E3 2018: Day One

Whilst I may be a skint graduate with a full time job and little free time, if there's one thing I always make time for it is this week: Nerd Christmas! Game-adan! Religious Festival Analogy!

Yes, it is E3 2018, where the biggest and brightest stars in gaming shine bright and attempt to drain your wallet with pre-orders and promises of things coming Soon™. It is fitting, then, that this year we start with one of the most vampiric, scummiest publishers in the video gaming world - Electronic Arts.

We start off with Battlefield V, which did not have the greatest reveal event a few weeks back, with fans, critics, journalists and developers seemingly at war over whether the game was pandering to identity politics and engaging in historical revisionism, or if the game was highlighting the contributions by a multitude of people of both genders and all races and ethnicities during the dark times of the 1940s. At EA Play, this discussion has thankfully been ditched in favour of demonstrating the new mechanics and gameplay options, with two of the developers, Oskar Gabrielson and Lars Gustavsson, on hand to show everyone what we’ve been waiting for!

…wait, what’s that? They only showed a tank knocking over a house, some guy falling out of a window, and yet another fast paced, confusing, and overall mediocre trailer? Oh, ok…

Yeah, it seems like DICE are committed to being too clever for their own good with the promotional material for BFV. At least singleplayer footage will be demonstrated at the Microsoft conference tomorrow. The developers also reaffirmed their commitment to zero lootboxes, season pass, or pay-to-win in the game, and then revealed that the game will have a fucking battle royale mode. Eugh; just, eugh.

Suddenly, EA CEO Andrew Wilson slithered into our world from his pocket dimension to preach the new gospel of cloud gaming and subscription services. Apparently EA have set up a new studio in Israel dedicated to cloud based gaming, and are introducing a new super-duper version of their Origin Access service called Premier. Whilst Origin Access is already a subscription based service, Premier apparently will be like a paid version of Steam, with not just new and old EA titles available, but other games from other publishers. This service apparently launches at the end of the summer.

Wilson reappeared towards the end of the conference to tell the audience that EA is “always trying to learn, and listening, and strive to be better”, and that player choice, fairness, value for money, and games that are fun and not too grind-y are EA’s main concerns for players.

All of this made me redecorate my floor with coffee that was formerly in my mouth, and Mr Wilson owes me one new rug.

There was some pleasant news, however, with players of EA games raising $1 million for the HeForShe, Pacer’s National Bullying Prevention Centre, and Ditch the Label charities for the prevention of bullying, discrimination, and persecution, all done through a series of gameplay challenges across multiple titles over the past few weeks, which goes to show what amazing things you can do with a guilty conscious.

Wilson then ate an entire child before returning to his eternal slumber, replaced by Patrick Söderland to introduce the EA Originals of the evening, kicking off with Unravel Two.

Seriously, only EA could turn a cutesy indie darling into a fucking franchise.

Yes, the adorably nervous indie dev returns along with Yarny, who has gained a blue friend. Unravel Two is a game about “new starts and second chances”, exactly like the one EA wants you to give it. And yet the game still looks to be as charming as ever.

The game can be enjoyed in solo or co-op, and is meant to be "friendlier, more challenging, and more playful". There was even some actual gameplay, where the adorably nervous indie dev was joined by an adorably nervous indie friend for some live co-op, hopefully demonstrating that the game has local split-screen! What’s more, the game released this evening!

Sea of Solitude was also revealed tonight. Created by the Jo Mei Games studio in Berlin, SoS is a game about loneliness, with a deep narrative based on personal experiences. What was shown in the trailer and what Cornelia Geppert (the Creative Director) spoke about looks and sounds like it might be something interesting and not stifled by corporate greed.

Vince Zampella of Respawn Entertainment teased a little of the Titanfall creator’s new Star Wars game – it’s called Jedi: Fallen Order, is set between Episodes III and IV, and comes out just in time for Episode IX.

Staying with Star Wars, Dennis Bränvall from DICE took to the stage to offer some coverage of Battlefront II. In a display of humility and regret, Bränvall admitted that EA got the launch of the game wrong and that the core changes made over the past six months were entirely necessary.

There’s yet more changes to come, from an improved squad spawning system to keep friends playing together, to new game modes like Hero Starfighter showdowns and Conquest. But finally, finally, Battlefront II is getting Clone Wars content! Once the Solo: a Star Wars Story season is wrapped up, the team are taking players to Geonsis, with one of the largest maps in Battlefront II. They are also adding the much requested General Grevious and Obi Wan Kenobi, along with Anakin Skywalker and Count Dooku.

Fellow hero of the Battlefront II community, Ben Walke, took to reddit at the same time to lay out the same changes, and further stated the teams continued commitment to providing the fans with more information and content in the future. Unfortunately, the future is uncertain and EA is the controlling, abusive spouse of the games industry, so who knows.

There was also some talking about FIFA 2019, NBA Live 2019, Madden 2019 and how much sportsball is being packed into some sportsball games about sports (it was super interesting, I promise). I will also use this paragraph to appeal to people to cease and desist with calling things “lit” and/or “fire”. Just stop, please. You’re upsetting the children.

A new Command and Conquer game called Rivals releases this year, and is a competitive mobile game. There was a live match with two competitors that the crowd cared so little about that I don’t think they even knew who won the match.

BioWare, 2018

Finally, there was a deep dive into Anthem with some of the dev team - Casey Hudson (general manager), Mark Darrah (exec producer), and Cathleen Rootsaert (lead writer). They spoke of how the game world was an online and co-operative experience whilst the player is on a quest, but functions more like a traditional singleplayer game when in safe areas. There was talk of how the game, story, and deeper lore is being created with an eye to expansion “for years to come”, and that in-game events will affect the world and lore.

To give BioWare their dues, the story they pitched tonight sounded fantastic – a world left unfinished by the Gods, where their tools and half-baked creations are left to roam the landscape. Yet more assurances that there would be no lootboxes, pay-to-win, and easily obtainable cosmetics available for players show that EA is not ready to make another mistake like the Battlefront II launch. After some gameplay, the devs finally concluded the show by announcing that Anthem will be released next February.

And that’s just Saturday. Join me tomorrow where we’ll go through the Microsoft and Devolver Digital conferences, provided the host of Devolver doesn’t lose her mind again.