E3 2021

[kamikazekeeg]

Kazuya in Smash is fun, Tekken is definitely a great choice to have as another big fighting game franchise representation.

Metroid Dread, what a great name.  I've never been a huge fan of Metroid, I've just never played it really outside of the first Prime.  No clue if I'll check it out, but seems kinda cool.

Wow, I forgot about SMTV and that it was revealed over 4 years ago lol

I never did play Fatal Frame 5 beyond the demo on Wii U, so I might consider this if it is a cheaper release.

Wait, did they just pull a Pokemon Let's Go with Skyward Sword and that analog controls are only allowed in handheld or did I hear that wrong?  I don't think I'm gonna buy it if they did, that's so damn stupid.  Also a small collection of Zelda games...but only on a Game & Watch? This is not what I want...And they only give a half-hearted nod to the 35th anniversary and saying they have nothing else planned? I mean, they could be bullshitting with that and we'll get a full Zelda event soon, but this weird underselling of the anniversary is confusing.  This is not how I wanted the Zelda portion to be.

At least we are getting something Breath of the Wild 2 and it looks real cool.  2022 release is not unexpected either.  Man, Nintendo undercutting their pretty alright event for me with the starting Zelda stuff, but at least it ended well.  Overall an okay event, nothing too amazing for me in particular, but it was consistent and well paced.

I think overall, I'd probably say Nintendo had the nicer event, even if I wasn't too excited for much of it, though Microsoft had some good stuff by showing off more Halo, STALKER 2, and Battlefield 2042.  Definitely a very low key E3 this year.

[weirdfeline]

Nintendo was so bad. Extremely lazy Mario Party and they made WarioWare look slow and boring. Seems like all microgames will be designed for two players which ruins the single player experience. Nothing else interested me.

I would have liked to see an update to get me to play Animal Crossing, Splatoon 3 even though I expect that at the Nintendo Direct in September, a new 3D Donkey Kong or maybe even Kirby. Maybe Mario Kart? Maybe a AAA new IP like Arms was? Maybe an update to the awful NSO service?

Those are all reasonable things I would have liked to see.

[kamikazekeeg]

Bandai Namco is the last event to watch for E3, though I thought I heard that it might not be much of a showing, mostly just focusing on House of Ashes, which would be boring, but I can't find anything specific on that in particular as otherwise I'm figuring it's mostly just like...Scarlet Nexus, Tales of Arise, something for DBZ: Kakarot, probably nothing new for Elden Ring, and while I'd hope for a surprise, I've learned with this E3 to keep my expectations fairly low lol

[Cartagia]

That was an above average direct, big surprises with Metroid and WarioWare, but with the way the rest of E3 was that also made it far and away the best showing of the entire event.

[telly]

I really enjoyed Nintendo's E3 presentation. Super pumped for Metroid Dread. If it plays like Samus Returns I'll be happy, looks like it's based on the same engine, and it will have some extra buttons to work with as well going from the 3DS to the Switch.

I'm really interested in the WarioWare and Super Monkey Ball games as some fun party options. SMTV looked really cool too, don't know much about the series, but I'd like to try it out. Would love to try out that Advance Wars collection as well.

The only thing that was dissapointing was the Zelda news. Had really high hopes for a bigger announcement than a 50 dollar Game and Watch, of all things.

[bikingjahuty]

I've watched most E3's since 2007 and this was by far the worst one. But here we go with my take on all the conferences I unfortunately watched.


Ubisoft: D


I admittedly don't like Ubisoft or really any of their games, but the lack of any big announcements beyond what we already knew they were working on made this even more boring than their conferences typically are. At least it wasn't between them and EA being the worst conference like it is most years.


Gearbox: F+


They literally spent half their presentation talking about a movie. Then they talked about stuff we already knew about. No big reveals, nothing to get excited about.


XBOX/Bethesda: B-


This actually felt like an E3 conference, mostly.They revealed new games, they released new trailers and info on highly anticipated games that had been announced (Starfield, HALO Infinite), and just overall it was a decent show. My only gripes had to do with wishing their premiers were bigger and more exciting. Truth be told, the Starfield trailer actually made me less hyped since it just made that game look like a generic scifi game. But we'll see what the future holds with that one.


Warner Bros: F


Pretty much just talked about one game. Not really a conference, but would have been nice to get some more info on Harry Potter Hogwarts game and MK11's future.


PC Gaming Show: B-


This was a pretty entertaining conference. Likable hosts, cool sets, fun premise, it was just enjoyable to watch from a production standpoint. Some cool game reveals and more info on other PC titles that have already been announced. My gripes with them is really nothing groundbreaking or amazing was announced, but for what it was, it was pretty good.


Square Enix: D


Rereleases, info on games that are already out, and mobile game trash was mostly all this conference was about. The big reveal was that Final Fantasy hack and slash game which I'm just going to call FF: Kill Chaos since that's pretty much what stuck with me when it premiered. Not a great conference.


Take Two: F--------


This was literally, without any question the worst E3 presentation of all time. Literally no games talked about, revealed, nothing. It was an hour long college lecture. And look, I'm not knocking the subject matter; I'd literally have disliked it just as much if they spent an hour discussing the lack of cheat codes in modern gaming. E3 is meant to show off new games and considering this is the company that owns the rights to the GTA and Red Dead series there could have been something here, but there was literally nothing. I honestly thought I was watching some sort of post/pre show discussion at first, but no, that was there presentation. WTF...


Capcom: D-


Talked about games that are already out and stuff we already knew about. Nothing groundbreaking or interesting and it was over way too fast. The host was ultra annoying too.


Nintendo: B


This was definitely the best big company conference this year. Between awesome reveals like Metroid Dread, Advanced Wars Remakes, Monkey Ball compilation, new Warioware, and of course a new BotW2 trailer I was pretty happy with it overall. My only gripes were wanting at least a title for the new Zelda game, which if that isn't ready to reveal yet I doubt this game is getting a 2022 release, but we'll see. Also would have liked to see another big AAA reveal like Metroid Prime 4, Bayonetta 3, or a Mario Kart 9. Still I liked it and was not disappointed.


Namco/Bandia: F


Pretty much talked about one a game for 10-minutes.


and finally, I saved the best for last....


Limited Run Games: A-


First off, the presentation was freakin hilarious and I loved how it mocked the stupid PR bullshit in the other big companies' presentations. But of course the reveals are what stole the show for me. There were only a handful of games announced that I didn't have that much interest in, but everything else is going to be a definite buy. When they announced Rondo/SotN coming to PS4 I lost my shit even though I was halfway expecting it. Also freaked out when Dusk was announced to get a physical release. And then of course there was the BIG reveal of Plumbers don't wear Ties. I'm not a huge 90s AMV fan, even for their unintentional humor, but I've always wanted to try this game and seeing how I have no desire to buy a 3DO or this game for it, this looks like a good opportunity.


But anyhow, there is my impression of E3 2021 which was overall a colossal piece of crap. Here are the top 5 games from this year's conference for me not including LRG announcements since the list would pretty much just be stuff they revealed is getting a physical release.


1. Breath of the Wild 2
2. Metroid Dread
3. Jurassic World Evolution 2
4. Halo Infinite
5. Advance Wars 1 + 2 remakes

[kamikazekeeg]

Looking back, I think other than wanting to see more from specific games like Elden Ring, Breath of the Wild 2, STALKER 2, and Halo, there wasn't a lot of new that excited me.  Battlefield 2042 was great to have there and I'm excited for it, Evil Dead could be fun, Death Stranding: Director's Cut I'm a sucker for, and Guardians of the Galaxy has some potential, and that's mostly it.  I don't think there was a single big surprise for the show at all, which is real unfortunate.  This could possibly be one of the weaker E3's I've seen in modern memory for me, I'd have to check to see what E3 did last year as I forget, but yeah, super low key year.

[Cartagia]

When you take into account that all the game Dev Day stuff wasn't E3 (it's a separate event using E3 to help boost it's profile) it takes a massive hit, as that includes Elden Ring, Evil Dead and Death Stranding.

[kamikazekeeg]

When you take into account that all the game Dev Day stuff wasn't E3 (it's a separate event using E3 to help boost it's profile) it takes a massive hit, as that includes Elden Ring, Evil Dead and Death Stranding.

That's very true, I forgot that wasn't technically E3, though I kinda consider sorta everything around it as "E3" anyways as it's basically just a week long gaming fest, but if I took that out, things are definitely lessened as Elden Ring was the most hype for me.

[redblaze57]

Wait, did they just pull a Pokemon Let's Go with Skyward Sword and that analog controls are only allowed in handheld or did I hear that wrong?

Decided to look on The eShop page and it says that the game supports the Pro Controller so...

[kamikazekeeg]

Decided to look on The eShop page and it says that the game supports the Pro Controller so...

As long as it says that, it should be fine, I just wouldn't put it past to Nintendo to do something restrictive like that.

[burningdoom]

Nintendo killed it for me! Finally a new 2D Metroid!!!

That alone was worth E3, even if the rest of it kind of sucked.

Not only that, but we finally get an update on Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2. More Hyrule Warriors is always a good thing, as well. And I didn't realize that Skyward Sword would support controller play. That has me much more interested in it.

Strange Brigade looked cool. I hadn't heard of it before, but it's already on Xbox One, so I just ordered that. I did the same with Strife after hearing about it somewhere in E3, it's already been ported to the Switch.

Other than Nintendo:
Halo: Infinite looks cool, of course, but we already knew about that. Sonic Colors Ultimate is nice, though not sure it's worth re-buying it. And Guardians of the Galaxy looks interesting, but I'm gonna have a wait and see approach with it after that abysmal Avengers game Square-Enix put out.

[tpugmire]

Metroid Dread was the highlight of the entirety of E3. I also may pick up Life is Strange, dashv has been trying to get me to play it for a while now, so I might give in now that it’s going to be on the Switch. I’m a little disappointed that there isn’t much more for Legend of Zelda’s 35th anniversary, but I’ll get over it. I’m also bummed because I thought that someone, somewhere, would say something about LEGO Star Wars. I’ve had it preordered and fully paid off for about a year now. I’m feeling like I gave GameStop a $60 interest-free loan for no reason. Maybe I’ll see if I can just move it to Metroid, since that will actually come out soon.  Limited Run has some fun stuff coming too, I’m sure I’ll wind up picking up a few.

[bunnybear]

I didn’t have time to watch them all, but I did for a few.

Nintendo fucking slayed it. Metroid Dread alone was worth it, but add the Zelda Game & Watch, SMT V (finally!) and the ports of Fatal Frame, Mushihimesama, Espgaluda 2, and Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu, and my mind was simply blown.

Limited Run Games always have sketchy videos, but decent game reveals. This year they had neither. That wasn’t “funny”, it was sheer stupid. Also, the games they announced, outside of those which frankly should go retail, were awful. What a pile of garbage.

[mrkonasoni]

Nintendo was pretty fun.
And they announced some interesting stuff like a new Cruisn", I knew it could pay being one of the few persons that liked the Wii game, haha.

Metroid Dread is also great, I don't think anyone ever expected that cancelled project to come back, I think this is what I needed for consider buying a Switch again.

The Zelda Game&Watch looks fine and it's cool it includes Link Awakening but I consider a truly lost golden chance not incluiding the Zelda G&W game from the 80s that nowadays goes for like 500$ and more, some people mentioned the fact the game is double-screen but then again, G&W Gallery 4 for GBA included it.

So, that's for me.
I liked Microsoft and Nintendo.