I'm a sucker for hype. I'm a sucker for trailers. And I'm a sucker for video games. So when E3 2018 rolled around, I pretty much melted into a puddle of excitement. E3 is what the cool kids call the Electronic Entertainment Expo, which is the biggest annual video game event and primetime for game studios to build hype for upcoming titles. At this year's expo, big name studios have revealed teasers for a plethora of promising games. These are the games I'm most excited to wear myself out waiting for.
1. "The Elder Scrolls VI"
The announcement of the next installment of Bethesda's flagship series generated the most hype with the least amount of information. All we got was a landscape flyover, a brass and drum fanfare and a generic title card. No release date, no defined setting, no story hints, no gameplay. But considering it's been seven years since the previous game and considering that previous game was arguably the best game of all time, it's hard to not be excited. It's impossible to speculate about anything other than the region the game will be set in (which there is plenty of speculation about), as the game is only in preproduction. It's going to be a long, hard wait for this one.
2. "Halo Infinite"
It's been a long time since I've been excited to play "Halo." So many things in the teaser trailer for "Halo Infinite" (effectively "Halo 6") suggest a promising future for "Halo." Whereas the E3 2013 teaser for "Halo 5" was all about the big bad alien robot, the teaser for "Halo 6" conveys a fundamentally "Halo" feeling. Serene environments, alien yet familiar. Gentle, hopeful music. And finally, Master Chief's helmet, which is accompanied by the familiar bong we know and love. The trailer digs into human feelings of awe, suspense, curiosity and hope. And that's what Master Chief's story has always been about: hope. The trailer brought me back to "Halo 3," especially the music and design of Chief's armor. That's enough to get me excited.
3. "Dying Light 2"
Techland, the studio behind "Dying Light," won my trust with the first game. Everything was so well executed and worked together perfectly. What makes "Dying Light" stand out from other zombie apocalypse games is the focus on parkour. Techland knew this and made sure every aspect of the game focused on and synergized with the movement system. The storyline, quests, map design, abilities, combat system, enemies and day/night cycle all serve to force the player to make use of the incredibly fluid and satisfying movement system. Gameplay-wise, "Dying Light" is already a perfect game. But Techland decided to add on a compelling, rich story with plenty of side quests, an amazing score and some pretty great graphics to boot. If "Dying Light 2" is more of the same I'll be more than happy.
4. "Just Cause 4"
"Just Cause 2" was one of the first PC games I played, and "Just Cause 3" was one of the best. "Just Cause 3" featured a huge, beautiful world full of things to blow up, lots of fun toys with which to blow things up and a fun new way to get around to blow things up (the glider). The biggest downside of the game is that it's repetitive, which is made bearable by how fun the repetitive gameplay is. From the reveal trailer and supplementary videos, it seems like Square Enix realized this and have added plenty of features to keep the game from getting stale. New unique enemies that force you to change how you play, destructive weather, a map spanning four varied biomes, new (hopefully half-decent) vehicle handling, all wrapped in a brand new game engine. What's not to love?
5. "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate"
We knew a new "Super Smash Bros." game was coming for the Nintendo Switch, but at E3 we learned more about what we can expect from the game—specifically who we can expect to play as. The game is dubbed "Ultimate" because it features every playable character from every past "Super Smash Bros." game, as well as some new faces. The lengthy reveal also shows off lots of updates, tweaks and quality of life changes to each character's move set, which is always exciting. Frankly, I'm just excited I don't have to buy a Wii U to play "Super Smash Bros."
There are plenty more games to be excited for, but these were the highlights of E3 for me. All in all, a pretty exciting showcase. What am I supposed to do while I wait? I suppose I could come up with the money the coming year is going to cost me. Good games don't come free. But considering the quality of games coming out in the past few years, I'll happily keep feeding the developers behind them money.
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