Who Won E3 2017?
Join us as we grade this year’s biggest conferences and find out who came out on top at E3. For the purposes of this feature, we will be grading the various presentations independent of each other, and only based on what was shown in the presentations themselves.
EA
EA’s games are usually quite mainstream, and their press conference was quite indicative of that. Of course, EA showcased Madden’s new Long Shot career mode, FIFA 18, NBA Live 18, Need for Speed Payback, some Battlefield 1 DLC, and Battlefront 2. For a full list of what EA showed, you can find out here. Perhaps the most interesting part of EA’s conference was a tease of Bioware’s Anthem, which they chose to completely unveil at Microsoft’s presentation instead. A Way Out also showed EA’s openness to innovation, showcasing a game that can only be played in multiplayer. EA closed their presentation with a longer look at Battlefront 2 gameplay. This part of the presentation dragged on a bit, and EA might have been wise to have shown some of their single player gameplay instead. Overall, EA’s presentation was average at best, with a healthy mix of interesting games and game footage that felt more like a formality.
Letter Grade: C
Microsoft
Coming into E3 2017, we all knew that Project Scorpio was going to be unveiled, and we knew that it was going to be a beast. Microsoft’s announcement of the Xbox One X was no surprise, and it was made clear that games would look and perform best on the Xbox One X, but also that current Xbox One and Xbox One S owners would still get to enjoy future game releases. Microsoft’s presentation also featured a bevy of game reveals from AAA titles such as Assassin’s Creed: Origins to indie titles such as The Last Night, and everything in between. What Microsoft did not reveal were new first party titles other than Forza Motorsport 7 and Ori and the Will of the Wisps, though they did manage to confuse a good number of gamers with the term “Console Launch Exclusive”. It is unfortunate Microsoft did not announce any other big exclusives as it would have been crowd-pleasing to hear about a title or two in development. Perhaps the biggest moment of Microsoft’s presentation was the announcement that OG Xbox titles would soon be available via backwards compatibility. Overall, Microsoft had a mediocre conference with plenty of game reveals alongside the reveal of the world’s current most powerful console. Yet, the lack of exclusives continues to haunt Xbox in 2017.
Letter Grade: C+
Bethesda
Bethesda’s E3 presentation began with a memorable montage that celebrates their employees while simultaneously dropping hints on what games were being developed. When one thinks of Bethesda, usually two big franchises come to mind first, Fallout and The Elder Scrolls. A decent portion of the presentation involved these two franchises, from Fallout 4 VR, to the mod community for the games, to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim coming to the Nintendo Switch. While these announcements were not very exciting overall, Bethesda saved the best for last. Due to speculation and untimely leaks, much of the surprise elements were taken away from Bethesda; fortunately, The Evil Within 2, Dishonored: Death of the Outsider, and especially Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus were enough to save the show from mediocrity.
Letter Grade: B