E3 2012: EA & Ubisoft Press Conferences
EA does sports and Ubisoft is cruel to animals
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Sorry for this being a touch late. Last year we didn’t highlight EA & Ubi’s events, but this year with added manpower I’ll be able to put together this compilation post (plus cutting out some fat). There usually is some decent stuff, but never outstanding or surprising enough. That actually does change |
| Dead Space 3 | |
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In addition to just knowing Dead Space 3 is happening, drop-in/out co-op was the other big item being sold during the presentation. I haven’t been able to play the series, but to my knowledge, Dead Space has been a terrific action-horror game and was looked at somewhat differently in comparison to the more action-heavy Resident Evil games. Will adding co-op tip the series more towards the path Resident Evil is walking and lose some of the tension that a good action-horror game can build up? |
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| EA Sports 13 | |
| Sports is an unpopular thing around these parts. FIFA 13 does have Kinect functionality in which you can tell a referee he f***ing sucks! Madden is the best ever this year, which is always (not) the case.
EA notched a multi-year/product deal with UFC. Because of this, the THQ San Diego studio staff (who had been working on the Undisputed series of UFC games) was let go, basically moments after the announcement. What a sucky way to lose a job. EA is making money and deals now, but they need to quit with the exclusivity contracts and eliminating quality sports competition. |
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| Sim City – Social | |
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The new Sim City will be coming out in 2013 and it looks better than ever. Aside from that, expect more of the same in terms of city building. One point of controversy is that the game will require an online connection regardless of single player or multiplayer. Sim City Social will also be coming to Facebook. It’s a game on Facebook where you build stuff. Now it’s a more respected franchise amongst core gamers than say Farmville/Castleville/anythingVille, so maybe it’ll be a good time-killer for a bit. |
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| NFS Most Wanted – Good Luck, Cops | |
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While reception turned out pretty decently for the first iteration of Most Wanted, Criterion takes over and flexes its muscle as it shows off how great it is at the super-arcadey racing game formula. Honestly, it reminds me a lot of Burnout Paradise (maybe too much) as you look at the gameplay footage above, but there remains plenty to be seen with Most Wanted’s gameplay structure and missions. |
All Them FPS’s, Bro:
- Crysis 3 — I’ve only played Crysis 2 in the series and really enjoyed it, but I don’t have any excitement towards 3. It’s an over-congested genre.
- Battlefield 3 Premium — If you enjoy Battlefield, you might go far enough to enjoy a subscription service a la Call of Duty Elite. Does Battlefield want to be better than CoD or does it want to be CoD? Doesn’t matter to EA, cause enough people like Battlefield to net a gain from this.
- Medal of Honor Warfighter — They had to put a buffer in between this and Battlefield so to not go back-to-back with modern warfare games. Can’t say I was going any sorts of crazy watching the gameplay demo.
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“We’re a little bit gay, all of us” – Aisha Tyler
I think Aisha Tyler was a good host and is more ideal for these kinds of events than Joel McHale was a couple of years ago. She is a gamer and is a part of the culture of the core gamer, so her alone was a good choice for Ubisoft. She had good jokes (love those “throwaway” punch lines) and wasn’t painfully jokey throughout the event. Not a good choice… adding a second YouTube personality to the mix. I can’t speak ill of Toby since I’ve never seen the guy before this, but they didn’t gel well together to the point that it stopped looking like a planned bit and more of annoyance on Aisha’s part. They probably had very limited time to rehearse anyway, so if blame should be placed anywhere, put it on Ubisoft for not putting the best show together and for trying to open with Flo Rida; you can’t open a conference trying to get people riled up.
I’m right about that and any indifference towards my views is of the utmost invalidity. Onto the important part, games and such.
| Wii U Showcase | |
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A teaser was shown for an FPS zombie game given an uninspiring name of ZombiU. There is one element of the game worth mentioning, which is that when you die, you’ll take on the role of another survivor and can loot goods from your previous body. Kind of like you’re playing a whole section of the human race over just one character like usual. Otherwise, if they can’t even show off some kind of gameplay footage, it’s a bit worthless to waste time thinking about ZombiU. Rayman Legends was also shown off. While gameplay does look like more of the great Rayman Origins, because the Wii U is a point of attention, shown off for it was 5-player co-op with the new WiiPad, the new Pro Controller and the classic Wiimotes. Different controllers can do different things, like the WiiPad as a touch screen for a character that can set up platforms for people with regular controls. Pretty much ~80% of the games Ubi showed off will be coming to Wii U, including Assassin’s Creed III and Avengers Battle for Earth. |
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| Far Cry 3 – Loco Siblings | |
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Well, who’d a thought the opening game for an event would show a topless woman straddling the character? The story centers around Jason Brody whose been caught up in a battle between siblings. Vaas is loco (I said oh no!) and Citra seduces our main hero into fighting to kill Vaas. Far Cry has always been a gorgeous looking FPS series with its island setting, and in addition to the nudity and gore and tigers taking bites outta the bad guys, the game will have an archipelago of islands for you to explore in FC3. In addition to the loco the gameplay demo showed off, it showed off the ability to plant a grenade into a knifed enemy and kick him where you want, and also the ability to unleash tigers into the open. |
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| Assassin’s Creed III – Fluidity | |
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Easily one of 2012’s most anticipated, I apologize for starting off my impressions with the fact that I’m not much of an AssCreed player. But after seeing the footage of 3, my curiosity has been peaked quite a bit (not to mention that Vita title also). There’s a couple of issues I had with AssCreed 1-2 that never got me to finish those games or even bother with Brotherhood-Revelations: the fighting and the free travel. When it comes to fighting, I’ve been playing Batman Arkahm City recently, and the fluidity of the fighting in that game looks mildly similar to what I’m seeing in this game which would be a great improvement. With free travel, traversing across tree limbs appears to be funner. It’s tough to gauge obviously w/o controller in hand, but if III can improve the two key components of the game, then I will hop back and follow Connor’s death trail. |
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| Watch Dogs – The City is Your Weapon | |
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Now, for something brand new and truly impressive. After an opening segment about 2003 and a blackout in the northeast United States, Watch Dogs shows our main character being able to have electronic access to most everything in the city. Turning all stop lights green to cause a multi-car accident, it’s a really new and unique way to make the player feel powerful. When Yves Guillemont said that the city can be a weapon, he wasn’t amping up his promotion. The game looked graphically sensational and was the first big out-of-nowhere surprise of the event. |
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Other notes:
- Just Dance 4 — The more popular of the dancing games thanks to Dance Central being a Kinect-exclusive.
- Splinter Cell Blacklist — More details in Microsoft’s conference recap.
- Marvel Avengers Battle for Earth — In addition to the heroes from the movie, Spider Man, Venom, Wolverine and Magneto will be added to the game.
- ShootMania — Men > Women. Fact proven.
By the time both conferences were done, we can safely say that Watch Dogs was the biggest surprise we’d seen throughout all of Monday’s festivities. Getting to E3 without a leak is always impressive these days, and being able to make a fresh gameplay component, literally making the open world itself a valuable tool, Watch Dogs will be anticipated for sometime and I guess we will be seeing it appear at E3 next year with hopefully a release date and more deets.
EA’s best was Dead Space 3 and I like Most Wanted, but it’s hard for myself to get excited about most everything else they presented. Ubisoft had a better showing than usual this time, though they still favor bringing the show to a complete halt with its e-Sport game ShootMania. Splinter Cell Blacklist got coverage, Assassin’s Creed got its usual extensive time, and of course that Watch Dogs game.
Check out steev’s 360 review, and look forward to Amuro and OC’s recaps of the Sony and Nintendo conferences, respectively.
About Jrow
Produces the MetaVerse podcast. Also plays games and watches sports of all sorts. Is an actual Pirate King.
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 167 comments
DAWWWW Coool!!! Where’s the new DOA DX DX DX !!!!!!!
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
DOA is a Tecmo game, but it was given a trailer today showing Virtua Fighter characters Akira and Sarah Bryant in it! 🙂
POWUH: iLurker with 1 comments
[…] 72 E3 2012: EA & Ubisoft Press Conferences – METANORN […]
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 209 comments
Ubisoft by far was the best sinc they had a good list of games and had a surprise of Watch_Dog, bring back original IP.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Surprises always get the headlines. Even in light of some of the gaffes during the actual presentation, Ubisoft had a really good showing.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Rayman Legends looks fun…Too bad I’m not sold on the Wii U yet. I also like the look of Watch Dogs, although I really, really can’t take any more games where I have to use a gun at ANY POINT AND TIME. If one of my friends gets this, I’m going to sit on their couch and just watch them play…and maybe wrestle the controller away to do some hacking. The hacking looks GREAT, but I don’t wanna shoot dudes. Can’t I just walk around the city and cause chaos?
Nice coverage, Jrow! I ended up missing all of Ubisoft’s conference and 1/2 of EA’s so I kind of..needed this. XD
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
The shooting thing is kind of tricky, I guess. If they made the guy somewhat like a Mirror’s Edge character where the idea was to take action and then escape, it would be awesome. I think a lot more open-world games should try for a “shooting optional” approach.
POWUH: 700-799 and Horror Expert with 701 comments
I was really disappointed that they didn’t show any actual gameplay of ZombiU. The idea of constantly restarting as a new human sounds unique enough to catch my interest even without the footage! If it looks anything like Watch Dogs, then I might consider actually getting a Wii U. (Not just for that game obviously, there are some others that caught my attention. XD)
But Watch Dogs, that was out of nowhere! Looks amazing, and the hacking, like OC said, looks like a lot of fun, especially if it’s in an open world. I NEED THAT GAME.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
They’ve since shown ZombiU gameplay at Nintendo’s conference. Looks like I guessed incorrectly about the interest, or just put my own opinions on the gaming masses.
I need Watch Dogs too! I just fear it’s a 2014 game and we will have to salivate and drool ourselves dry for two years until the game comes out. It looks good there, but I imagine they wanted to get one section made so they could show it off at E3.
POWUH: and Vampire Lover with 11746 comments
I can definitely agree Assassin’s Creed III is the most anticipated game this year. I admire the fluidity it has compared to the previous installments. It’s flawless. Ubisoft has done it again and it’s one of my favorite game companies next to Square Enix. Like the Prince of Persia franchise which is also from Ubisoft, I’ve noticed they like to make their characters scale anything, be they cliffs, towers or anything else that a person is able climb.
I look forward to getting to know Connor’s personality. Altaïr and Ezio Auditore were badasses in or out of a fight so I hope Connor can continue the trend in his own way.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Did you play the Prince of Persia with the girl partner Elika? Man, I loved that one. Prince could climb anything especially with a magic girl helping/saving him.
But I’m excited about Creed III and also the Vita game they showed off. Nice to see a woman lead as an assassin.
POWUH: Meta Team and Megane-chan with 3214 comments
I’ve never played/ seen anyone play an Assassin’s Creed game in my life, but I’m surprisingly excited for this new title of theirs based on that trailer.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
It seems like the culmination of the American Revolution setting and the improved gameplay, Creed 3 is exciting hardcore fans and non-fans like you & I. 🙂
POWUH: Meta Team and PreCure Mastah with 9203 comments
On my do want list!
Assassins creed 3, Watch dogs and Sim City – Social all look so fun xD
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I’m gonna give Social a run. It might get me in trouble if I like it and get addicted to Facebook like the 40-50-something parents, but Sim City is THE city building game.
POWUH: Beginner (20-35) with 20 comments
Watch Dogs won E3 for Ubisoft, I am so keeping both my eyes and ears on that game
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I want it to come out so soon, but as I commented to Hawthorne earlier, it’s looking like we got plenty of games to play while waiting for Watch Dogs.
POWUH: 700-799 and Parkouring Fanboy with 776 comments
Where’s Beyond Good and Evil, Ubisoft!? The first game was excellent, and the parkour teaser trailer was off the hook. I really want to see what it will look like with today’s technology.
I’m liking the way Assassin’s Creed looks. I’m only partway through Assassin’s Creed 2, so I’ll probably try to finish that before I get 3.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
If we’re to believe that Ancel means what he means, then we might have to wait for next-gen tech. A lot of people feel that’s the case with Watch Dogs and certainly the case with Star Wars 1313, so we just gotta keep holding our breaths for it.
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 151 comments
EA Games
The new Most Wanted certainly looks fun and very Burnout-ish, which I have no complaints since the original PS2 Burnouts were crazy fun, now all Criterion needs to do is bring back DAT BMW M3 GTR.
Crysis 3 just seems retarded now, how the hell is Prophet still alive? MoH Warfighter, the “multiplayer campaign” involving the world’s CT forces piqued my interest, hope more will be shown soon.
Ubisoft
Far Cry 3 – Vaas, villian of the year already. (And Tigers! Holy crap!)
AC3 – I would’ve been crazy excited about AC3 if not because the yearly installments killed my anticipation for this series. Tree-to-tree parkour seems fun but other than that it just doesn’t amaze me anymore.
Blacklist – was expecting a co-op demo, not a cinematic trailer, damn it Ubisoft. (and Michael Ironside is no longer Sam Fisher, DAMN IT UBISOFT!)
Watch Dogs – cool concept but still unsure what the game is supposed to focus on, it seemed like an MMO but it isn’t, it certainly looks like a single-player game but it’s too vague so…what is it?
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
I’m not too big on Assassin’s Creed, but it seems like AC3 is a much more reinvigorating experience of the series than the side stories of Brotherhood/Revelations. And I don’t know how much of a fan you are, but it’s rare to see someone not hopping on the AC3 bandwagon, which even I’ve jumped on.
I think Watch Dogs was implying multiplayer at the end; MMO seems to me like that’d be a bit much for the game’s sort of ambitious idea of using tech to control the city.
POWUH: Beginner (20-35) with 22 comments
Watch Dogs has to be the game I wasn’t expecting and am now incredibly excited about. It just looks amazing.
POWUH: Meta Team and Ringleader Extraordinaire~ with 6433 comments
I’ll still be making Wii U jokes. On the lookout front, Watch Dogs looks pretty awesome. Meh for Sims. Social games are so previous century.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
For Sim City, it’s more about Sim City 4 that’s really interesting. I’d give Social a run on Facebook since it is the concept that’s driven Farmville and all those Zynga games.
Wii U? More like Pii U!
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 207 comments
Dead Space 3 and Watch dogs are the ones I’m looking forward to most. I want to try that Dead Space co-op mode so badly!!!! Ughh XD, oh and for Watch Dogs, OMFG even for the dark sort of story line here, everything looks freaking incredible 😀
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Both are pretty quality games. The only Dead Space game I’ve played was Extraction, which was really great with Move controls; I’d like to see another one of those on-rail games.