I must admit, I'm a little surprised by people's response to Sony's and MS's conference. Tonally and presentation-wise, I think MS had a good conference. The pacing was nice, Phil was humble and brief, and the format was what gamers usually say they want to see. And looking back on some of the E3s of the past, it seems that MS's presentation is always good. The main sticking point for most of those past conferences and this conference is the quality and/or quantity of content. I always try to look at E3 from a bird's eye view across all of the conferences and use that to paint of picture of where the industry is at as a whole and where these companies fit in relation to me and other consumers.
I look at every conference because potentially not only are you looking at multiplatform games that will likely show up on your consoles of choice (provided you're not on a Nintendo platform), but you can also identify trends and strategies that your respective console might adopt. So while a Witcher 3 gameplay trailer may go over well at MS's or Batman over at Sony's, we know they'll be on both. With that said, we're getting a lot of sequels, but these titles are looking very good.
When I look at indies, I always see that as a wash ultimately. Show me a Rime, and I'll show you an Ori. Show me a Witness, and I'll show you an Inside. You can go tit for tat like that for hours I'm sure and ultimately when its all said and most of, if not all, will jump ship to the other side. Factor in the fact that it will be near impossible to play all of them eventually...who can afford or have the time for them afterall. Indies always feel like a wash to me.
As far as trends go, we're seeing some experiments with Far Cry's ticket system (wherein your friends can play without owning the game). We're seeing some cross-gen cross platform save updates with GTAV. 343 has some interesting ideas with playlists for Halo ports. These could make for some interesting trends in the coming years.
Once you've taken all the multiplats, indies, and presentational flare out of the meeting. You're left with the exclusive content at the end. No one is going to be thinking about pacing or little quips execs made at the competition when it comes down to playing the games.
Looking at MS, I find their first party studios lacking. Halo 5 will be big for sure, but Lionhead's Fable Legends looks like a good conceptually, but from the demo the execution leads me to believe that the game will not fair well critically. Going by combat in Fable in the past, they normally lacked depth. This game looks like individual combat will be just as simple, with some basic hooks for teamwork. In the coming months, we need to see some depth. This franchise has been headed down, imo, over the years and I'm not sure this one will save it just yet. Microsoft first party seems poised to be what it was been last gen (Fable, Gears, Halo, Forza). They've padded their lineup with games like Sunset Overdrive which for me is the premiere exclusive for this Fall on either console and in future are relying on Phantom Dust, Scalebound, and Crackdown. Crackdown is like Fable, in a sense, each addition has served to lessen the franchise. While there's always hope for any game, this game certainly has a lot of proving to do. All I could think about when I saw Scalebound was 'this will not sell.' Outside of not liking the artstyle...I know Platinum is in a league of their own and an acquire taste for most. I actually think this probably a taste of a CG trailer being tamer than the actual gameplay will end up being. I never played the original Phantom Dust, and I think this serves as risky move for MS...but one they should definitely take if its as good as some folks seem to claim. But I still wonder if this game, will resonate with people. These are games that have traditionally been lost in the shuffle for various reasons. Plus with no Japanese support, I suspect these games will struggle to find a sizeable audience. They definitely need to launch in the off season. Sunset Overdrive was easily the game of the show for them in my opinion. It wasn't CG and the gameplay looked fun and showed well. But SSO is much like TitanFall in my eyes...I think its sequel will find a home on PS4. The roadmap for MS looks very predictable for the next 2 to 3 years.
Sony pacing wasn't as strong as MS's. Their tone wasn't always as agreeable (though I find it all inconsequential). Their indies didn't show as well as MS's, but then as I said indies are a wash. The Order looks magnificent and while I have faith in RAD; with folks still thinking their game is basically a movie, I realize this game will just have to prove itself when people get their hands on the finished product. It garners enough attention visually that people will follow just to see something new on it, so if it is as good as I think it will be and it comes to show, people will take notice. LBP has its audience, so the arguments for it are well founded. Its no SSO, but its something for Fall 2014. The big thing here is that Mm didn't seem to be making it. So they've met their 'quota' for an LBP on every PS platform now lol and Mm can work on the next big thing. UnCharted looks unreal. The impact of this game won't be fully realized til next E3, but it was in-engine which beats CG. This and the order showed the potential for graphics for sure. Let it Die had me scratching my head. It looked like Manhunt, meets Resident Evil, meets Bushido Blade. That's on a level with Scalebound and Phantom Dust to me. It'll likely have its audience, but it'll be small. With all the exclusives that had some in-engine visuals or gamplay, I expected Bloodbourne to follow suit given the leaks. The big takeaway to me, was how little they had to show from their other studios to remain competitive at this show with MS. No media molecule, no guerrilla, no sony santa monica, no sony bend, no insomniac ratchet, no polyphony, no quantic dream, no japan studios.
E3 is about giving gamers more information about where gaming stands now, and in the near and sometimes far future. You're meant to take the information you've collected over the past months and add this new information to form a view of where these companies want to take you. Considering this, I think Sony is far and away in the best position. People will grade conferences, but after this week is over; its back to games. And the games that will come out first over the next coming months will be best on PS4. That familiar narrative starts up now. They've wisely got folks tuning into Destiny now. That'll be a big influx of gamers to Playstation before MS gets a chance with SSO. They've got a big push for TLOU and PSNow for late summer. There will be a lead up with Playstation between now and Destiny's launch. The indie titles they've announced earlier will likely be hitting around this same time. I expect games like Loadout and Planetside 2 to make a nice splash on consoles. All of this is buying their studios time to polish and have their games mature and ready to show the next go-round. By 2015, most of Sony will finally have all of its gears turning. MS and Sony always have another E3 to "show off" at; so you can't show your full hand in one go. Sony looks to have more opportunities to show new games than MS in the future. As this industry marches forward, its going to become more expensive for MS to attempt to pull moves like SSO and TF. I think MS's best days are 2014 and 2015, maybe 2016 when Gears and Crackdown have a chance of landing, but by then I think the Sony machine is going full steam and a lot of those timed exclusives have found their way across the stream.
And we still have Gamescom coming up.