It’s the most wonderful time of year to be a gamer! E3 2018, aka Christmas for Gamers, as many like to refer to it, has kicked off with a decent press conference from Electronic Arts (EA). Although everything EA showed wasn’t exactly what we were all expecting, they did have a few nice surprises. Hit the Jump to read on!
LOW – EA Sports
What would an EA press conference be without a gratuitous mention of sports and mobile games? A normal EA press conference, that’s what. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy for the people out there that love the yearly iterations of FIFA, Madden, and NBA Live, but year after year these segments always fall painfully flat. Unfortunately, the E3 stage is not the place for big sports game reveals. Now granted, EA’s investors love seeing these games at E3 and they do huge numbers, but the general E3 populace is not the audience for those games. This is made extremely apparent during the FIFA world cup segment when the presenters were greeted with deafening silence. I know I mentioned mobile games earlier, but I’ll get to that in a second.
HIGH – Unravel 2 and Sea of Solitude
One thing EA does well is showcase some of their games from much smaller developers. This year we were treated to the follow up of one of the more charming games EA has put out in recent years with Unravel 2 by ColdWood Interactive. This sequel takes the adorable Yarny on a new side-scrolling puzzle-platforming adventure, but this time Yarny is not alone. One of the biggest complaints the original Unravel had was that Yarny was constantly running out of yarn which detracted the player’s agency and ability to solve puzzles their own way. With the addition of having two characters connected by yarn, it opens the game up for more creative solutions while still maintaining the finite yarn limitation.
The second smaller title was Sea of Solitude from Jo-Mei Games. This third person adventure game places you in a world where people turn into monsters if they succumb to their loneliness. You take control of Kay, a girl who has turned into one of these monsters, as she journeys to discover a way to change herself back into a human. Sea of Solitude looks to be a deeply personal journey for Kay as she fights back against the monsters in the world around her, and within herself.
LOW – Star Wars
How do you take one of the most beloved franchises and manage to not generate any sort of hype for it? Watch EA’s presentation. Instead of getting a bombastic new reveal trailer for a new Star Wars game from developer Respawn, we got an awkward interview with creative director Vince Zampella. Unfortunately, the amazing Andrea Rene couldn’t goad anything more that the title of Respawn’s Star Wars games, Jedi: Fallen Order. This game will take place in the time between Episode III and Episode IV, so that’s cool. After that lackluster reveal, we got a look at the next free DLC from developer DICE’s Star Wars Battlefront 2. The only bad thing was, they just used a trailer that was already revealed a few days earlier and only really offered an extended explanation of the DLC. Fans of the latest movie Solo: A Star Wars Story rejoice! Now you can play Battlefront as Alden Ehrenreich’s Han Solo and Donald Glover’s Lando Calrissian.
HONORABLE MENTION
Battlefield V got a nice little trailer that touched on some elements of the multiplayer and we got a brief look at the story mode. There wasn’t much else about the game though.
LOWEST OF THE LOW – Command and Conquer: Rivals
Remember that thing I said about mobile games? Well yeah, Command and Conquer: Rivals takes the beloved real-time strategy (RTS) game, and simplified it down to a one-on-one competitive mobile game. Not only that, they had to show us how legitimate the game was by having two professional RTS players actually play a match on stage. I know, there’s no possible way it could be that bad right? Yeah, you’re right. It was worse. They had another two men do live commentary of the game. If you ever do your own gaming press conference, please don’t ever do this.
HIGH – Anthem
EA did the right thing and ended their conference on the highly anticipated third person shared-world RPG from developer BioWare, Anthem. If you have ever thought to yourself, “I wonder what it would be like to fly around and fight monsters like I’m War Machine.” this is literally the game for you. Because that’s exactly what you get to do and who you basically are. Anthem is the latest entry into the Games as a Service genre. You play as a pilot of a Javelin, Anthem’s version of an Iron Man suit that gives players the ability to fly and fight horrible monsters. You can play by yourself or with friends, but whichever you choose, you never have to worry about fighting against any other players. When Anthem launches on February 22nd, there will not be any player versus player modes as BioWare is a company that prides itself on its story-telling. Out of everything shown at EA’s conference, Anthem is clearly the strongest title they have in their arsenal.
Personally, I thought EA’s entire press conference was pretty lackluster, but I’m definitely looking forward to Unravel 2, Sea of Solitude, and Anthem. If there was one thing more I wish we got, it would be Dead Space 4 or a Dead Space reboot or a Dead Space remaster or…You know what? Just give me a new Dead Space EA! Please! I’m begging you!
What did you think about EA’s press conference? What was something you wish was shown? Let us know in the comments below!