The Most Cringeworthy Moments
1) The Opening Monologue From A Sony Executive
Hardly anyone at these big conferences cares all that much whenever an executive talks and talks and talks about the thing you’re all really there for: the games. However, it’s rare whenever an executive or developer has an awkward or cringe-worthy opening monologue for their conference since most of the time these speeches are pretty dull.
Unfortunately for Sony, one of their executives had one of those rare moments. Shawn Layden, the CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment, spoke breathlessly when he appeared on-stage at the beginning of the conference and seemed unprepared the entire time he spoke. It didn’t help how long he went on for during his speech while many Sony fans just wanted him to get on with it and show the games already!
2) The Flute Guy
Sometimes, a live musical performance can really add to the atmosphere of a game reveal. For example, God of War had live music during one of its E3 reveals and it really set the mood for what turned out to be an incredible surprise.
But for Ghost of Tsushima’s big gameplay reveal, it was nothing short of cringe-inducing. The flute player himself wasn’t the problem, it was just that the placement of his performance brought the momentum of Sony’s conference to a halt. There we were, waiting with tons of excitement to see Ghost of Tsushima gameplay for the first time but suddenly this guy comes out on-stage, starts playing his flute and, instead of being excited, we were looking around awkwardly and wondering just…why?
Speaking of momentum killers…