The E3 Marketing and Trailer Editor Olympics Have Arrived
There’s a helluva lot of trailers shown every year at E3, and not all of them can be what the kids nowadays call “bangers.” Every now and then we’ll get something phenomenal like the God of War reveal back in 2016, or the surprise Kingdom Hearts 3 announcement immediately following the Final Fantasy VII Remake unveiling. But a lot of the time, even if the game itself looks and sounds awesome in theory, the trailer just can’t stick the landing. This year’s E3 is a bizarre one with the notable lack of a Sony conference, meaning some of the most hyped-up incoming titles aren’t getting trailers this week. But, there’s still a lot to be excited about, with this year’s holiday season effectively written in stone now, along with the first few months of 2020. So, which development teams had the best and worst trailer editors? Here’s our definitive list of E3 2019’s top 3 best and top 3 worst trailers.
The Best Trailers of E3
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Sequel
Going into this year’s E3, a new main-series Zelda title felt like a pipe-dream – but here we are. The trailer’s haunting tone has been giving lots of fans Majora’s Mask vibes, though Eiji Aonuma has confirmed that the two games are unrelated. The trailer has naturally already been dissected for more clues about what the game could entail. One fan has discovered that when played backwards, the audio sounds like someone saying “Oh Zelda, oh please find the body.” Some are claiming that the voice sounds an awful lot like Fi, Link’s Companion from Skyward Sword. The game is also confirmed to be a direct sequel to Breath of the Wild, and Aonuma has said that the team has drawn a lot of inspiration from Red Dead Redemption 2.
12 Minutes
12 Minutes was easily the most shocking and gripping trailer of any E3 presentation this year. From The Witness art director Luis Antonio, 12 Minutes is an “interactive thriller about a man trapped in a time loop” after a police detective breaks into his home, accuses his wife of murder, and beats him to death. According to the publisher’s official YouTube posting, the game draws influence from classic thriller films like Rear Window, Memento, and The Shining (you can see the hotel’s iconic wallpaper in the trailer!). There’s no release date yet but this looks like one indie game that’s gonna be the talk of the town whenever it does drop.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons
As someone who is outspokenly critical of Nintendo and not a fan of the Animal Crossing series, I was pleasantly surprised with the House of Mario’s showing this year. The new Animal Crossing looks like the most realized version of what the game was always meant to be, and everything about the new trailer just feels so zen and wholesome (not that past titles weren’t, they just didn’t grip me the same way). Though some fans were disappointed by the game’s delay, Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser has explained that the delay was the result of maintaining a healthy work-life balance for the dev team. That just makes the game feel that much more wholesome!