Ubisoft
Ubisoft are so pissed off with Brexit, they made a game about it.
Watch Dogs Legion (3) as already announced after leaking, is set in an overly cockney London.
It's a bit strange seeing areas I know very well not looking quite as I know them, as it’s set a few years ahead of us. I Wonder how close of a representation it is. The driving engine still looks awful. I miss The Getaway.
They keep emphasising about being able to recruit and play as any random NPC, which seems to be a big part of the game. I get the feeling it's not quite as open to taking "anyone" as they'd like us to believe, but I would love to be proven wrong.
The rest of the show is mostly updates to already released games and lots of self-congratulating. Meh.
Square Enix
Square Enix had a long show but the only real take away was the first good look at the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. Giving a better understanding of how the combat system will work and a rough idea of the games size and a release date of March 3rd 2020 (Next year’s looking busy).
Final Fantasy 8 also gets its first re-release since the original PlayStation, as it’s heading to just about anything that can run a game. To close out, they showed off their Avengers game. Which has been in the works foreeeever and we still saw no real “gameplay”. It seems to be trying to go for the “games as a service” model, which seems a little weird and unfair to the kids that will want to play it.
Really good voice cast involved, though.
Nintendo
After several underwhelming stage shows, Nintendo did their own pre-recorded Direct show and pick up the slack of everyone else; showcasing a ton of games.
Some of which we already knew about as well as some nice new surprises. No Metroid though.
We got a long look at the much-awaited sequel to the GameCube launch title, Luigi’s Mansion.
This time set in a haunted hotel with all new gadgets, abilities, and some weird Ditto like Goo-uigi; who doubles up as a co-op character.
Pokemon Sword and Shield was shown off, to some, length during Nintendo’s Treehouse aftershow, giving us a good look at what the game will play like.
Pokemon are now visible on the world map as the player is wandering around, much like in Let’s Go, Pikachu/Eevee!, and random encounters still exist within areas such as tall grass, for those surprise battles.
Pokemon Go-style raid-like encounters also make an appearance, where a giant version of a Pokemon will show up and the player will need to team up with other trainers to take them down.
We got an update on the progress of the latest Animal Crossing. The game where you do chores you wouldn’t want to do in real life, and take abuse from woodland creatures. This time set on an Island. It’s due out March 20th 2020.
The Witcher 3 is getting a (massively downgraded) Switch port. So now everyone can play Witcher 3 on their travels. Still, the fact it can run on a Switch is fairly impressive.
Suda51 with No More Heroes 3.Yay. I also approve of Travis Touchdown’s Joy Division-inspired t-shirt. This time around it looks to focus less on the league of assassins.
Another Mario and Sonic Olympics game….
Contra Rogue: Corps ditches the side-scrolling of the good games, in the series, for a top-down perspective. It looks like it plays more like Diablo or a twin stick shooter, like Enter the Gungeon.
I’m a fan of twin-stick shooters, but not sure this is what I want for a Contra game.
The Link’s Awakening remake still looks really good and includes is own dungeon creator, allowing everyone to build their own Zelda dungeons.
An unexpected short trailer for a remake of the Sega Saturn cult favourite, Panzer Dragoon.
Fully remade but sticking accurately close to the original.
Banjo and Kazooie were announced as DLC characters for Smash Bros, to many a Nintendo/Rare fan’s delight. Which made the inclusion of Dragon Quest characters that bit more underwhelming. Sorry DQ.
Nintendo direct ended with a surprise teaser for a no named full-on sequel to Zelda: Breath of the Wild, that’s in development but a good few years away.
Breath of the Wild is my most played game on the Switch, next to Smash Bros, so needless to say I’m much looking forward to this.
Like I said… They had a lot to show.
Overall, not many new titles from this year, but we got some better looks at games coming soon to look forward to.
Guess all we have now is to see what Sony have to show. I think they possibly made the right choice by staying out of it this year and not showing the same four games again.
Bry Wyatt
