Predictions:

Sports. Let's just get that out of the way right now (and hope that EA take much the same approach, frankly). The annual sports titles EA publish are basically their biggest source of income, so it's foolish to not expect them to give them a fair chunk of screen time. I imagine they might avoid drawing much attention to FIFA 16 at the moment, though...

On the more interesting side, though, EA have a massive Star Wars game in hand in Star Wars Battlefront and it will get top billing. We might even see another Star Wars game from them as part of their exclusive license and the hype train for the Force Awakens later in the year.

Mirror's Edge 2 will also be featuring ahead of its release next year as well as the brand new and rebooted Need for Speed and both will almost certainly be joined by a new Battlefield game, though we likely won't see it in action this year.

It's also very likely that we'll finally get a real look at the next Mass Effect game following some teases last year. The game itself is probably a minimum of a year and a half away, but I'd expect to see enough to set up the basics of the game at least.

The new Mass Effect will probably be the most surprising thing at EA's show, but we could also see a little something from Popcap (Plants vs Zombies on consoles/Peggle 3/Something new?), perhaps a revitalisation (again) of Medal of Honour and who knows, maybe even something brand new. We don't tend to see much of The Sims at E3 beyond new main releases, but you never know.

Don't kill yourself to watch EA's show, is the main takeaway here. Most of it worth watching will be broken down into a few 5 minute trailers afterwards. They could surprise us all, of course... but they probably won't.

 

[Doctor Oak]

Ubisoft Press Conference Predictions:

We already know that Assassin's Creed: Syndicate will get a starring role at this year's E3, so no surprises there. I expect they'll officially reveal the playable role of Evie Frye in a gameplay demo to kind of combat the teacup storm from last year's all-male co-op demo, but otherwise I think it'll be a bit paint-by-numbers for AC in the show here.

Aisha Tyler will have a terrible script and the show will be unbearable to watch. And Mr. Caffeine will probably inexplicably reappear as well. You've got to give Ubisoft a gold star for effort in trying to be irreverent with their shows, but they normally just end up being the same kind of unbelievable mess as when Nintendo made us sit through watching someone pretend to play the drums with a Wiimote - or forced Miyamoto to awkwardly join in.

Tom Clancy will have a minimum of three games at the show. We actually already know there'll be two - Rainbow Six Seige, first revealed last year, and The Division, now competing with Quantum Break for seeing how long they can show up at E3 and not be released. While we may even get a new H.A.W.X. title, even more likely is a Xbox one and PS4 debut for Sam Fisher in a new Splinter Cell game. One way or another, Tom Clancy won't be short on cash while Ubisoft is around.

Rayman has enjoyed a fair resurgence thanks to the excellent quality of Rayman Origins and Rayman Legends and the Ubi Art engine behind them. I'd kind of expect, at the very least, one new game revealed on that delightful engine to join the Rayman titles, Child of Light and Valiant Hearts. A new Rayman is perhaps not that unlikely either.

Watch Dogs 2 is the biggest rumble in Ubisoft's corner right now. The original game didn't fare too well against either the Internet or critics, but mostly because it has been built up to somewhat impossible standards by the time it finally released last spring. Much like Assassin's Creed, though, it's generally expected that a second outing will refine the best parts of the game and deliver a more well-rounded final product. Ubisoft have likely been working on finding a way to deliver that since the first game launched to that tepid reception, so here's a pretty good chance we'll see the first signs of that here.

Just Dance 47 will be announced. Or whatever number it's on now. Ubisoft have said it's the only game they'll continue supporting on the Wii U, so at least Nintendo will be happy about that, but I doubt many people watching the show will be bothered.

Prince of Persia could return again? This is a bit out there, really. Ubisoft have already acknowledged they don't really know where to go with the series right now, and considering the series basically became Assassin's Creed, it's not really surprising. HD remakes of the classic PS2 Sands of Time trilogy are the most likely way we'll see the series show up any time soon - which wouldn't be unwelcome, really.

Random not actually games/mobile game things - Between a kind of laser-tag thing and weird mobile apps for Just Dance, Ubisoft seem to have a penchant for using their conference for more out-of-the-conventional-box ideas than just main games. There'll probably be a few curve balls like that here again.

 

[Doctor Oak]

Sony E3 Press Conference Predictions:

The biggest thing expected to drop at Sony's conference is the finalisation of their Project Morpheus into a real product with a real release date (but given that it's likely to be quite high, perhaps not a real price right now). It's currently expected to be available next year - likely around a similar time as the Oculus Rift will be. So far, we have no real idea of what Sony plans on using it for on the Playstation, but we'll pretty definitely find out at this conference. I think there's a pretty good chance Morpheus could be somewhat of a lame duck and end up very much being another Kinect, but this is the show that will do its best to try and prove that wrong.

Indies! Because Sony loves their indies. Without them, the PS Vita wouldn't have had any releases for the majority of its history after all. No Man's Sky is easily Sony's biggest scalp in terms of getting indie devs locked in to Playstation and we'll likely see this conference being used to confirm a release and give us one more look into the procedurally generated explore-em-up.

Bloodborne is definitely getting an expansion, and it'll most likely be revealed here first. As will a first look into the recently revealed Uncharted: Nathan Drake Collection (even though it's not actually all the Nathan Drake games...) and, of course, Uncharted 4 - due out at the end of this year.

I'd consider it pretty likely that we'll see Batman: Arkham Knight getting a play-demo on stage ahead of its release in a few weeks, as well as a likely peek into Rock Band 4 as a response to Guitar Hero likely featuring in Microsoft's conference. Tony Hawk also has a new game coming out and a close history with Playstation will likely see the game featuring here if anywhere.

New first party exclusives? It's not really a secret that the PS4 has been somewhat sparse in terms of big exclusive (not Indie) titles. However, Resistance developer, Guerilla Games, has a new game in development, which we could well see at Sony's show. There's even a fairly good chance we'll see the next God of War at the show. Whether we'll see any real surprises or brand new IP is pretty up in the air. Certainly this year is the year of Nathan Drake, either way.

Bye bye PS Vita? The PS Vita's had a hard old life. It's not actually a terrible bit of kit, but a self-fulfilling prophecy of the system not having enough big exclusive games (fuelled by a lack of sales because it doesn't have enough big exclusive games) have left it as kind of an appendix to Sony's offerings rather than a major feature. Last year's release of Playstation TV, as well as the promise to start building that into its Smart TVs indicates that the PS Vita as a piece of hardware doesn't have a lot of life left in it. We'll probably see Sony just completely ignore the PS Vita rather than officially kill it off, but its future is definitely as more of a "Playstation Service" of downloadable classic titles and Sony's PS Now streaming service.

Speaking of PS Now, the service will probably get a rough date for a real rollout after its prolonged beta period.

Aaand that's kind of it. Sony tends to have pretty light shows on the years they're not debuting hardware, and while the Morpheus reveal might well make up for that this year, the rest of their fare may be somewhat unsurprising and low key.

 

[Doctor Oak]

Nintendo E3 Digital Event Predictions:

One of the advantages of doing a big, pre-recorded show like Nintendo's Digital Event at E3 instead of the traditional conference is that they can pack it out with a lot of fluff. Entertaining fluff, sure - last year we got some fantastic skits from Robot Chicken and Mega64 - but very deliberately not new games. It's something Nintendo kind of needs right now, because they don't have all that much in reserve.

We don't expect a lot on the Wii U front now that we know that the next Legend of Zelda title isn't coming out this year and won't even be at E3 because of that. The tech demos that Miyamoto showed off last year, such as Project Giant Robot are actually due to be made into full releases (which is questionable, really, but they've pulled this shit before with Steel Diver and Yoshi's Touch and Go, so I really don't doubt it). Really, though, the big name on Wii U at E3 this year will be Star Fox. Teased behind closed doors at last year's E3, it's set to be properly revealed this year. Perhaps questionable if it'll make it out this year, but if not, next year may well be a hell of a year for the Wii U... though probably its last. We will probably also see a bit more of Shin Megami Tensei X Fire Emblem on the Wii U and the new Xenoblade Chronicles X as well. The former is only due out in Japan this year, but the latter is due out everywhere before the end of 2015.

My big wild card on the Wii U this year is Pokken Tournament. The game's only been announced for Japanese arcades so far, but it's definitely going to have been made with a Wii U release in mind (it's even made to be played with a controller rather than an arcade stick). Whether we get an announcement for that at E3 is up in the air, but my view is that the arcade release in Japan is their major release either way, while the Wii U release will be ours, making E3 a pretty excellent place to confirm a Wii U version. We also don't yet know if there'll be a main series Pokemon game out at the end of this year (which would make it the first year without one for a while) and there's a small chance they'll announce it at E3 - particularly since it's likely to be a follow-up to X/Y, which actually got quite a lot of love at E3 before its release. It is small though.

On the 3DS, we can expect to see a bit more of the new dual natured Fire Emblem If just ahead of its Japanese release, but the game's not actually due out elsewhere until next year. Perhaps we'll see a slightly more sensible name for it beyond Japan at least. Other games Japan is getting that we're either not any time soon or perhaps not at all include the new Japan-centric Ace Attorney game which is due out in Japan next month and Layton 7 which doesn't even feature Professor Layton. I'd say both will need Nintendo's direct involvement to get them outside of Japan's borders on the 3DS, so if we're going to see that we'll probably see it here. All is not lost if we don't, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

We'll probably see a fair amount of amiibo on show, along with some meaningless platitudes about Nintendo not actually making enough of them for anyone to be able to buy them. We'll perhaps see an announcement of some re-releases of previous hard-to-get amiibo, though. Will we finally see a game that uses the amiibo fully in the same sense as Skylanders, Disney Infinity and the upcoming Lego Dimensions? It's definitely something Nintendo is lacking right now, but otherwise I'd guarantee most other games covered in the show will have amiibo support one way or another.

Will we see what Retro Studios are up to at last? Will we see another Metroid game at last? Will Animal Crossing make its way to the Wii U? It's hard to say on all those big questions really. Nintendo may have left it too late to make much of the Wii U despite any big releases they throw at it between now and the likely release of the NX (definitely not featuring at this year's E3, by the way) in 2017 because they'd really have to be releasing a new first party title every 3 weeks to keep any sort of momentum going in the absence of literally any other releases. They could very well move to focus on launch titles for the NX instead.

On the brighter side of things, though, Nintendo's partnership with DeNA for both mobile gaming as well as improving their online account system into something a bit more, well, modern, should make for some hopefully pleasing results at this year's conference ahead of a new Club Nintendo and their first game later in the year. One concern may just be that as we've seen with recent Pokemon eShop releases, Nintendo will continue to edge closer into rip-off F2P territory... but perhaps it's the devil worth a sensible approach to online accounts and - hopefully - digital purchases.

 

[Doctor Oak]

Square Enix E3 Press Conference Predictions:

As with Bethesda, Squeenix are newbies to the E3 conferences. So much so that they initially scheduled their conference for the same time as Nintendo's event (even though Nintendo always takes that slot). Thankfully they were wise enough to not try and compete with the Kyoto-Giant in the end. We can be pretty certain of a few games we'll see at their first ever conference:

• Rise of the Tomb Raider - We'll see plenty of it in Microsoft's conference, but Square Enix will most certainly give it plenty of screen time in theirs as well.
• Deus Ex: Mankind Divided - Revealed a few weeks ago, we don't know too much about the game just yet, but I'd guarantee a gameplay reveal here at E3 and probably a confirmation of a (late?) 2016 release. We might also see a bit more surrounding the game involving mobile games, novels, comics etc.
• Just Cause 3 - also very recently revealed, we'll see a bit more of the game at E3 ahead of a release later in the year.
• Final Fantasies - There are quite a few in the pipeline at the moment, and this is Squeenix, so expect to be watching quite a lot of Final Fantasy content at this conference.
• Bravely Second End Layer - it's actually already out in Japan, but we'll probably see a bit more of the game ahead of its worldwide release next year.
• Kingdom Hearts III - It seems like this game has been in the air forever at this point, and we'll probably see it break cover at E3. I somewhat expect that we'll see another Kingdom Hearts collection to precede it, though - particularly as this game is due out on the Xbox One.

That's a pretty massive amount of games we can already know to expect, so what else have Squeenix got under their sleeves that we don't already know about? Hitman and Sleeping Dogs joined Tomb Raider with releases in 2012, but we don't yet know when/if we'll see any more from either of those franchises. I'd consider it pretty likely they're both in active development and on the way, so we may well see teases here at E3 at least. Hitman is also the only of the three without any presence on the PS4 and Xbox One following re-releases of Tomb Raider and Sleeping Dogs, so perhaps we'll see a definitive Hitman Absolution or even another Hitman Collection on the current-gen machines.

For their first ever conference, Squeenix certainly won't be short of brand new games on show. We've had a few sneak peeks at what would otherwise have been massive new reveals, but all the same Squeenix holds the cards on some of the biggest third party franchises in both the East and West right now so their own conference is really long overdue now.

 

[Doctor Oak]

PC Gaming Show Press Conference Predictions:

It's kind of impossible to make much of a prediction for this one because it's simply so unprecedented. The fact that EA/Origin, CD Project/GoG and Valve/Steam don't actually seem to be involved is a bit questionable as, ultimately, they are the primary store fronts for PC and de-facto platform holders.

Microsoft getting involved under the Xbox banner is very much a commitment to PC Gaming on Windows, and we could at the very least see some of that commitment in the form of new Microsoft Studios PC games. A lot of people are somewhat clamouring for Halo on PC again, but as far as I'm concerned, what I'm looking for is a return (and a true return) of Age of Empires after a few years of maltreatment of the franchise from Microsoft.

New game reveals are probably going to be somewhat thin on the ground when it comes to big name publishers and developers, though there'll likely be plenty of indie games to go around. What we might see instead is a bit of a PC Master Race show of force by making the most of running games shown at recent console conferences on max-settings... running on AMD Radeon cards of course...

Oh, and since it's the third show, on the third day and features plenty of third parties in a show probably divided into roughly three parts, I think that's pretty damned obvious that the show is all about Half Life 3 confirmed.

 

[NonAnalogue]

I would be very very surprised if we don't get some more Smash Bros. DLC news during the Nintendo event. Lucas is being released right beforehand, which clears the way for news about the next set of downloadable characters. The popular rumor right now is Roy and Ryu based on some supposed files found in the depths of the last update, but I'm not sure how much stock I put in that. I would put money down on there being some more Splatoon update news as well, since they're passing content for that out like cheap cigars.

I'm also keeping my fingers crossed for a Golden Sun 3DS, but I know it's not going to happen.

 

[Doctor Oak]

I would be very very surprised if we don't get some more Smash Bros. DLC news during the Nintendo event.

I did actually mean to mention that but forgot. I reckon we'll probably see a new character coming from the recent straw poll they conducted being announced for much later on and a returning fighter to go with Mewtwo and Lucas to come much sooner.

I would put money down on there being some more Splatoon update news as well, since they're passing content for that out like cheap cigars.

I'd expect more Splatoon 'DLC' too, but given that we're basically just unlocking content that's already on the disc, I'm not going to give it much weight.

I'm also keeping my fingers crossed for a Golden Sun 3DS, but I know it's not going to happen.

I reckon there's probably more chance of Halo appearing on a Playstation than any more follow ups to Golden Sun, sadly. A collection of all three games on the 3DS would be nice to get out there eventually, though.

 

[NonAnalogue]

I'd expect more Splatoon 'DLC' too, but given that we're basically just unlocking content that's already on the disc, I'm not going to give it much weight.

Eventually they're adding in some new modes and stages, and I have no idea if those are already on the disc or not. Maybe we'll see news on those.

Didn't Nintendo say a while back that they were going to be branching into quality-of-life products? I know the heart rate monitor that went on your finger never went anywhere, but maybe we'll see evidence of their work in a different direction. I remember seeing a really good suggestion back when that monitor was first announced that a horror game that monitored your pulse and amped up the tension as your heart rate sped up would be amazing - and while that specific idea is obviously not going to happen, I wouldn't put it past Nintendo to have some really underwhelming accessory announcement that turns out to augment some game in a really cool way.

 

[Brendan Savem]

To be honest, I'm still hopeful for the 4th Golden Sun. Is it coming this year? I highly doubt it. But interviews on the series future said that a new game will come if there's enough demand on it. Isaac has been a popular choice for the Smash Bros poll, so that might be a good signal for Camelot to start developing a new one. That's still at least a year down the line though, so I would be very surprised if there was news of it now.

We almost have to have Starfox here, otherwise we would have heard about it along with the new Zelda. My flatmate was hoping that Pokémon wouldn't release another main series game this year, because a pokémon a year is too much for him. As much as I could try to agree with his hopes, we are almost certainly going to see it happen, Nintendo has no reason to slow down now.

 

[Doctor Oak]

Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare is returning with a sequel at E3.

It'll feature in Microsoft's conference, meaning it's also likely to be a temporary exclusive for Microsoft once again. The first game was an excellent twist on both the Plants vs Zombies series and the Team Fortress 2 style gameplay it borrowed heavily from. There wasn't a massive amount to keep me playing very long after launch, but that's pretty normal for most games with me. A sequel with some brand new modes would definitely be very welcome all the same.

 

[pokeman266]

A trailer for Hyrule Warriors for the 3DS was leaked. Since this leak was so close to E3 it's not hard to imagine that this is going to be one of the games Nintendo talks about. I think this is going to be a big E3 for Nintendo!

 

[ShinyZekrom009]

I would be very very surprised if we don't get some more Smash Bros. DLC news during the Nintendo event. Lucas is being released right beforehand, which clears the way for news about the next set of downloadable characters. The popular rumor right now is Roy and Ryu based on some supposed files found in the depths of the last update, but I'm not sure how much stock I put in that. I would put money down on there being some more Splatoon update news as well, since they're passing content for that out like cheap cigars.

I'm also keeping my fingers crossed for a Golden Sun 3DS, but I know it's not going to happen.

Well, they have officially revealed that, at least.

I am wondering if they are gonna announce a new Pokemon game, whether it is a sequel/third game to the Gen VI games or a spin-off of some sort. I believe the last year a main-series Pokemon game did not come out was 2008/2009(whichever year Platinum did not release in), so I'm expecting something, but I'm not totally sure. It seems like there could be a Pokemon Z, which I largely attribute to Zygarde(hidden special two moves and all). Honestly, though, I'd just like more news on some DLC at the very least. We still have Hoopa, with both of its Forms, as well as Volcanion, which has not even been "officially announced," waiting in the shadows. Then there's the matter of "AZ's Floette," with a special move called "Light of Ruin." Not sure when that is gonna be released.

Goshdangit, Nintendo, just please release your DLC already!

 

[Doctor Oak]

Wow, so it's probably fair to say that yesterday was probably the biggest day of E3 for a very long time. I don't think I've seen such heavy punches all around in a non-hardware-announcing year.

Let's run through each conference and the big points from each:

Nintendo World Championships
Catch up:

• Before the thing even started, Nintendo announced the first Mother game is finally coming to America and Europe as Earthbound Beginnings... and you can go get it now!
• A round of the competition revealed a brand new game called Blast Ball. It seems to be a bit of an attempt to bring Splatoon-like gameplay to the 3DS and it actually looked a lot of fun. We'll be keeping our ears on the ground for that one.
• Mario Maker is now Super Mario Maker and it went from being a cool idea to a MUST HAVE after pitting the two finalists against some incredibly insane levels made with the game.
• Reggie sucks at Smash.

Bethesda
Conference:

• We saw plenty of Doom at last and it looks amazing.
• Doom Snapmap, coming with the game, brings in-game modding to a whole new level and is available on all platforms.
• Elder Scrolls Online is getting even more new content soon.
• Dishonored 2 is real and stars a new, female, playable character (something of a trend this year). It's not out for a while, but in the meantime the original Dishonored is coming out again on Xbox One and PS4 with an upgraded, definitive edition.
• Battlecry is a F2P class and team based combat game. No hard date, but it's due out this year.
• Todd Howard gave us a massively detailed playthrough of Fallout 4, revealing gameplay features, doggies and an insane crafting/building system.
• Fallout Shelter is an iOS game giving you control over your very own Vault Sim City style.
• You can have your very own Pip Boy if you buy the collector's edition, and you can pop an iPhone in as well for the full Pip Boy experience straight from the game.

Microsoft
Conference:

• We saw a lot more of Halo 5 in action, including a massive PvE co-op mode that puts you and a up to 23 other people not against eachother but against the AI.
• We saw a first look at Recore, an action adventure game made by none other than Mega Man's Keiji Inafune and the heads behind the Metroid Prime series. No gameplay as yet, but those names alone are enough to get us super hyped.
• Phil Spencer dropped the first massive bomb of the night by announcing backwards compatibility on the Xbox One - and those of us in the preview program can use it, right now.
• We're getting a brand new Xbox Controller called the Xbox Elite. It's super customisable, super high-end and super-fucking-expensive at $150 or £130.
• Fallout 4 mods made on the PC will work on the Xbox One
• EA Access is continuing to add new games to its vault, starting with Titanfall this week and Dragon Age: Inquisition in the summer. Members will also get early access to EA's big games later this year, including Need for Speed and Star Wars Battlefront
• Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 is on a highway to the daaaanger zooone. And it looks pretty damned awesome too.
• Forza Motorsport 6 might just be the prettiest racing game yet.
• Dark Souls III - purportedly the last in the series - is official and coming early next year.
• The Division is back! Supposedly this is going to finally be out early next year, with a beta exclusive to Xbox in December.
• Rainbow Six Seige will come free with Rainbow Six Vegas and Vegas 2 to play with the freshly new backwards compatibility when it releases on the 13th October this year.
• Gigantic is a free to play MOBA style game coming to Xbox and Windows 10 this August.
• There are a load of new Indie games coming out over the next year, but most important to me will always be the amazing looking Cuphead. Other featured games were Tacoma, Ashen and Beyond Eyes - a game about 'seeing' the world differently through a blind girl.
• Xbox Game Preview is Xbox's version of Steam's Early Access and essentially gives you the option to buy a game while it's still being made if you like the free demo that the service provides. It's worked really well for games like Minecraft and DayZ (the latter of which is a banner participant of this service) but it'll remain to be seen if it's really worth it on the Xbox.
• The DayZ guy, Dean Hall, wants a game that's not a game. That not a game is Ion. We didn't really find out much more than that...
• As expected we got a hefty playthrough of Rise of the Tomb Raider - featuring actual raiding of tombs this time!
• Rare Replay, leaked during the course of the day, was confirmed and features practically every RARE game made (30 of them, to be exact - but including the original Banjo Kazooie games as well as both Viva Pinatas, Kameo and Banjo Kazooie Nuts and Bolts - not including Goldeneye because of licensing hell) for $30. The pre-Xbox 360 games also feature a rewind option to give you a chance to actually finish a game like Battletoads and the pack comes with documentaries and special features as well.
• That's not all, though, RARE are also finally making a brand new not-Kinect IP with Sea of Thieves, a multiplayer Pirate simulator. Not a massive amount more to go on, but it does look incredible.
• Fable Legends didn't actually get a date, but it did confirm crossplay with Windows 10 when it does come out at the end of this year.
• Microsoft have taken a somewhat device-agnostic approach to VR (the best move in my opinion) and will support both Valve's Vive headset and Oculus Rift in a fashion.
• Their own VR/AR efforts of Hololens, however, brought Minecraft to life live on stage with yet another impressive demo of Microsoft's black magic hardware.
• Gears of War 4 was shown off for the first time, looking very dark and impressive, but it won't be out for a while. In the meantime, the first Gears of War is coming out later this year in a new HD flavour.

EA
Conference:

• Things kicked off with a cinematic trailer for Mass Effect: Andromeda. Not much to go on other than it looks like the rumours of the game being about setting out and creating your own colonies are true. It's due out at the end of next year, so we'll see more next year.
• The new Need for Speed looks insane graphically. A mix of live-action and real-time computer generated graphics leave your mind a bit confused as to what's real and what's not. It looks like a pretty fun game too.
• Star Wars: The Old Republic is finally getting a story expansion - free to subscribers of the now free-to-play game. Knights of the Fallen Empire launches later this year.
• A very nervous Martin Sahlin was forced out on stage to promote his amazing looking game, Unravel.
• We saw much more of Plants Vs Zombies Garden Warfare 2 and it keeps looking even more insane. They've also announced a commitment to free updates to the game after its release early next year as well as single player options for every game mode.
• blah blah blah Sports blah blah blah Pele (no but seriously the football bit was like 20 goddamned minutes long)
• Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes is another mobile Star Wars game... and is basically Hearthstone.
• Minions: Paradise is The Minions: Tapped Out. It's got plenty of character from the Rabbids clones, but I'm sure it'll have maaany more microstransactions too.
• Mirror's Edge Catalyst was shown off for the first time and does indeed look amazing
• MORE SPORTS
• Aaaaand Star Wars Battlefront. We saw a massive gameplay demo set on Hoth and I'm not even going to bother explaining it. Just go watch it. Watch it again even. The demo also set a new record with nearly half a million people watching it live on Youtube.

Ubisoft
Conference:

• Ubisoft started things off in fantastic fashion by announcing a sequel that many of us thought would never get made (especially since Matt and Trey basically said so) to one of the absolute best games of 2014... South Park: The Fractured But Whole.
• A brand new game was demonstrated, pitting Vikings against medieval warriors in a team based action game called For Honor.
• The Crew is getting a big expansion of new content, as is Trials Fusion with the absolutely INSANE Awesome Level Max expansion pack bringing a cat riding a fire breathing unicorn next month
• Hey it's The Division again! This time the gameplay demo showed off a special kind of mission in which you can completely dick over everyone you're playing with by killing them and stealing their loot.
• Anno 2205 is coming out this November and will not only give you the chance to build massive cities on Earth... but on the Moon as well.
• Ubisoft still want you to play Just Dance.
• Angela Bassett is joining the case of Rainbow Six Seige as a character that's also basically Amanda Waller. The game continues to look amazing both in co-op and single player forms.
• Trackmania Turbo is finally coming to Xbox One and PS4.
• Assassin's Creed Syndicate only really got lip service and a (very nice) cinematic trailer.
• Ubisoft's big secret reveal this year is a brand new reboot of Ghost Recon Wildlands which looks incredible. The game can be played with up to 4 people in co-op, or all on your own and will scale the enemies appropriately.

Sony
Conference:

• Sony kicked things off by finally bringing back The Last Guardian after years of development hell. It is still very much a Team Ico game.
• Guerilla Games presented their new, not Killzone, IP, Horizon: Zero Dawn - an amazing looking third person action adventure game very reminiscent of the recently released Witcher 3.
• Hitman is coming back with a new game. Not much revealed at Sony's conference other than a cinematic trailer (and it's not exclusive), but I imagine we'll see more at Squeenix's.
• Street Fighter V is an exclusive for Playstation and PC and Birdie and Cammy are two more fighters returning for it.
• No Man's Sky once again returned to Sony's conference to highlight the sheer scale of the game. Still no date, but hopefully it's not going to take another E3.
• Media Molecule revealed its latest game/creation tool, Dreams. It looks massively powerful and what talented people will be able to do with it will be incredibly impressive (though I'm out there...).
• Firewatch will debut on Playstation - an amusing puzzle/adventure game set in the wilderness of Wyoming.
• There's even more exclusive content coming for Destiny.
• Assassin's Creed took its usual slot in Sony's conference to highlight the playable character of Evie Frye - though it was another cinematic.
• World of Final Fantasy was announced with multiple levels of chibification of classic Final Fantasy characters which seems to have some sort of Pokemon-like mechanic within it.
• The Final Fantasy VII remake is finally happening. It isn't exclusive to Playstation, though, which is somewhat surprising given the history of this remake.
• Devolver Games -the minds behind Hotline Miami are bringing 4 new games to Playstation 4
• Shenmue 3 is finally happening you guys! Ok, so Sony aren't funding it despite apparently doing some deal to keep it console exclusive, but the Kickstarter has already blasted past its $2million goal so the game is finally happening!
  
• Batman Arkham Knight got one more day in the sun in Sony's conference to highlight the special Scarecrow missions available exclusively to Playstation. The missions seem to be from the first person perspective of people within Gotham City.
• Sony Morpheus did get a bit of attention with some games revealed for it from Sony's studios, but it was actually surprisingly light on details.
• Playstation Vue and Playstation Music got a bit of attention, but I can't say any of it was relevant to me so I tuned out most of it. Mostly just surprised that it's a terrible thing for Microsoft to have TV functionality and amazing for Sony to do it...
• Call of Duty is now Playstation's bitch instead of Microsoft's. Kinda seems a bit like Sony are getting Microsoft's sloppy seconds here, with CoD really feeling at the end of its tether.
• There was a Playstation Vita on screen for like 5 seconds! It still exists, guys!
• Sony is bagging a few timed exclusives for Disney Infinity, keeping hold of the Rise Against The Empire playset and figures as well as a Boba Fett figure until they're available for others next year (though you can get the figures off eBay or whatever and they'll still work).
• Star Wars Battlefront got another lengthy demo showing us even more of the game.
• Uncharted 4 super didn't work the first time they tried to demo it, but looked very impressive once it did.

All in all, I'd probably rank the shows, based on content, as such:

1. Microsoft - for dropping an immense line up of games and for a fair amount of them coming out this year
2. Bethesda - focusing on quality over quantity, there weren't many games at Bethesda's conference (and only 2 real reveals), but they brought the A game with some big, in-depth playthroughs of some of the biggest upcoming games in Doom and Fallout 4.
3. Ubisoft - The show wasn't even a nightmare to watch as it normally is hosted by Aisha Tyler (though she pushed it) but the games on show from Ubisoft this year - especially a new South Park game - are cementing their position as a blockbuster third party publisher.
4. EA - They kinda ruined it with the sports bit in the middle, but it started off great with the new Mass Effect reveal and ended fantastically with that in-depth look at Star Wars Battlefront. I can safely say that every EA game on show last night that wasn't a sports title was a must buy from me.
5. Sony - Sony dropped some big bombs, but most of them were on their own heads, really. The Last Guardian shouldn't have taken until now to rear its head again, so we can only congratulate them on that so much. Final Fantasy VII finally being remade is a big deal, but it's moreso for Squeenix than Sony - the same with Shenmue, which really just leaves a weird taste in your mouth when you have a multi-billion-dollar company like Sony announcing a Kickstarter on stage for a game they should really just pony up and pay for if they want it to be an exclusive anyway. A lack of big, exclusive titles is continuing to linger around the PS4 and the show was mostly about copying Microsoft's tactics with the 360 in buying up exclusive DLC for multiplatform games. Horizon: Zero Dawn was, easily, the best game in their show - which makes it a pity that it isn't coming any time soon.

We've still got Nintendo, Squeenix and the PC Gamer conference to come today. It'll be interesting to see where they fit in with the above. Nintendo easily walked away with E3 last year from their inventive and entertaining Nintendo Digital Event. Can they do it again this year? Will Mother 3 join Shenmue 3 in rising from the grave? Half Life 3 Confirmed?