The Best Games Shown at E3 2012
The big announcements of E3 have now past, and while I think that Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo did a pretty shit job during their keynotes, the fact remains that despite that, some truly amazing games premiered this week that everyone should check out
I’ve compiled a list of the games I was most impressed by during the show, and tried to include the video that made my jaw drop. New IPs surprisingly led the charge in terms of quality, but even a few sequels looked pretty damn good as well. Check out the collection below, and add your own if I missed any.
Watch Dogs
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcMRkyoHKeA&feature=plcp
This game stole the show in a way unlike perhaps any other, with fans now calling it “Deus Theft Auto” for its combination of cyberpunk hacking and GTA open world cityscapes.
This video is long, but I promise it’s worthwhile. I wasn’t sure why everyone was so mad about it in the first few minutes, but it becomes apparent soon enough. It’s gorgeous, but more importantly original, which is a rarity in the industry these days.
The Last of Us
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZYkj0glnqs
I couldn’t even wait to show you guys this game, and I posted the above video a few days ago right after it aired. Simply put, The Last of Us is the post-apocalyptic title we’ve always wanted. Or so it would seem.
The Uncharted team has crafted something more beautiful than ever, and if combat truly is this dynamic throughout the game, with situational dialog and character and enemy responses, we’ll truly never have seen anything like it.
Halo 4
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Em1MiiqT9A
I’ve been jaded with Halo since Reach really rubbed me the wrong way, but watching this footage from E3, it’s hard not to get a little bit excited for the series again.
Though it’s all going to come down to how the game “feels” when you play, it all seems to be so far, so good, with fantastic new graphics, cool new weapons and NO MORE GODDAMN HEALTH BARS. Thank you…
Star Wars 1313
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U08QNPk0ZNE
Out of everything listed here, this is perhaps the most surprising title out there. We’ve all been clamoring for an M-rated Star Wars game for years, but now, we finally have one? Seriously? Pinch me, I’m dreaming.
But no, and not only that, it looks pretty damn good as well. Obviously drawing influence from Uncharted as well, the game features dynamic combat and ever-changing environments. And those graphics…This has to be for the next generation, right
Assassin’s Creed 3
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ye1r2u5bOA&feature=youtu.be
Yes, we’ve seen AC3 footage before E3, but damn, this game does look cool. We got to see a section of the game that we weren’t aware of before, as Connor takes the wheel of a ship engaging in naval combat.
It seems a touch scripted to me, but that doesn’t make it any less cool. Who knew that AC3 would end up being a badass pirate simulator as well?
Beyond
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFxAJ3eaaC8
Heavy Rain is one of my favorite games of all time (if you can call it a “game” really), and I was thrilled to see the studio come out with their next project: Beyond.
Simply put, video game humans have never looked this good. The facial animations here surpass even LA Noire, and star Ellen Page gives a performance that we can see 100% of through the animation with every twitch of her eye or quiver of her lip. It all looks just so incredible.
Dishonored
httpv://youtu.be/9ITq0hXCCB0
The makers of Skyrim giving us a game that feels like Bioshock and looks like Half-Life? Too good to be true. Dishonored wasn’t a huge focal point of E3 as it had premiered beforehand, but damn, does it look rather cool.
And they actually did pick up the lead designer from Half-Life to design the world, which is readily apparent as you watch the footage. Graphics may not be quite what the above games have to offer, but the gameplay looks like an absolute blast.
No Pikmin?!
Assassin’s Creed III is now my most anticipated game of fall. All signs point to Ubisoft finally getting this series back on track. AC2 was amazing, hopefully the third act will be even better.
I am pleased and disappointed. Disappointed because the coolest-looking non-Halo games were PS3 exclusives since AC3 is old news. I may be onboard for Watch Dogs, though. But I’m also kind of pleased because amazing games have been coming out on top of each other for so many years that I had skip and postpone dozens of them. The very slow upcoming release schedule will give me time to finally rock New Vegas, Red Dead, AC:R, and all of the rest I missed. 4 months until AC3 and 5 months until Halo 4. Finally I can breathe. Then again, Dragons Dogma is so awesome I may never get away from that one…
I can understand no Pikmin. I love it to death, am excited about it, but it’s not something that will get a “core” games going. And Paul’s just not a Nintendo kind of guy anymore. Other than Pokemon. He might lose his sh*t when a console version comes it. (Yes, I said “when”. With NFC capabilities, it’s a LOCK on Wii U)
But no Zombiu? That’s should be here. It’s the survival-horror game that we’ve been waiting, and all the hands on confirmed it. In spite of being a zombie game, I’m surprised at the originality.
Hoodvents: lol, for reals.
Overall, I was kinda dissapointed with this year’s E3.
Way too many Third-Person Shooters with obviously scripted interactions, quick-time events, and shaky cam bull-crap explosions that distracts us from the fact that we’ve played this before over and over.
Basically, videogames are becoming so expensive to make, such a high-risk venture, and the consumers are so predictable in what they will buy, that everything is converging into a barely distinguishable, third-person, detail overloaded, gritty/grimy, rough caucasian protaganist with a deep voice (sans Lara Croft), cover shooter. Frankly, it all kind of blends together. There really wasn’t anything truly unique in it’s vision IMO…a bunch of tired, borrowed concepts and tropes tossed in a bag, shaken up, and scattered about.
I agree, not all of the games fit this mold, but the majority that did were just sequels…
Watch_Dogs was most definitely the most exciting demo to me, but I’ll have to see more before I believe that most of that was either massively scripted, or it’ll be a game where you are only given the illusion of choice and basically you’d have to do exactly how the character did in the video order to achieve the correct results…or you just get a “Mission Failed” message on the screen and have to start over to try and organize the exactly right situation in order to pass.
I think I’m just becoming an old man…
Thought the naval stuff on AC3 looked pretty meh, gameplay-wise anyways. Did not seem that the enemy ships did much in the way of actually shooting back.
On a wider note, from what Ive seen so far of AC3, the developers seem to be going the Americans = freedom loving patriotic heroes, British = tyrannical, repressive evil empire, route.
Spiderman looks cool too.
Watch Dogs looks good.
Last of Us looks just as generic as Uncharted.
Halo is still a good series on a shit console.
Nobody wants a Star Wars game with no Jedi/Sith unless it’s Battlefront 3.
AC3 looks good.
Beyond will be just as overrated as Heavy Rain but admittedly looks more unique at least.
Dishonored is published by Bethesda, not made by them. Looks alright.
Nintendo’s conference destroyed all of the others as usual, but no pricing or release date details for the Wii U was pretty damn stupid. No Zelda or SSB4 is understandable, but they won’t have a bigger chance to announce a release date and price than E3.
Really not even a wimper of Borderlands 2?
Beyond looks promising. I found Heavy Rain hugely, insultingly dissapointing, and for a group that obsessively trots out tech demos to show how they can “finally portray real emotion in a video game” to put out a marginally interactive film with a bad plot and abysmal, hollow acting just infuriates… but, if they’re going to continue to stray away from Indigo Prophecy down the Heavy Rain path, getting a solid actors that can actually show of the ability of the engine by being able to, wow, ACT(!) is the way to go.
Now, if they can at least pull off a 1:1 ratio of “bullshit plothole shoehorned in to get one more inconsequential QTE in there” to “actual game/story,” they’ll be 2/3rds of the way to achieving what they set out to do in Heavy Rain.
@Mr.Right: Do you even play video games?
watch dogs, last of us and halo 4 look well on their way to being great..
watch dogs looks like it has a lot of potential.. im definately keeping my eye on that one…