E3 Special 2013

So let’s take a look at some of the titles which caught my eye at this years E3!

Top of list is undoubtedly Total War: Rome 2, where we saw for the first time the campaign map in action. It was only a small look, but from what I saw the map is glorious, with fantastic detail, vibrant colour and lots of cool little features. It’s also freaking massive. The battle looked great too. Damn, I really need a new PC for this.

Next up is Watch_Dogs with another good showing. I have my concerns about how much freedom the game world will actually offer, but it’s an impressive looking title. Also from Ubisoft was the announcement of The Division, which I initially thought looked great, but on second viewing it appeared the world wasn’t as ‘open’ as I first thought and it appeared to be a lot of cleverly disguised larger corridors. I might be wrong though, and it’s one I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on.

Ryse: Son of Rome was one of the prettiest games on show, but it looked incredibly shallow and repetitive in terms of gameplay. Titanfall looked okay, but not really different enough to really peak my interest. The Crew looked like The Fast and the Furious Online, and although I don’t really play racing games, I thought it looked pretty fun. Mad Max was a surprise, but I haven’t seen any gameplay footage yet. Assassins Creed IV looked okay and it may yet reignite my interest in the series which plummeted after the lacklustre Brotherhood.

Battlefield 4 looked pretty but I can’t say much else about it. It honestly just looked like a spruced up BF3, so I guess if you enjoyed that you will probably enjoy this. InFAMOUS Second Son looked okay, but the gameplay video left me a little meh. Dead Rising 3 was...odd. I’ve only played the first game but it definitely had a less serious, more ‘cartoon’ approach, and this third one seemed far more ‘realistic’ and serious. Not necessarily a bad thing. I still really want a great, realistic (ha!) open world zombie survival game. I’m not sure this will be it, but I’ll keep an eye on it.

We also had The Witcher 3 which looked great, and although I’ve never really played the series, Metal Gear Solid 5, which looked interesting. There was also Destiny which looked okay but didn’t really excite me. The Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare demo made me chuckle and there was the new Thief which...uh, I’m actually undecided on. There were aspects of it I liked but others I’m not so sure about, but I’ll reserve judgement until I’ve seen more. Finally we have Battlefront, which could potentially be all kinds of awesome, and the exciting reveal of Mirror's Edge 2! Hurrah! I think that’s about everything.

Uh, what else? Well the conferences were certainly better than last year, but that’s not really saying much. In terms of the new consoles, Sony seems like the better bet - cheaper, less restrictive features, although the new paid online is a bit of a bummer. I know it’s not a great cost, but for someone like me who plays primarily on PC but has always had a companion console for exclusives and other stuff, I don’t really use it enough to warrant a monthly online fee. Well, we’ll see, but my priority is still to get a new PC and after that it all depends on the games. But right now, nether console has anything that would make me rush out for it on Day 1.

Overall though, a pretty good E3 this year, and compared to last year we got a lot of really nice looking games. Seemed like a real emphasis on open-world stuff this year too so I guess that’s the ‘in’ thing at the moment. But with a new PC and a copy of Rome 2 to play this September, I doubt I’ll be giving much thought to a whole lot else.