Survivor: David vs. Goliath: Episode 1 Thoughts

Hey, I’m back. It’s been a hot minute. Is anyone reading this? Probably not, but I’m gonna talk anyways. I’ve been thinking, and yeah, I think it’s time I got this blog back into the swing of things. Some stuff’s gonna be different, but some old things are coming back too. So, how about we get started with a good old fashioned Survivor article?

It’s that time of year again, where 20 people follow Jeff Probst out into the wilderness to starve and strain their bodies for 39 days in hopes of walking home with a bit of cash. It’s no secret that I love everything about this show, and hey, now that Canadians are eligible to participate, maybe someday I’ll get to test my skills.

But we’re not here to talk about me. We’re here to talk about Survivor: David vs Goliath, dang it!

I’m not a huge fan of “vs” themed seasons, unless the theme really works. I really enjoyed Millennials vs. Gen X because of how well the age theme worked in the interactions between the members of the two tribes, giving us great moments like Bret coming out as gay to Zeke. On the other hand, it’s hard not to agree that Heroes v. Healers v. Hustlers was a mess, with an extremely flimsy theme that was thrown away like mouldy toast the second the merge hit.

The idea of David vs. Goliath is a much easier to grasp concept than the confusing HvHvH (remind me how Joe the probation officer wound up in the Healer tribe?), but there’s definitely the concern that the ultra-powerful Goliath tribe will dominate the Davids in the early game. I mean, look at them! They’ve got the Mayor of Slamtown on their side! How can they possibly lose?

That question was answered in the first challenge of the season. After the Goliath tribe chose their two strongest members and who they thought the two weakest David members were, the Davids were allowed to choose between different obstacles to make courses for both themselves and the Goliaths. Of course the Davids built themselves the easiest course possible, made even easier by Christian’s apparent mastery of slide puzzles, giving them an early win.

One thing interesting about this premiere is that, thanks to the extra half hour of runtime, everyone got at least one confessional and a quick moment in the sun. While screentime still wasn’t doled out equally (since he broke his NDA, Alec is our purple contestant of the season, mark my words), it was still nice to get introduced to pretty much everybody on our first day.

Over on the David tribe, Pat quickly put his skills as a maintenance manager to the test as he put himself in charge of building the shelter. He definitely made the mistake of rubbing the tribe the wrong way with some borderline offensive comments and excessive yelling, but it was hard to deny that some of the stuff the guy was doing was really impressive. Seriously, him going up that tree just to take down a branch? Awesome.

Meanwhile, chaos engulfed the Goliath tribe, as the reverse happened while they were building their shelter. Their oldest player, Natalie, felt that the best decision for her game was to stand back, watch, and complain while the rest of the tribe built the shelter for her. I’ve said many times before about many subjects that nothing is more important than a first impression, and the same is true for your Survivor game. Once you get off that boat, you immediately have to start working on getting people to like you. If people don’t like you, you might as well not even bother unpacking your bag. Judging by next week’s preview, it looks to me like poor Natalie isn’t making the merge.

Also on the Goliath tribe is former Amazing Race contestant and writer of The Emoji Movie (that is not a joke, look it up) Mike White. Mike decided that the best use of his time was to run off into the jungle in search of a hidden immunity idol on Day 1, yet another rookie mistake that we’ve seen time and time again. At this, everyone promptly decided that if Mike was looking for the idol, they should do the same, and that led to a montage of everyone checking under every nook and cranny in the camp. Angelina and Alison teamed up, hoping to break the trend of HIIs being mostly found by men, Mike realized he was committed to trying to find it at this point and kept going, and even Natalie got off her high horse for a second to join the hunt. In the end the idol was found by police officer Dan in a surprising edit that told us he had it before it showed us.

After a brutal challenge taking place in the middle of a typhoon resulting in a win for the Goliaths, the Davids prepared to go to Tribal…or at least, that was the plan. A rocky boat ride home proved to be too much for Pat, smashing up his back bad enough to take him out of the game. While medevacs are an unfortunate reality of Survivor, it’s always a real shame when one happens, because losing a potential vote-off because somebody couldn’t keep going is no fun for anyone. This one was especially hard to watch as Pat begged and pleaded to be kept in the game, but the damage was done. The good news is that Pat left enough of an impact on his first appearance to justify maybe seeing him again at some point in the future, but as it is right now it was a real downer ending to a pretty strong season premiere.

Okay, now for the moment you’ve all been waiting for. Who’s gonna win? Well, first thing’s first. It ain’t Alec. He hasn’t even been invited to the reunion because he broke the NDA.

It’s always hard to tell on the first episode because a lot of the time the editors tend to focus hard on big personalities that don’t stick around very long in the pre-merge. Case in point, both Pat and last season’s Jacob didn’t make it out of Episode 1, yet were both given a lot of screentime because the editors knew we weren’t going to see them again.

My pre-merge pick to win it all was Alison, but she didn’t have a lot of screentime today, instead working as a partner to the much more prominent Angelina. I can also see the Mayor of Slamtown going decently far, at least to the merge. He seems likable enough and it’s always good to have a strong challenge beast on your tribe. As for Mike, he has the advantage of being a sort of David on the Goliath tribe, meaning that so long as he doesn’t drag them down he could fly under the radar for the time being. Last but not least, I don’t think Dan’s going too far. The fact that he’s already trying to build a showmance and align himself with all the pretty girls on his tribe means that he’s an easy target for a blindside, even with a HII.

Meanwhile on the David tribe, we have a lot of strong alignments. The nerd team-up of Christian and Gabby looks like a lot of fun, and Christian already proved himself to be exceptionally good at puzzles, the most crucial part of Survivor challenges. I’m also really interested in Lyrsa, who seems like she’s already putting the work in to make strong alliances. Unfortunately, judging by the Next Week promo it looks like she’s already in danger, which is never a good sign. I also really enjoyed Davie the David, who’s octopus-catching adventures were a lot of fun. I’ll need to see his strategic side before I can commit to him, but I’d like to see more.

So I think, for now at least, I’ll be sticking with Alison. While we didn’t see much of her just yet, the fact that she was singled out in the opening is a good sign, and a close alignment with one of the more prominent players on her tribe is always nice.

I’ll probably be doing more of these than my usual three, so keep checking back for more!

Editorial: My thoughts on all the E3 2018 conferences (E3 Month 2018 Part 3)

My thoughts on the E3 2018 conferences

          Well, E3 has come and gone and it’s time for my final wrap-up. This is gonna be a long one, so let’s get right into it.

EA

          One thing I love to boast about on this blog is that last year I wrote an article in the lead-up to E3 about all the ways Ubisoft could improve their conference. Then, two weeks later, it turned out that that year’s show basically followed every suggestion I made.

          So I decided this year to try and make lightning strike twice and kicked off E3 Month by talking about all the ways EA could fix their conference. And, unbelievably, it worked again.

          …Kind of. Like, half-worked.

          Pretty much my only suggestion for them was to cut down on the sports trailers, and they did that this year. The sports stuff amazingly encompassed about just 10 minutes of the 70 minute show, leaving us with a full-length conference rarely interrupted with a ball.

          The only problem was they seemed to have a problem finding stuff to replace it with.

          Let’s take it from the top. We kicked things off with Battlefield V…only to promptly say goodbye to Battlefield V. Okay then.

          Yeah, they announced that battle royale was coming to the game, promised we’d see it again at Microsoft, showed some pre-rendered fluff and made their way off the stage to make room for FIFA. I gotta admit it was a pretty silly decision on their part, especially since a lot of the stuff we had to sit through in it’s place was pretty dang boring.

          After FIFA left (and I’m not talking about any of the sports because who cares) and Andrew Wilson briefly took the stage to talk about some subscription service no one’s gonna buy, we ventured into the war-torn realm of the audience and found a survivor in the form of a Respawn dev, who promised a Star Wars game entitled Jedi Fallen Order due out next holiday season. According to him the game takes place between Episodes III and IV and yes, you will be able to wield a lightsaber in it. And…that was that. For all we know the game’s a moisture farming simulator.

          EA is disturbingly trigger-happy when it comes to announcing Star Wars games when they don’t actually have a Star Wars game to show that year. The same thing happened in 2016. We got to see a video taking us through various EA-owned studios and heard some folks talk about their Star Wars games and how much they loved the universe and how their game was gonna be great and blahdey-blahdey-blah. And this here was no different. Why get hyped for a game on nothing than the name alone?

          Fact is that EA now has two major Star Wars games under their belt, and neither of them are particularly beloved by the public. Battlefront 2015 was rushed and half-finished in an attempt to capitalize on the release of The Force Awakens, and Battlefront II was such a monumental disaster that real-world politicians actually got involved to reign it in after EA bit off more than they could chew with the monetization. Don’t complain if I’m not exactly interested to see what EA’s doing with the franchise next.

          And then we got to what is easily the best part of the show: the EA Originals showcase, starting with a look at Unravel 2 and the return of Martin Salim, the lovable developer that nervously showed the original Unravel off back in 2015. And, perhaps thanks to Salim, this was the most genuine and heartfelt part of the entire conference. He and his friend just playing through a level and having fun together was a delight to watch. If it was scripted I didn’t even notice because I was so charmed by their presentation. Even better was the surprise that the game was releasing right away, which was nice.

          Next up was a brand new indie game, Sea of Solitude. Or at least that’s what would’ve been next if the developer didn’t spend an eternity talking about the themes of the game before the trailer actually played.

          This is a big problem I have with these E3s that seem to think we’re more interested in what the developers have to say instead of letting the games speak for themselves. She was just going on and on about depression and loneliness and how they play into the game, but I could’ve gotten that from the trailer alone. I feel like if we saw the trailer first and then heard her talk about the themes of the game afterwards it would’ve worked better because we would’ve known what the game looked like and weren’t impatiently waiting for her to stop talking.

          Despite that, the game doesn’t look half bad. I am concerned it’s just the next in the neverending line of sad indie games that make you feel sad  (the trailer bore a striking resemblance to RiME), but overall I like it’s aesthetic and think it could be something special if done right.

          And after that sad stuff it was time for MADDEN OH YEAH

          And after that we got perhaps the strangest thing I’ve ever seen at E3. A pair of “mobile gaming champions” came out onstage and competed in what looked like a Clash of Clans ripoff. For ten minutes. With a really bored guy casting the whole thing. Whoopdie-doo.

          Finally, it was time for the main event. Anthem, the last next game by BioWare. And, big shocker, it looks like a typical EA game with absolutely no heart or soul, and just a bunch of menial tasks meant to keep you occupied but never have an emotional response of any description.

          That is, it looked like that when we actually got to see the dang thing. A lot of the segment was spent looking at concept art for some reason. Not different concept art either. Just the same five or so ones put on loop. If that’s really all they have to show right now I feel like we’re gonna have one big trainwreck on our hands when the game launches in February.

          So that was EA Play 2018. I appreciated not having too much sportsball this year and both the EA Originals look neat, but everything else was just a mess. Battlefield V essentially no-showed, Anthem looks stale and uninteresting, and I’ll never know why we had to watch ten minutes of hot mobile gaming action.

          Maybe I should’ve put a point in my article from two weeks ago that they should make their games actually investing for a change…

Microsoft

          While the Xbox One continues to lag far behind the competition in terms of sales and exclusives, Microsoft has made a name for itself in creating great E3 conferences. Last year I named their show my favourite of the bunch, and they did spectacularly again here.

          This show was just a barrage of game after game after game with world premieres abound. Even better, there truly was something for everyone, leaving little to be disappointed about.

          We started off with a real big smash: Halo: Infinite. While Halo as a franchise has kind of fallen off the map since Bungie went solo and Halo 5 was met with a resounding “meh” from consumers, I can’t deny that this looked really interesting.

Unfortunately I’ll have to stop at interesting, because we didn’t see anything to elicit a response more than that from me. It was some pretty glamour shots of the world, then a quick look at Master Chief, and we were done. I really wish they’d elaborated on what the game was. Is it an open world game, or is it more traditional? Is it Halo 6, or something different that’ll reinvent the series? I guess we’ll have to wait until next E3 to find out.

After that, we were off to the races with a constant stream of new titles and world premieres, including looks at games from EA, Bethesda, Square Enix and Ubisoft outside of their own conferences. I guess because Microsoft’s show is so much bigger than theirs they like to have them there as a little tease for their own conference (except EA, but who cares about them) later on.

          Speaking of Ubisoft, it has to be said: we seriously need to cut it out with the stupid fake gamer voice chat, like we had in the trailer for The Divison 2. It instantly makes me lose interest and is more annoying than clever or interesting.

          What Microsoft did do though is show off how E3 conferences can handle developer interviews without being obnoxious about it. For some of the bigger games they brought out developers to talk about them, and it never felt boring or like it was taking up time that could be better spent actually seeing the game. I truly felt that the guys they brought out for the new Devil May Cry were really passionate about what they were making and loved that the fans wanted more of their franchise. Compare this to the roundtable discussion we got for Anthem at EA, which went on for ages in droning voices that never seemed to be interested in what they were talking about despite being the literal people who made the game. I feel that to really make those work they have to be quick and fast, as well as have people really passionate and excited for what they’re talking about (like Martin Salim for Unravel and Ubisoft’s For Honor guy).

          Moving on, a game I wasn’t expecting to be excited about was Dying Light 2. I ignored the first Dying Light, mostly because it looked like just another zombie game in a sea of them. Fortunately this sequel looked really unique. I’m a huge sucker for games with stories that change depending on how you play, and Dying Light 2 promises a world that changes based on your choices. It looks like a really interesting concept, and I hope they deliver.

          We also almost got Skate 4, but it was called Session instead. So close...

          After a quick trip to the Gears universe (now seemingly populated by living, breathing Funko Pops) and an announcement for Gears of War 5, it was time for the big finale: CD Projekt Red’s highly anticipated next game, Cyberpunk 2077. And while we didn’t get to see much (including a release window), what we did see looked amazing. It was fast, colourful and action packed, and I can’t wait to get more.

          Microsoft really came to play this year. While they’ve recently found themselves struggling to compete with Sony and even Nintendo, E3 has truly become their domain in recent years. Their promise of fifty games was delivered upon, and it moved so fast that everyone felt they got something and yet no one was shortchanged. More like this, please!

Bethesda

          I’ve never been a fan of Bethesda’s conferences. To me they’ve usually just felt like the company patting itself on the back for all the games they’ve previously released and mainly taking this opportunity to announce DLC, expansions and ports.

          This year was different, and yet it also felt the same, if that makes any sense. While I know a lot of people loved this conference, for me it was one of the most middle of the road show I’ve ever seen. It had some great announcements, but we didn’t get much substance from anything outside of Fallout 76. There were lots of fun and clever moments, but a lot of the conference felt like padding so they could fill the full hour.

          Let’s start by addressing some of the elephants in the room: the announcement of Doom: Eternal, the sequel to the massively successful 2016 franchise reboot, the mysterious new IP Starfield, and, perhaps most exciting of all, finally getting to see The Elder Scrolls VI announced after all these years of waiting and seeing Skyrim ported to every single game system ever made ever. Those announcements were easily the highlight of the show and will be one of the biggest things people talk about when E3 is over and done with.

          But here’s my problem with them: yeah, it’s great that we know they’re coming, but all three of them (with the slight exception of Doom) basically just had fancy logo animations and that was it. We can only guess what kind of games Elder Scrolls and Starfield are going to be. I definitely think it was great they were there because without them this show would’ve been a complete snooze, but I would’ve liked to see more of them instead of hearing about the ten-millionth Elder Scrolls Online expansion.

          One thing I really liked about this conference was how it didn’t really take itself seriously. Aside from Nintendo, Bethesda is one of the only companies that does an E3 show that always manages to hit that sweet spot of not too cringey and actually funny. Opening the show with a bouncy metal band was a great way to set the tone, and Todd Howard is clearly aware of all the memes we have of him. The announcement of the next places Skyrim will be ported to was hilarious, and I want to see them do more stuff like this in the future.

          So, let’s talk Fallout 76 now. We got official confirmation that the game will be 100% online, but that does kinda worry me. Real life online gaming isn’t like the online gaming in E3 trailers (no matter what The Division 2 tries to tell you). What’s stopping racists and trolls and other horrible people from ruining the good time of everyone who just wants to enjoy a new Fallout game? Managing toxicity online is one of the most important part of making these kinds of games, and I really hope Bethesda knows what they’re doing.

          Ignoring that, the game itself looks pretty cool, but I still have some concerns. According to them the map is even bigger than the map for Fallout 4, which is great in some aspects but worries me that it’ll just be filled with a whole lot of nothing with the cool stuff spread thinly across it. I do like a lot of the cool new designs they introduced, especially the new monsters. Mushroom sloth is the best video game character ever and I’ll fight anyone who says otherwise.

          Aside from all that, I found the conference pretty boring. A lot of it was just developers standing in front of logos and talking, with very little gameplay actually being seen. And, as usual, a lot of the announcements were DLC and expansions for existing games, which is never that interesting to see unless you’re a big fan of whichever game is getting it.

          Still, I have to commend Bethesda. While this conference left me falling asleep again this year, they still had a lot of guns in their arsenal. The cool announcements were awesome, and I loved the jokey nature of the show. I just wish we got to see more of stuff like that instead of talking on and on and on about games we either have already seen before or already have in our houses.

Square Enix

          This was a short one so I’ll try to keep if brief. Apparently I’m the only one in the world who found Bethesda kinda boring but thought that Square Enix was actually pretty good. I found that with Bethesda I only really was able to get excited about the big-name announcements and everything else looked like filler to me, Square Enix presented everything in a way that got me interested in stuff I’m never going to buy.

          A good example of that is Shadow of the Tomb Raider. I haven’t played any of the new Tomb Raider reboot games (aside from like an hour of the first one), but the demo they showed off looked really cool. The mechanic of hiding in the jungle and using the background and environment as a means to get through a stealth section seems awesome. I definitely will check out what I’ve been missing before the new one comes out.

          We also got two big reveals of brand new games: something from Platinum Games called Babylon’s Fall, as well as a weird looking new IP called The Quiet Man. We really didn’t get to see much of these aside from the fact that they exist, but they both look interesting enough to get me excited to see what they’re about.

          While this has been a good E3 overall one big problem I’ve had with it is that we’ve gotten a lot of non-announcements. Like, we’ve had a lot of saying “Hey, this is a thing we’re making!” and that’s about it. Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order, Halo: Legacy, Doom: Eternal, Starfield, The Elder Scrolls VI, and now Babylon’s Fall and The Quiet Man came and went with little more than some pretty pre-rendered images and a logo (sometimes even less than that). It’s cool to know they’re coming, but I really want to know more than just that they’re a thing that we’ll see at the next E3.

          Last thing they had was Kingdom Hearts III, which just had the Microsoft trailer with a few extra shots, so that was kinda disappointing.

          Honestly? I really enjoyed Square’s quick and done approach. They gave us everything they had in just half an hour, and a lot of the stuff looked good. I would’ve liked more info on the new IPs and an actual new trailer for Kingdom Hearts, but I’ll take what we got over a bunch of nothing.

Ubisoft

          I don’t think I’ll ever not expect Ubisoft to deliver a bad conference. I guess I saw waaaaaayyy too many of their old shows with Mr. Caffeine and memes and awful trailers. But last year they finally bucked the trend and made one of the best conferences of the entire show. And wouldn’t you know it, they did it again. Ubisoft appears to have finally learned from their past mistakes and is now one of the best parts of E3.

          After a terrifying intro featuring a nightmarish dancing panda, we got right to Beyond Good & Evil 2. Having never played the original game I wasn’t super keen on the trailer from last year, but I will say that I thought this one looked leaps and bounds better. They seem to have dropped the excessive amounts of swearing, which is nice. I also really love the sci-fi/punk/zoo aesthetic they’ve got going. If we can get more games that look like this and Cyberpunk 2077 I’ll be a very happy man. I do wish we’d have gotten a better idea of what actually playing the game is gonna look like, but I’m happy with what we got.

          Next up was a man faceplanting into a desk to advertise the next Trials game.

          And after that was something awesome: a live performance by Grant Kirkhope of the music of the Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle Donkey Kong expansion. I always love live gaming music, and I find it weird that Sony is the only companies that typically does that at their conferences. I’m glad more companies are starting to make it a trend, because it was especially cool to hear classic DK music live on stage by one of his best composers.

          Speaking of Nintendo, I’ll move ahead to Starlink: Battle for Atlas for the sake of an easy segue. This game we first saw last year as a sort of Skylanders for spaceships, allowing you to build a ship from real-life toys that’ll then appear in-game. All in all the game looks pretty basic stuff, maybe something that’ll appeal to kids.

          And then Fox McCloud showed up.

          In yet another demonstration that Ubisoft and Nintendo are BFFs all of a sudden, stuff from Star Fox will be in the Switch version of Starlink. Even if I don’t buy the game I’ll probably get that Arwing model just because it looks so cool.

          Before that we had Skull and Bones, a game determined to make everyone forget Sea of Thieves ever existed. We got an even better look at it here, and it looks like the pirate game we’ve always wanted. Full ship customization, epic high seas combat, massive hearty crews and stopping at ports to explore? Yes please.

          My one concern is that a game like this would be incredibly easy to monetize into oblivion. At one point in the trailer the pirates unearth a “Legendary Chest”, and anyone who witnessed last year’s Battlefront II fiasco should have cause for alarm here. I really hope Ubi doesn’t ruin this game, because it looks like it has tons of potential.

          And lastly, we had Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. I’m a little surprised that they didn’t give the franchise the year off again after boasting so much about how Origins benefitted from the extra dev time, but if it was ready to go they might as well release it. This year the assassins are going to Greece, and it looks like the franchise is going to be taking new leaps into the future, including a choice between male and female characters and dialogue options.

          Y’know. Stuff other games have been doing for years now.

          While I’m not a franchise fan by any means, I will say that Odyssey does look entertaining. A big leap forward is what Assassin’s Creed needs to stop it from becoming irrelevant, and while only time will tell if it turns out good, it looks like a step in the right direction to catch them up with the rest of the industry.

          So yeah, Ubisoft was pretty great. While there’s always a concern with them that the end product will turn out crappy, they’ve become great in the last few years at creating incredibly appealing trailers and fun and investing conferences. Skull and Bones alone was worth the price of admission.

Sony

          Man, what happened here?

          Formerly the undisputed king of E3, Sony’s crown began to slip last year when they delivered an underwhelming conference that didn’t really show us anything we’d never seen before. And thanks to some shockingly bad production decisions and (once again) a lack of surprises, Sony delivered yet another just okay conference this year.

          Easily their biggest mistake came right at the beginning. They gathered the crowd in a church-like building for the Last of Us: Part II trailer. When that was finished, everyone had to go into the real theater so the actual conference could start. While we were waiting for everyone to take their seats, we were treated to a painfully awkward roundtable discussion and a bunch of trailers we’d already seen.

          As for Last of Us itself, it looks fine I guess. I still find it impossible to get excited over grimdark apocalypse games anymore, so I really doubt I’ll be interested in it. Still, the story stuff looked cool and the combat and stealth mechanics look pretty interesting, so I’m sure fans will love it.

          And then we waited. And waited. And waited some more. And then the PlayStation Twitch stream died so we had to run to Twitch’s official E3 stream.

          After over ten minutes of waiting we finally got to the next game: Ghost of Tsushima. I’d never heard about this one before, and here it looked pretty cool, albeit a kinda unoriginal concept. Maybe it’s because I’ve played too many Warriors games but I think I’ve visited ancient Japan more than I’ve visited my local national park. All joking aside this was probably Sony’s biggest new announcement for me, and I definitely will keep an eye on it.

          Later on we had our first real look at Death Stranding…kinda. Basically all we saw was a bunch of Norman Reedus hiking in the mountains and then a bit of what I can only assume was a stealth section.

          I’ll admit it: until Kojima sits down and fully explains what the hell is going on with this game, I am officially getting off of Death Stranding’s hype train. This is the fourth time we’re seeing the game in a span of two years, and we STILL have no idea what it is. Is it an action game? A stealth game? A shooter? An interactive movie like Detroit: Become Human? As far as I know right now it might as well be a card game. I don’t want another No Man’s Sky situation where a game sells itself on how mysterious it is and the only way of understanding it is to play it. That burned me and thousands of other people hard last time, and I’m not about to go through it again.

          Finally, we got another look at Spider-Man. I’ve mentioned many times on this blog about how I’ve always wanted a game like this, and it still looks so, so great. Finally getting to see villains other than Mr. Negative was a treat, and we also got a tease that he and the other baddies are working for someone who Spidey apparently sees at the end of the trailer. My money is on either Green Goblin (as we already know Norman Osborn is in the game) or Doc Ock (as we just need one more villain to complete a Sinister Six, which he is typically the leader of).

          All in all, Sony was…fine. A lot of the games they showed looked really good, but aside from maybe Spider-Man (which we’ve seen many times before) there was no real big “wow” moment for me. With the other conferences we had stuff like Cyberpunk 2077, Doom: Eternal, The Elder Scrolls VI, Beyond Good and Evil 2 and Skull and Bones. Sony really didn’t have much firepower backing them up, and it didn’t help that the conference itself was horribly paced and disastrously organized. Go back to the orchestra next year, guys.

Nintendo

          They did it. The crazy madmen went and did it.

          We knew going in we were getting Smash Bros, and while we didn’t know if we were getting a new game or a port, just the promise of a new game in one of Nintendo’s most enormous franchises was enough to get us hype.

          And man, did they ever deliver.

          The star attraction this year was Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the Switch iteration of Nintendo’s famous fighter. And it features nothing less than every single character ever featured in the franchise ever. Characters long since thought dead such as Pichu, Young Link and even Snake have made glorious returns, alongside literally every character that’s ever been playable as well as some new ones, such as Splatoon’s Inklings, and the no-longer too big Ridley from Metroid. The game looks like a complete celebration of everything Smash, and with it releasing just a short six months away is unbelievable.

          We also managed to get a few quick looks at some other new stuff, like a new Mario Party that looks awesome, as well as a new Switch Fire Emblem game, but those were just raindrops in the ocean that was Smash. While Nintendo didn’t come geared to the nines with announcements this year, they definitely prioritized quality over quantity, and at the end of the day, that’s all that matters.

FINAL SCORES

(Friendly reminder that this is just my opinion and is completely subjective)

1. Nintendo (9/10)

2. Microsoft (9/10)

3. Ubisoft (8/10)

4. Square Enix (7/10)

5. Sony (6/10)

6. Bethesda (5/10)

7. EA (2/10)

          I couldn’t resist giving Nintendo the top spot. Overall Microsoft might’ve had the strongest and most consistent show with the most big announcement, but Super Smash Bros. Ultimate was such a powerhouse that, in my eyes, they absolutely deserve this honour.

          Second and third go to Microsoft and Ubisoft, who both boasted incredibly stellar shows this year with lots and lots to get excited about. Cyberpunk 2077 and Skull and Bones were two of my favourite parts of the entire event. If they keep it up or, even better, improve on what they’ve got going, they’ll quickly become the new kings of E3.

          While this may be a controversial pick, I really did think Square Enix was better than Sony for a few reasons. Firstly, they managed to get me excited for games I knew about but wasn’t interested in beforehand, while Sony did not. I couldn’t have cared less about Shadow of the Tomb Raider, but Square’s presentation of the game’s stealth mechanics definitely made me interested in looking at the other games in the franchise beforehand. And secondly, Square actually teased new stuff. I dunno if Babylon’s Fall will be good, but I’m interested in it purely because it was something new.

          Sony on the other hand I felt was a bit of a mess this year. The conference’s organization was mind-boggling, starting off in a completely different room and forcing us at home to play the waiting game while they made their way into the real room. And while a lot of the games they showed looked really, really good (Spider-Man looks like a dream come true), there was barely anything big and new we hadn’t seen before, leaving the conference lacking in a real “wow” factor.

          Bethesda this low might also be a controversial pick, so let me explain. I am absolutely excited for stuff like Elder Scrolls VI, Doom: Eternal and Starfield. My problem is that we barely saw any of them aside from logos, and a lot of the conference was just talking and talking and talking with no real point to it. It wasn’t bad, just not great.

          And unsurprisingly, EA brings up the rear, with a shockingly boring and uninspired conference that only served to kill any hype I had for Anthem. Whoops.

          All in all though this was an incredible E3. Next Monday I’ll be talking about my favourite trailers and games of the show, so be sure to check that out!

Editorial: My E3 2018 Predictions (E3 Month 2018 Part 2)

My E3 2018 Predictions

          It’s hard to believe E3 is already starting this weekend, and that means it’s finally time for me to give my annual predictions!

          I’ll be doing it a little differently than previous years. Before I would pick a specific game that might get announced and explain why I thought we were getting that. The problem with that was that oftentimes I’d have no real frame of reference for what was coming next, so it was mostly me guessing based on what was popular and what hadn’t had a sequel in a while.

          So this year I decided to go for something a bit more casual: I’ll just be talking about the various things we might see at the conferences, some things I want to see, and also a few expectations I have. I also won’t be talking about Devolver Digital or the PC Gaming Show, because the former is just here for the laughs and like only three people watch the latter.

So let’s get started!

EA

          Oh, EA. Why do we always have to start with you?

          As I mentioned last week, EA’s conferences are possibly the least anticipated of the entire show. Recent years have seen the show turn into a sports broadcast that ends with a game demo from DICE, and I fully expect us to see the same thing happen again this year.

          I’m not interested in the usual rigmarole of Madden, NBA and FIFA, so let’s just move on to the real games. EA conferences are usually split into four different sections: EA Sports, the EA Originals indie game, the big DICE finale game, and usually something else, typically Titanfall or something by BioWare.

          So let’s kick things off by talking about what the show will inevitably finish with: Battlefield V. It’s already been revealed and we know it’s gonna be there, but you might’ve noticed that something wasn’t announced at that initial reveal show.

          I wouldn’t be surprised if Battlefield follows in Call of Duty’s footsteps and throws in a Battle Royale mode to try and cash in on some of that sweet, sweet Fortnite money. Introducing a new mode would be a smart way to keep fans invested and not make them feel like they’re seeing the same trailer they just saw a month ago.

          Whatever this year’s EA Original will be is anyone’s guess, so what about the other big game they usually have in there? I have little doubt that Star Wars will be absent from this year’s show with the chaos EA unleashed with Battlefront II last year still fresh in everyone’s minds, so the only real option we know about is Anthem.

          Last I checked Anthem is due for Spring 2019, meaning that unless another delay happens this is its last chance for the E3 stage. But then again, last year we only got a sneak peek at it at the EA conference and didn’t see it for real until Microsoft showed it off the next day. Will they do the same thing again? I guess we’ll find out on Saturday.

Microsoft

          To say the Xbox One has had an uphill battle since launch is putting it nicely. Frankly, I don’t know why we don’t mention the thing in the same breath as the Wii U. After a disastrous pre-release that left the core gaming market wide open for Sony to take control of, Microsoft has sort of coasted their way through this generation on hardware specs alone. Even Halo wasn’t enough to generate enough buzz to get their console to compete with the PS4, and once Nintendo came back swinging with the Switch, Microsoft has sort of become that weird third console developer that isn’t really relevant anymore.

          But with early rumblings that the eighth generation of consoles is coming to an end sometime soon, this seems like the perfect time for Microsoft to pull a Nintendo and bring themselves back from the brink. I definitely think we’ll be getting an early tease and a codename for the next Xbox this year, sort of how they teased the Xbox One X in 2016 under the name Scorpio before properly unveiling it a full year later.

          I also think Gears of War 5 is a safe bet, especially after it was seemingly leaked by Walmart Canada. Microsoft needs a big holiday season game to keep themselves afloat until the One finally crosses the finish line, and with Halo seemingly dead in the water, good ol’ Gears is always a fan-favourite choice.

          As for rest of the conference, Microsoft has made a name for itself lately being a jack of all trades of sort. They have big games, small games, a metric ton of indies, and a lot of other stuff. It typically makes for a great variety show (last year’s especially was a good time), but it’s a little hard to predict. Maybe we’ll get our minds blown and CD Projekt Red will be there with Cyberpunk 2077 like the rumours have been talking about. Maybe they’ll have games from EA and Ubisoft there for some reason again. Maybe Half-Life 3, I dunno. Whatever the case, I’m interested in seeing what they do this year.

Bethesda

          Fun fact: literally as I was writing the Microsoft portion of this article Bethesda announced what is surely going to be the focus of their conference this year.

          So, yeah. We all know that this year’s BE3 is going to be nothing but Fallout 76, Fallout 76, and more Fallout 76. And you know what? That’s okay. After having two incredibly boring and underwhelming years at E3 in a row (they absolutely should’ve skipped last year or at least had a segment at someone else’s conference), having a big gun in their arsenal like a new Fallout game is definitely a good thing for them.

          It’s also important to note that the initial release trailer for the game tells us absolutely nothing about the actual product. I think they’re saving the real big gameplay details for the show itself, which is a great way to get people watching. According to what I’ve been seeing it’s a sort of DayZ-esque experience, but whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing will likely be determined by how it looks in action.

          But my real question is…where the hell is Elder Scrolls VI? It’s been seven years now since Skyrim came out, and despite Bethesda’s attempts to port it to every single gaming platform that ever existed ever, it’s gotten really tired. Skyrim seems practically archaic when compared to modern day games of similar genre, including Witcher 3, Horizon Zero Dawn and even Zelda: Breath of the Wild. It’s time for Bethesda to stop reminiscing about Skyrim’s glory days and realize that it’s time for a new installment.

Square Enix

          Much like how I think Bethesda’s show this year is going to be almost exclusively focused on Fallout 76, I think it doesn’t take a genius to realize that there’s only one reason why Squeenix is doing a conference: Kingdom Hearts III.

          The long-awaited third installment in the now eight-game spanning Kingdom Hearts franchise has been one of the most anticipated games by fans since it was announced years ago, and it looks like it’s finally on target to release this holiday season. That being said there’s still a lot that we don’t know about the game, and I’m guessing Square will be pulling the curtain back a little more during this conference.

          We’ll likely see some new Disney worlds (probably some big name ones like Frozen or The Incredibles), learn about some new gameplay mechanics, and get a tease at where the ever-convoluted story will be taking us next.

          And if you’re hoping for the Final Fantasy VII Remake to finally make a return this year…keep dreaming.

Ubisoft

          Ubi had a huge success story on their hands last year after they finally decided to cut the crap and fix their E3 show. As a result it turned out to be one of the best conferences of the year, pumping out game after game with little messing about in between. And even better, a lot of the trailers looked really, really good.

          I think it’s safe to assume we’ll be seeing a few favourites from last year make a return experience, such as Skull and Bones, which I’m guessing is going to be Ubi’s big Christmas game, and Beyond Good and Evil 2, which I’m not expecting until next year at the earliest.

          The Division 2 has also been confirmed, and unless I’m mistaken I think this’ll be the first time we’re seeing it. The first Division was met with a pretty resounding “ehhh” from everyone who played it, especially after one of the worst launch day in game history when players were stuck waiting in literal line-ups to access mission terminals because someone had the stroke of genius to make them only useable by one person at a time. Smart!

          We also know Assassin's Creed Odyssey will be there thanks to a leak forcing an early announcement, so expect lots and lots of Mario jokes surrounding that over the next few weeks. Ubi has also promised several surprises will be at the show, so one has to wonder what those are.

Sony

          It’s all speculation right now, but a lot of people have been talking lately that the PS4 is heading into its twilight hours. Even major Sony employees have gone on record saying that the system is approaching the end of its life cycle.

          Despite this, I still think it’s way too early to be getting a glimpse of the PS5. The 4 still has quite a few games promised, and unlike Microsoft, Sony tends to wait until release date is closer before talking about new hardware. I do think that this conference will be a good place to judge how much longer the PS4 has before it’s replaced, especially if anything new is teased.

          Right now we know at least four games that’ll be at the show for sure: Spider-Man, Days Gone, Death Stranding and The Last of Us 2. Aside from Last of Us those have been E3 staples for Sony dating back to their 2016 show, but time is running out for a few of them. We know we’re getting Spider-Man in September, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Days Gone received a Spring 2019 release date, leaving just Death Stranding and Last of Us as the stragglers likely sticking around for E3 2019. If Sony doesn’t announce any other major titles this year and instead focuses on those four, that likely means next year will be reserved for showing off the PS5 instead of more exclusives for PS4. Maybe we’ll even get a Breath of the Wild-style release for Death Stranding or Last of Us, releasing them simultaneously on PS4 and as a launch title for PS5.

          But if we do get something new this year, I’d really, really like to get a glimpse of Horizon 2. The first game was a monumental success for both critics and audiences (I stand firmly by my choice naming it Game of the Year 2017), and I am very hungry for another taste of Aloy’s mechanical world. While I think it’s much more likely I’ll have to wait until PS5 to get that game, I’d be totally okay with a quick tease. I also wouldn’t be surprised if Crash Bandicoot got a new game, thanks to renewed interest in him because of the N-Sane Trilogy. It wouldn’t be hard for Vicarious Visions to make a new one using assets from N-Sane, and I think now is the perfect time to strike that iron while it’s hot.

Nintendo

          Let me get something out of the way real quick: the big Pokémon RPG due for 2019 isn’t going to be at the show. Okay?

          Alright, let’s go.

          Nintendo is easily the biggest show this year. After a monumental first year with the Nintendo Switch, gamers are practically beside themselves getting excited for what’s coming next.

          Let’s start with the elephant in the room: Smash Bros. for Switch. We’re still not clear on whether it’s an extended port of Smash Bros. for Wii U or an entirely new experience, but at the end of the day Smash is still Smash regardless of what package it comes in. We’re gonna get some new characters, probably including at least one big name. Past E3s have seen characters like Solid Snake, Mega Man and Pac-Man announced at the show, so we'll likely be seeing someone of that caliber.

          As for the rest of the games, I think it’s safe to say we’ll get our first look at what Metroid Prime 4 is all about, as well as a return of that Yoshi game that fell off the face of the Earth after last year’s E3. We’ll probably get at least one surprise, too. Some people are betting on the supposedly leaked Star Fox Racing game Retro Studios has apparently been working on, but I’d really like to see the return of Animal Crossing. The Switch would work perfectly with that franchise.

          What would you like to see at E3 this year? Let me know, and enjoy the conferences! I’ll be back on Tuesday to give you my full thoughts as well as my annual ranking.