PixlBit

I'm writing this off the cuff, so if you feel I'm missing something you think I'd be interested in, don't be shy about saying so in the comments. 

Please NOTE:

I am writing this based purely on my opinion of the presentation of these games, NOT the games themselves. My personal tastes are going to vary drastically from others on this site and I have no way of knowing how the games actually play outside of past experience and guessing. 

Microsoft

The Excellent: 

My favorite thing from the Xbox One X conference was honestly this indie trailer Julian kept bringing up on Nerds Without Pants E3 specials, but forgetting the name of. Basically, I just think it looks cool, even if I don't think it would require a 4K television. 

Apparently, one of its creators caught some flack on Twitter for saying supposedly anti-feminist things around Gamergate and the developers have argued it's nothing like Blad Runner, even in terms of style. They've since walked back whatever comments those were about feminism, but their denial about how immediately this style reminds one of Blade Runner's aesthetic (I never saw the movie, but I know its general look and yeah; it's the same art style) seem odd. Still, it's a style that appeals to me and has me intrigued. 

Casey informed me on Twitter  Super Lucky's Tale was  his E3 favorite (or one of them; he got a chance to play it, I believe) and that there's a mascot platformer for each system this year. I'm in favor of it, for sure. 

Also, while I don't know what they look like in actual 4K, I was impressed by what was shown of Forza 7, whose environmental/weather effects seem to be the big graphical appeal beyond the cars looking real (imo the racing genre has easily become the most photorealistic already), and Anthem reminded me of Titanfall 2 in a good way with power suits and mechs. I want to say the trailer was meant to showcase how online play would be, since the dialogue doesn't sound like something that would be in-game. 

Finally, Ori looked damn good to me. Loved the beautiful live piano. I never played the original, but I'm intrigued for sure. 

So color me legitimately jealous of some of the Xbox exlusives for once. I know most are coming to Windows 10 as well, but still. It's not like I'm buying a gaming PC any time soon after my experiences with Steam and the inconsistency of games working for me. 

The Excrement:

Ok, so I know OTHER PEOPLE are super-excited by this game, but I'm just ... not. The graphics style, multiplayer gameplay, and pirate theme just do not appeal to me at all; the combat looked too slow for me, etc. and this trailer went on for what felt like an eternity. 

Not a popular choice for my excrement section, I'm sure, and maybe it'll be a great game, but it got me to stop watching the Xbox E3 presser early because I just could not care less about this or some of the many other games they were flooding their presser with.

The Ehhhh:

I don't play Minecraft despite owning it (my mom wanted it for her lesson plans, but never used it; it was bought with her money for my PS4, but probably would have been smarter to get it on her laptop; oh well), but while 4K definitely improves its graphics, I laughed out loud at this being lauded as part of the Xbox One X presentation. I know. I'm a dick. 

But it was just a reminder to me of why the presentation's biggest draw: the Xbox One X, just doesn't appeal to me much at all. I'm happy with the 32" 1080p TV I bought in 2013, and since I can still see how pretty these games are on a computer screen, I doubt I'll make the jump to a 4K any time soon. It just doesn't seem worth it for me to plunk down a total of $1000 on a new TV and console to have the privilege. 

I can certainly see why people with 4Ks already in the homestead are excited, but I'll personally wait to upgrade until the next generation, when I imagine 4K TVs will be more ubiquitous and less pricey. I'm not at all into the iPhone model of slightly upgraded systems within the same generation, and I'm not sure how developers feel about making sure games work with original Xbox Ones as well. 

Sony

The Excellent:

I'm probably losing a lot of you with my excellent and excrement choices, but that's fine. We don't all have to have the same taste. 

The reason this is so appealing to me is 1) it was the biggest genuine surprise of E3 for me, personally, 2) I never played the original, which was lauded as proof video games could be high art at the time of its release, and 3) I played The Last Guardian not long ago, and am interested in playing its prequels (of sorts). They are also apparently upgrading the control scheme (while leaving the option to play with the original controls), which is probably a good thing 

I also loved the Spider-Man trailer, mostly because the swinging mechanics (5:44) seem to be taking their cues from Spider-Man 2. 

Also, why do people keep saying the combat copies the Arkham games style when every Spidey video game I've ever played had similar combat before that series existed? Just cause Arkham perfected it doesn't mean those games didn't have very similar combat mechanics. Honestly, I'm surprised people were focusing on it so much, since parts of old Spidey games were about unlocking the combat variety people kept harping on. How is this new to people?

I would like to know how the QTA events work though. I would much prefer seeing my character get hit if I mess up, but have the animation still going and some other consequence for messing up besides the black screen and coming right back to where I was that deflates the excitement and tension of these things in other games. Those segments often feel like they're on autopilot to me, even when they're not, so hopefully they're used sparingly enough. 

I know it sounds like I'm worried, but it honestly did look really good and fun to me. 

God of War and Uncharted looked cool as well, marking another two Sony franchises I have yet to play. I own the Nathan Drake Collection, and plan to play that and Uncharted 4 eventually, but the new God of War will likely be my introduction to the series. 

The Ehhhh:

I honestly thought Monster Hunter looked like Horizon when I first saw it, and I'm not really that interested in Horizon DLC, since I have yet to finish the standalone game. I realize many of you are super-stoked for MH, but my reaction was "huh ... neat." Nothing bad, just ... eh.

The Excrement:

The game itself is really an "eh" entry for me, since I definitely liked the story more than the actual gameplay of The Last of Us, but Days Gone had an overlong trailer full of nothing that interested me. You'll notice I'm listing games here because of how they were presented at E3 and not as an actual value judgment of the games themselves. I can't know how these will turn out, so I'm basing all this on how much I enjoyed trailers more or less. 

That said, the trailer for Days Gone is inherently uninteresting to me because zombie apocalypses are inherently uninteresting to me and really always have been. I like the characters in TLoU DESPITE what I think is an incredibly boring and unoriginal background for them to exist in, not because of it, and the characters in Days Gone to not seem interesting to me. Strike 2. 

I'll give the game kudos for the use of a zombie horde against some campers, but otherwise the length of this trailer is what took it from "ok, that seems maybe promising aside from the stupid zombie thing" to "OMG will you please MOVE ON TO OTHER GAMES" for me when I was watching the Sony presser. 

Nintendo

The Excellent:

This trailer is best-of-show for me, not because it's necessarily the game I'm most excited for (I probably won't have a Switch by the time it releases), but because it showed the most interesting and fun looking gameplay (I don't agree with Cary that it's like Kirby, since it's 3D and Kirby gains powers but not actual control of other things/characters in the environment) from probably the most-finished game of any at E3 that has people hyped. 

I admit the T-Rex is what pushed it over the edge for me. This game looks pretty. 

2D Metroid  was also a pleasant surprise. 

Sonic Forces also got me hyped, because I think Sega is finally starting to understand that no one plays Sonic for jewel-hunting and fishing minigames. 

The Ehhh:

Honestly? I've never been all that interested in Yoshi or Kirby titles, and ARMS seems like a Switch gimmick that may or may not take off. 

Don't get me wrong, these seem like good games I would enjoy for sure, but they don't get me excited for a system or anything, and if I'm going to buy a Switch there need to be a few more games that do that for me. 

So really, most of Nintendo's presser was kind of eh for me, which hurts me to say as a former fanboy up until the end of GameCube's life. 

Zelda: BotW is included in this category because I never played the original game, so ... 

The Excrement:

Again, grading the presentation and not the games themselves here, but I refuse to get excited by fucking title cards and verbal promises about games coming in an industry where development is halted or abandoned so often. 

To me, the announcements of Metroid Prime 4 and a core Pokemon game for Switch just felt like cheap, meaningless ways for Nintendo to create buzz. I don't care until I see a cinematic trailer at the very least. Empty promises, in my opinion. 

 

As for the rest of the publishers there, I'd say

The Excellent:

Need for Speed meets Burnout = Day 1 purchase for me if I can also play as the cops. In any case, I'm super excited for this and call me weird all you want, but as a mostly single player gamer

story modes in sports games have me excited for sports games for the first time in a long time. I just wish these were arcade sports titles ... still, Madden especially looks like one I might actually consider buying since I dig Mahershala Ali as an actor and it appears like you can start out playing college ball? Sign me up; only wish that option appeared in NBA Live, since my alma mater actually went to basketball NCAA tourneys a couple times recently. 

Oh, and I thought Battlefront 2015 was a sad mess of little content I'm glad I bought on sale, but this looks damn good to me:

The Ehhh:

Bethesda. Just ... their presser as a whole. I just finished Wolfenstein: The New Order last night and I honestly wasn't that big a fan of it, though I get why people are. So the Wolfenstein II trailer that looks like more of the same just doesn't do it for me, and I don't care about VR until I can try a headset for myself. Eh.

I will admit, I would like to see where the story goes, but would it be worth it for me if the gameplay is like the tedium I experienced in The New Order? I put it on very easy mode so I could just finish, delete and be done with it, cause the endless waves of enemies became more annoying than fun. OTOH, awesome 60s/70s characters and a good look overall. I guess I'm conflicted.

The Excrement:

For many people, this was what made Ubisoft "win" E3, along with Mario and Rabbids (would be in my eh category if you're curious; that gameplay style just isn't my thing), and it LOOKS amazing visually ... but the dialogue killed it for me.

I haven't played the original yet (been meaning to; I own it on STeam), but nothing about it was "Mature" in the juvenille "tee hee titties and cursing" if I remember, and hearing a bunch of unecessary f bombs strung together awkwardly by a Fu Man Chu talking pig reminded me of the switch from Sands of Time  to Warrior Within when the newer Prince of Persia titles just started rolling out in the worst possible way. I can still remember after being blown away by SoT the disgust I felt at my character in Warrior Within calling a female character a bitch just to seem "edgy" and the dull Mortal Kombat-like graphics and bloodshed replacing the shiny and exciting art style from SoT.

Of course, PoP started selling MUCH better when it took what I thought was an unfortunate juvenile-"Mature" route, so I guess that's Ubisoft's play here. Apparently, it's also a prequel to a game that deserved a sequel, so ... naming conventions and all, this is a concept I do not like. 

Let me know what your favorites and least favorites of E3 were in the comments. I'm excited for all the disagreements I'm about to have!