E3 2016 – Sony Press Conference

 

 

Sony knows how to open a press conference. Before the curtain even lifted, a strong tone was set for the event. An orchestral number like those from God of War opened the event after a brief introduction.

 

 

The game introductions began just after that. It started with the trailer the next God of War. It opens with Kratos following his son after the passing of his wife. Kratos is having his son hunt a deer to feed them both. After some tracking, we are shown some combat between Kratos and various inhabitants of the woods. His battle axe was shown to have runes inscribed on it which gave it freezing properties. A short while later and Kratos is fighting a massive troll which is attacking him with a stone pillar. It uses its own rune magic to attack Kratos with fire. Kratos' son fires off some enchanted arrow. After some battle, Kratos uses his Spartan Rage to bring the Troll to the ground. His son misses the shot on the troll and hits him. In a moment of calm as his son apologizes, he tells him to hunt the deer once again. The two find the deer, hit it with an arrow and then track it to finish it off. Kratos helps his son with killing the deer so that they will have food. It is revealed that the orchestration was indeed from this God of War title.

 

Shawn Layden opened up after that. It was a live demonstration of gameplay from the new God of War title on the Playstation 4. He took a moment to acknowledge the tragedy of Orlando and that all those can find aid from the gaming community. The gaming community is diverse and spread all over the world. They showed a number of trailers, some with and some without gameplay attached to it.

 

After the beginning address, a new trailer was shown. The first was “Days Gone”. This told the story of a motorcycle gang leader. He was talking about the fall of the world, when large scale electricity seemed to stop. He had become a mercenary to survive. The trailer focused on him remembering the fall and what lead to the world that they were presently living in.

 

 

It was followed by a new trailer for the long anticipated title: “The Last Guardian”. Being in development for 9 years is a long time. It showed the boy and the Guardian exploring the world and some of the foes they will encounter. This included a Dark Guardian, an armored enforcer of sorts and the trademark puzzles of the franchise. The trailer was met with massive applause when a release date of October 26^th, 2016 was shown.

 

A game play demo was shown for Zero Dawn. It showed off a new dialogue choice wheel that has been incorporated into the game play mechanics. It gives more a feeling of control of the conversations with Aloy and a person who was escaping from a corrupted machine. After that, we see her override and tame a Broadhead so she can rush to a village's defense. A scan option was also shown which let her analyze what the weaknesses of a new enemy are. She also used her own whistling to call her tamed broadhead mount to gain greater mobility against her foe. That was until it smashed the broadhead into scrap. She eventually manages to bring down her massive foe using her tether ropes after having significantly weakened it.

 

This next trailer showed a new investigative game set in a futuristic world. It opened with an android sent in to negotiate for the release of a little girl taken hostage. The negotiations fail and the android and the girl go over the edge of a building. We then see the android collecting data on what was happening with the suspect. From there, you can see the different branching paths that the story can take. To lie, agree, manipulate and much more. Each shapes the story.

 

 

The first VR trailer shown was started with someone struggling to get up to answer a ringing phone. It had a simple message of escape. The protagonist slowly made their way down the stairs and started exploring the house that they were left in. They find their way to the kitchen. You can hear their breathing and foot fall. As they turn to leave the kitchen someone passes in front of its door. They make their way into a living room where they find a VHS tape and a TV to investigate it on. From there, it broke to the trailer of the game. This game boasts a release date of January 24^th, 2017. It looks to be a nice break from the traditional style of the games and into something completely new but very appropriate for the series.

 

 

After the trailers, the orchestra stuck up against and the Shawn returned to the stage. He announced that Resident Evil 7 will be fully playable in VR. He stated that Sony already has the technology and integration needed to allow the launch of VR on Playstation. The Sony VR headset will be $399 and release on October 13^th, 2016. At launch to the end of this year, more than 50 games will be available.

 

Following the VR announcement, we were treated to a new VR game that is coming. It showed someone exploring a new planet. A strange robot, a massive spider-like creature attacking Pilgrim, the protagonist. The planet looks like a massive desert with little in the way of features. It also sported a few crashed space craft.

 

 

 

After that they presented something many will be looking forward to, a VR Star Wars game. Not too much was shown of the gameplay. Still, you look to be in full control of the pilots view and the X-wing as well. There was only a little game play footage shown in the trailer.

 

 

The following trailer opened with Joker narration. He talks about finding a mask that fits so there is never a need to take it off. This title has a Release date in October of 2016. A full VR experience as Batman would be amazing and some game play would have been wonderful to see. Instead the trailer just showed the iconic Batman mask.

 

After a silly opening with the lead protagonist riding a Chocobo, they are shown throughout the world confronting various foes. All this was set to a new song by Afrojack. It also gave a release date of September 30^th, 2016. It is definitely a title to look forward to. It was followed by in game footage of the team wearing VR headsets to engage their foes. This part of the trailer had the team battling against a Behemoth. It was followed by the announcement to play as Prompto.

 

The next trailer opened with the new Call of Duty game. You are the captain and have to deal with various threats in the solar system. This showed space dog fighting from the pilots perspective. From there, they transferred over to a direct conflict. You could see them going against people in outer space as well as inside the ship. A variety of tactics were used to deal with the various foes. Some of these are turned against the player. The whole mission gave a good impressive of what the game will be like. It was definitely better than the earlier trailer for the game. It also has a release date of November 4^th, 2016.

 

The next preview was for Call of Duty Modern Warfare Remastered. It showed a number of iconic scenes that have been remastered for the present generation of consoles. This is another push that is being made to aid the sales of Infinite Warfare which has been in a slump. Hard to see it as something else. It was good to see the changes from the last generation to the present one for Modern Warfare though.

 

Getting a break from the trailers, the next presentation brought Shawn back out. This time with an animated background which gave him Crash Bandicoot's shadow. Crash 1, 2 and Warped will be coming to the Playstation 4. First though, he will be making an appearance in Skylanders. This game will also offer a first in the series, allowing you to create your very own Skylander with a unique look and various custom abilities.

 

 

The next trailer was for a Lego Star Wars Episode 7. It, like all the modern Lego games, is fully voiced. It looks to feature all the hallmark humor of the Lego games. It features either clips from the movie and new work from the original cast for the game itself. There is already a demo up and available for this game. The game itself will be released in less than 2 weeks.

 

 

Next on the stage was Andrew House. He came to present on the upcoming line up for the Playstation. This lead to the introduction of one of the best known game developers: Hideo Kojima. He opened with “Hello, everyone. I'm back”. From there, he presented a trailer for their upcoming game, which he told us was running in real-time. A few quotes were shown and then we were shown a naked Norman Reedus of The Walking Dead fame. He was shown holding a child who vanished from his hands leaving behind a black substance and crawling away. During a pan up, we see a cross-shaped scar on his lower abdomen. Like any Kojima game trailer, there are a lot of questions to what is going on in this game.

 

 

 

Another trailer started after that. From Insomniac Games and Marvel, for a new Spider Man game with a very modern costume. It looked to be a mix between in-game footage and cinematic. It is hard to say much about with the trailer showing so much action of the Spider Man slinging around and fighting crime.

 

Shawn came back out for the next presentation on the floor. He thanked everyone involved. The core of this entertainment is the play elements, the full game play elements. The presentation wrapped with a live game play demo of Days Gone. The protagonist is shown hunting his target Two Dog. He moves into a tent to explore. He encounters some wolves ravaging a corpse. He drives them off and determines that who they were eating was not who he is after. He investigates a nearby truck and finds something useful inside. He mounts the pieces from the truck onto his pistol as a make-shift modification. He finds Two Dog under attack from a strange child-like creature. Both of them escape up to the roof. He continues to hunt for Two dog and the two start wrestling. The creatures attack Two Dog before the protagonist can finish him off. He starts running away from the oncoming horde that is rushing him. He uses the shutter doors to slow them some but it only does so briefly. He then has to run and fight his way upwards as he attempts to reach the roof and get away from this horde. Even after making it up, the creatures, zombies, continue to rush him. Any point he can is used as a choke point to slow their advance. It ends with what looks like him getting over run.

 

The show wrapped with a quick recap of the various titles that were displayed and more during the presentation. It featured both games that out and many which are still pending. It was an amazing wrap up to everything that had been shown on the floor and highlighted just how much we have to look forward to from Sony both in this year and next.