The biggest game convention of the year is finally underway and new announcements are coming from left and right. And how is it so far? Did it live up to expectations? Exceeded it? Or the biggest letdown since first Watch_Dogs? Here are top game segments that I was most anticipating or caught my interest and what I personally think about them.

EA Conference

EA conference: 90% Sport games. 10% Games that actually matters.

Mass Effect: Andromeda

This was probably my most anticipated game in E3, but unfortunately it didn't reveal much about the game other than showing a trailer which gives more or less details from what we already know. I was really hoping it will give more insight on the timeline, story, characters and gameplay. What was even more disappointing is that they put so little time on this game but went forward to spend a LOT longer to promote the annual sport games.

NEW Star Wars Games

Probably the biggest let down of EA Conference. I was looking forward for a major announcement fn an upcoming game especially with a reveal trailer but all we got was a video that confirms that Visceral Games are working on an open world game that takes place in Imperia Era and Spawn seems to be developing a Lightsaber dueling centric game. Other than that they are also making new content for already released games like The Old Republic and Battlefront. It's been years since EA was given license to develop future Star Wars and they are a long way from proving themselves that they are up to the role.

Battlefield 1

At this point this doesn't even need an introduction does it? ;)

Titanfalls 2

I wasn't interested in the first game so didn't buy it but the new story mode and different types of Titans looks interesting. I can't say that I'm thrilled, but going to keep an eye on this one.

Bethesda Conference

What I loved about Bethesda conference is that most of it consists of presentations of actual gameplay instead of flashy eye candy trailers.

Dishonored 2

The first two I noticed: Emily is finally addressing Corvo as her father, putting all those theories and hints to rest. It will be really interesting to see their interactions with this new father-daughter relationship and how it affects the story. The next thing is Corvo is much more talkative and has more personality in contrast for the first game, where he was more of a silent protagonist. The gameplay also seems to be a lot improved; Other than the fact we can play as both Emily and Corvo (Which means you can have 4 different playthroughs :D ) we also get to see the new world and the unique powers each of them has. The most eye catching powers were Emily's ability to manipulate time and the domino power. In short, I'M SOLD. :D There's no more need of spoiling surprises with story trailers nor gameplay videos, this is in top of my 2016 Wish List.

Prey

The development of a sequel to the 2006 Prey has been going through a lot of hoops for quite some time but after a decade we're finally seeing the reboot done by Arkane Studios, the guys who are behind Dishonored series.

Microsoft Conference

Gears of War 4

Gears of War was the first game of the conference that was announced to have crossplay across Windows 10 PC and Xbox One. There are many more games that were announced to have this feature and I really do believe this a step toward the right direction.

We happy few

This is probably the strangest game of the conference. Even though we didn't see that much gameplay footage I do like the story concept and has a Bioshock: Infinite vibe especially with its visual art style, time periods it is set and similar political philosophies. Fortunately we don't have to wait long as the game will be released next month.

Dead Rising 4

I still haven't played the previous games of the series (Bought DA2 from a sale though. :P ) so I can't tell how much improved the game is from the predecessors but it does look really fun especially with the Christmas themed weapons.

State of Decay 2

At this point Zombie games have become its own genre and I loved the first State of Decay for taking a different path from the traditional hack and slash games. Much like how Telltale's Walking Dead was story centric, this game is more survival centric where you're trying to survive in an open world with limited resources. There are no main characters, anyone can die at any time due to the choices the player make. I don't usually like Zombie shooter games but every now and then you get a unique game like this so I'm very interested to see what the sequel can offer.

Scalebound

An extreme version of "How to train your Dragon". ;)

Sea of Thieves

Monkey Island meets Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag. :D With all these big and complex games around this one looks very light hearted and simple but also has enough to make it a lot of fun.

Halo Wars 2

This is not what people had in mind when they asked to bring Halo to PC. :p

Ubisoft Conference

The best part of this conference was probably Aisha Tyler with her witty and sometimes cringe worthy comments. :p

Watchdogs 2

At this point this game does look promising, With improvements upon the features of the predecessor, more expanded story, more alive open world, and new game mechanics. And since it's coming in a few months, chances of it being downgraded are low as well. So hopefully this game will live up to the expectations that are set by trailers. Hopefully.

Steep

After seeing so much dullness of FIFA and Madden, this game was a real sight of sore eyes.

For Honor

While I do like the story concept of this game, I feel the combat system seems very basic even for a hack and slash game. Hopefully in the coming days we will see more gameplay elements and how it differs from the rest.

Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Wildlands

I'm a bit behind when it comes to Tom Clancy's series but this looks awesome. I've already bought Conviction and Blacklist so hopefully I would be able to finish them before this is released.

Trials of Blood Dragon

I haven't played any of Trials games but I loved Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon for its nostalgic retro theme and witty pop culture references. I wish we had a full sequel instead of a Trials spinoff but we'll see how it goes.

South Park: Fractured but Whole

I don't usually watch South Park, but I like this game purely for its adult humor and banters, especially how they are taking shots at Marvel, DC and J.J. Abrams.

Sony Conference

I personally think Sony won this year with many new game announcements and promotion of PS VR and VR exclusive games. Also they had an epic orchestra.

Spider-Man

Good bye Activision! For over a decade they made more than a dozen of Spider-Man games till 2014 when their license expired. As a big Spidey fan myself, I have played almost every video game and can say while most of them were good and enjoyable, it was in need of a new direction and fresh ideas to reach its full potential. And that's where Marvel and Insomnia games comes to play. Insomnia have already proven themselves with the highly successful Ratchet and Clank series, Resistance and Sunset Overdrive so I hope they will do the same thing to Spidey what Rocksteady did to Batman.

The bad news is this being a PS4 exclusive, most likely due to a deal made with Sony. A game about a pop culture icon like Spider-Man shouldn't be available for just a part of its fanbase. I hope this is only a timed exclusive like Rise of Tomb Raider because otherwise I would very disappointed.

Horizon: Zero Dawn

I love everything about this game: The story, the open world, game mechanics, everything. Making epic games like these to be console exclusives should be made illegal.

Detroit: Become Human

One of the most unique games that was announced in the conference. I love story driven games like these where the player can observe situations and surroundings and make different choices that leads to different conclusions. And the fact that is neo-noir sci-fi game featuring Androids makes it even better. The trailer that was released last year had my curiosity, this has my attention.

LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens

With all the hype for the big games I forgot all about this one. One thing I need to point out is giving voice to LEGO characters really doesn't work with games like these. It works on LEGO movie and games with original stories like LEGO Batman, but not with movie adaptations in which you directly put dialogues from the movie in to the game's scenes. Without the complex facial expressions and emotions of the movie, hearing those dialogues coming out of cartoonish mini figures looks like a really cheap voice dub. It loses the uniqueness and charm of traditional LEGO games that made is so fun and humorous.

Days Gone

I can't say much about the story and open world since we didn't see much, but that horde in the gameplay was impressive. Though I did notice that the Zombie AI is literally brain dead considering how the main character runs directly toward them and they just moved out of the way. Hopefully there are enough elements to make this a unique game considering this is like 4th Zombie game that was featured in the conference. (Others being Dead Rising 4, State of Decay 2 and Resident Evil 7) That's a tough competition especially considering this is new IP of a way too worn out genre.

Call of Duty

Even though Infinite Warfare got a lot of 'criticism' from people, (including me :p ) to be honest the gameplay itself looks pretty decent and they seems to have put effort to set themselves apart from the predecessors of the series, especially by adding space combat. It still seems to suffer from traditional restricted mission design and 2007 graphics design though. I'm sure most would jump to the bandwagon of hating COD, and review sites will give it a good 'ol 9/10 but I think I'll wait and see till the game is released before judging whether it's worth buying or not.

VR Games. VR Games Everywhere

One thing that was very eye catching this year, especially in Sony and Ubisoft conferences, were the introduction of new VR exclusive games and VR Tech. Not only there were original games such as Farpoint and Eaglepoint but also licenced ones like Batman Arkham VR and Star Trek VR. There were also games that supports VR gameplay like Final Fantasy XV and Resident Evil 7. Then there is the promotion PS VR. The concept of Virtual Reality has been around for some time and now we're seeing a leap with all these big commercial games which would decide how successful this tech will be in long term. While I don't see myself buying these any time soon, (I'm poor. :p ) it will be very interesting see where this will be headed for in future and how it will affect gaming industry as a whole.

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Of cause these are the ones that took my personal interest, There were many awesome games like God of War, Final Fantasy XV, Resident Evil 7, which I'm sure many are excited for.

E3 is all about presentation and promotion, and I think this year was pretty solid one with announcement and demonstrations of new games, sequels, reboots, remasters, new hardware, tech, Hideo Kojima and whatnot. I didn't get to see much about my most anticipated games but at same time found new and interesting games to look forward to. What did you think about E3 2016 and what game segments did you love/hate the most?

Thanks for reading.

Bee Out.