E3 2016 - Conference times, news and hype (!)

[Scrustle]

Square Enix are running streams through the week to show off their games in more depth, and did one for Nier: Automata earlier today. It's looking very good. After their work with Activision, I think there's been a reasonable air of uncertainty around Platinum and whether they're taking on more than they can handle, but it certainly shows that this game is one they're giving proper attention to.

The stream showed then walking about a small camp for of NPCs to start off, because apparently there were people out there doubtful of how much of an RPG this new game is. The people in the town are apparently quest-givers and shopkeepers. After that they walked out in to an open area which they said was like one of the open fields in the original game. Except here there was no loading screen at all, they just walked out of the camp and they were right there in this destroyed city overgrown with lush vegetation. It was quite impressive.

They then did a bit of combat, explaining the weapons system a bit more. It seems to have the same system as Bayonetta, allowing you to equip two weapons at once, and two sets of weapons to switch between on the fly, with one button assigned to each weapon's attacks. It's also got a dodge move similar to Bayonetta, which had a really cool particle effect to it, where your character zaps out of existence for a second. Movement was really quick and fluid, with hits being flashy and impactful, as you would expect from Platinum. The general character movement looked very similar to that of Metal Gear Rising too. In fact I think some of the animations may even be lifted right out of that, but it still suits this game well. They also showed a fight against a tougher enemy that required you to break through its outer armour to be able to hit it, with some really satisfying sound design when you break through. The enemy had some really cool and strange looking attack animations too.

Then they finished off with a trailer of some boss fight gameplay. The movements of the boss were synced up to the music, which was a really cool effect, and one which was clearly inspired by similar stuff in Drakengard 3. The boss fight in general looked exciting and interesting to fight, and did a good job of showing off some of the bullet hell shooter elements with the magic attacks that the first game had. It's pretty much exactly what you would hope for from Platinum doing a Nier boss.

So I'm still really excited for this and can't wait to play it myself. I have to admit my confidence in Platinum has been shaken a bit recently, since it's been quite a while since they really knocked it out of the park. It's looking as if that we won't have to wait much longer to see them at the top of their game again.

[Stanshall]

I heard from a mate whose mate works at Rockstar (I would be rolling my eyes at this point too, if I were you) that the next Red Dead game was meant to close the Sony presentation but as it featured an extended shoot out in a bar they decided to pull it, after tragic events of late. I scoffed anyway but he has come through in the past with loads of GTAV stuff, so, maybe...

Hence the underwhelming cut back to Sons of TLOU or whatever it's called.

[ratsoalbion]

To be honest that sounds entirely feasible to me. Forumite Laika Muttnik (Mrs Jay Taylor) would be able to confirm, but she'd probably lose her job!

[dezm0nd]

When I used to work in publishing, I drunkenly discussed with a R* employee who said "We'd be stupid not to do a Red Dead sequel" and "Max Payne 4 is never happening, ever"

That was about a year ago now! Time flies!

[gallo_pinto]

The way that they started with a Days Gone trailer, ignored it for the whole presentation and then ended with a really underwhelming Days Gone demo, that sounds super possible. And I want a Red Dead sequel really bad!

[Scrustle]

That sounds reasonable to me. I heard that several of the conferences changed at the last minute because of the same reason. I think that was from a Giant Bomb thing, with them talking about hearing that too. Also explains why they showed that zombie game twice. It could also explain something which stood out as a bit odd to me too. Before they showed that demo at the end, they had that speech about games as an art form, innovation, and all that. Then they bring out the demo for yet another post apocalyptic zombie shooter. Seemed a bit incongruous to me.

[Flabyo]

You can't just bring in a live gameplay demo at short notice, although it's debatable if that demo really was live or not. It might well have been a backup option they had ready though.

Apple tend to prep multiple options for their presentations and only decide on final running order on the day. I'm not aware that MS ever did that for the years where we were demoing Fable things, but it wouldn't surprise me if they did.

[chase210]

I've seen the same story from more than one person on Neogaf now, and even if its not 100% true, its pretty clear a new Red Dead is being worked on.

[Alex79]

I'm disappointed we'll probably never see a Max Payne 4 though, I love that series.

[dezm0nd]

Ah you know, business changes with each new year and employee within. Xbox did once say that they'll never do backwards compatibility.