God bless Geoff Keighley. He just won’t allow the plug to be pulled on E3.
Summer Game Fest is an event aimed directly at my generation of gamers. We grew up on 8 to 16-bit systems. We were coming of age when E3 was at its apex which was long before APEX. We are a generation of people who took days off of school or work to watch E3 and the subsequent games that came out of that conference.
Summer Game Fest is for us. It is a present directly from Geoff Keighley to us.
If you don’t fit into that group, you will play the games after your favorite streamer plays them. You don’t care about gorging yourself on all of the pre-release information because you are busy streaming now. You might catch a clip on TikTok, Reels, or YouTube Shorts but you aren’t going to sit down for multiple hours a night and watch these streams.
Well, I did. And, as predicted, I actually enjoyed most of what I saw. Here is my rundown of games from Summer Game Fest 2024.
Keighley started off by paying lip service to all of the staff who have lost their jobs over the past couple of years as the industry has gone through a culling. Of course he could have said more but I am actually surprised that he said even the bit that he did. He usually has his lips firmly placed on the buttocks of the nearest industry luminary so I’m surprised he was able to mumble this between cheeks.
The first game on the docket was Lego Horizon. I like the Lego games just fine and since they turned off the tap there has been less overflow of them in the last decade or so.
I wonder if this game happened because the toys did well or if it happened because Guerrilla and Lego are Scandinavian companies and it was in their interest to help each other out. We see a lot of this in Japan but it is the first time that I have noticed it elsewhere. (It also could just be an insane theory. )
No More Room in Hell 2 came after. I have zero idea of the circumstances surrounding this game but I will say that it looks really good. The first game was a Source mod. I’m not sure if the first game was the same kind of game but this game looks like Left 4 Dead.
The next game announced was Harry Potter Quiddich Champions. (I think I am getting whiplash from the differences between these games being announced.) I don’t know why they are making this game. I know that the last Harry Potter game did well so I’m sure that has something to do with someone thinking it’s Quidditch’s time to shine. If I recall, I think the EA version of Quiddich World Cup was a pretty middling game. I’m not sure what the sales figures were but they couldn’t have been great because EA would have driven it into the ground with yearly sequels.
Cuffbust is one of the games of the show for me. I think that this game is aimed at the audience of gamers that I spoke about before who probably aren’t even watching this show. I think Cuffbust is going to appear on some streamers channels and it has the potential to be the next big thing.
Star Wars Outlaws looks awesome. I can’t wait to see more about it at the Ubisoft conference. It has the potential to be just as good as the EA Star Wars games.
The team behind Gris is making Neva which looks absolutely gorgeous. The fluid movement of the character and the art and vibes of the game are just jaw dropping. I think this game has serious Mononoke vibes and I am here for it.
Sid Meier appeared in a video introducing Civilization 7. That is awesome. I am glad we are getting more Civilization. I am happy for all of the Civilization players out there who need to move on so they can get a different game charted in the Steam most hours played column.
Black Myth: Wukong looks sick. I like the Journey to the West story being presented as a modern day action game.
Asgard’s Wrath 2 looks good. Facebook is still trying to get people to forget that they are Meta and buy a Meta Quest 2 because you can’t get this game anywhere else than on a Meta Quest 2. It looks good but it’s just not for me.
Next is Once Human. That’s all I have written.
Moving on, Space Marine 2 is coming soon. Space Marine was the first 40k game during the PS3 generation that caught on with people outside of the 40k audience. It was basically Gears of War. It was the game that finally justified all of the 40k fans who had been beating their drums telling console gamers that their video game characters were all based on 40k Space Marines. We all knew but we just liked to watch them get all foamy at their mouths.
Metaphor from the Persona team looks really amazing. Never has a property, Shin Megami Tensei, had so many offshoots that were leagues better than the original property they were based on.
Batman Arkham Shadow is the most promising VR game that I have seen recently. It is coming from Camoflaj, the team behind the excellent Iron Man VR game that game to PSVR.
Street Fighter is getting new characters. That’s nice. I’m glad that this new Street Fighter game is better than the last one. I think the last thing that Capcom needs right now is for Street Fighter to have to back into hibernation for a few years like it did before Street Fighter 4 debuted.
Tears of Metal looks interesting with a very unusual art style.
Dragonball Sparking Zero is a new game for the people who loved Dragonball Budokai.
Delta Force Hawk Ops is the reboot of series that has been chugging along on PC and PlayStation for a long time. I still remember seeing the PS1 version when I worked for Blockbuster.
Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves looks great. I am sure that a lot of Mexicans and Central and South Americans are going to be super happy.
Battle Crush looked interesting. It looks like the developers just took one for the modes from Fall Guys and made a whole game based on it. It is a brawler where the environment slowly breaks away and gets smaller and smaller until only one player remains. (You know the mode I’m talking about if you’ve played Fall Guys.)
Mecha Break looks like it could be something amazing for fans of mecha fighting games. It doesn’t have any Mech franchises locked to it but that might be a good thing. The fighting looks fluid. I’m not sure if they are going after an action audience or if they are going after a simulation audience. I think if they can bridge the gap they could do pretty well with this game.
Blumhouse Games came out and debuted two handfuls of games and, just like their movies, I think some of them will be pretty good and others will probably be duds.
Project C from Sam Barlow is my most anticipated of the group. Fear the Spotlight is the first release from this new publisher.
Power Rangers – Rita’s Rewind is a new game from Digital Eclipse. It looks a lot like the older brawlers that they have been making in recent years. It will probably be pretty solid. Is Power Rangers popular again or is this further proof to the audience that this show is really going after?
Deer & Boy looks like it could be very good. I am getting Never Alone vibes from it. I hope it is even half as good as that game was.
Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 is another game that isn’t for me but the story looks like it might be very interesting so I hope that this game can prove me wrong and become something I need to play.
Slitterhead is a horror/ action game from the guy behind Silent Hill. The gameplay looks like it’s reminiscent of an old GameCube game called Geist. The player is moving from one NPC to another within the game world to solve puzzles or just play the game. Also, this isn’t the only Geist-like that is shown this year.
Killer Bean is the other game that I think has the potential to be the next big streaming game. It is a shooter where the player plays as a bean and the NPCs are also beans. It’s weird in all the best ways.
Cairns is a mountain climbing game that I think looks really cool. I like that they want the game to be more an exploration of man vs. mountain and the mental strength needed to overcome the obstacles – instead of just the strength needed to overcome.
Wanderstop looks like a nice cozy game. It’s another game where the player runs a shop. It’s coming from Annapurna so it probably is going to have something a bit more than just cozy vibes so that appeals to me.
Unknown 9 Awakening looks good too. It’s coming from Bandai Namco. This is the other Geist-like.
Monster Hunter Stories is coming out again for people who didn’t play it the first time or the second time. Also, the second game is coming back too.
Enotria: The Last Song is another game that looks good. There is a demo out now.
The First Decendent looks like an interesting looter shooter. I like the space setting.
The team behind Among Us, Inner Sloth, has started a funding effort called Outer Sloth. It doesn’t seem like they are becoming a publisher but just dipping their toes in to publish some games with some money they had laying around since they raked it in during the Pandemic. It truly seems altruistic. The games coming are: Mars First Logistics, Battle Suit Aces, Mossfield Archives, One BTN Bosses, Rogue Eclipse, and Project Dosa.
Sonic X Shadows Generations is coming. Sonic has been on a bit of an upswing lately. It looks like an interesting game.
Dune Awakening is telling an alternate history of the Dune series. The trailer looked good. I need to get some more information about this game because I love the Dune series.
Battle Aces is trying to bring back the RTS genre. They tried to pitch this as an RTS game for anyone but it just looked like an RTS game. We’ll see if they are able to follow through with it being for anyone.
The Finals Season 3 is announced. I should give this game a try. It seems cool.
Alan Wake 2: Night Springs is coming too. It has Twilight Zone vibes. I think it’s going to be really cool. Remedy can do nothing wrong.
New World Aeternum from Amazon Games was announced. I’m not sure if this is a new game or if this is just Amazon reminding people that this game is still around and that Amazon Games still exists.
Dark and Darker is going to be free on PC.
Kunitsu-gami: Path of the Gods from Capcom is the other game with an Eastern setting that didn’t really appeal to me but seemed like just another game to add on the pile of games that are all going after that setting.
Hyperlight Breaker looks like a great addition to the Hyperlight series. This game looks so much better than the first game even though the first game looked really good too.
Party Animals looks like it could be a lot of fun as a party game.
The Skate trailer got me excited for a new Skate game. I don’t think it is coming anytime soon. This trailer was really just proof of life as well as a way to keep the audience interested in the game.
Palworld is getting more content.
Valorant is coming to consoles.
Squad Busters is another game from Super Cell that will make hand over fist but I have zero desire to play.
Monster Hunter Wilds makes its second appearance of the season. This trailer had a bit more in it than the State of Play trailer.
Phantom Blade 0 is the game they decided to finish things off with. I’m not sure if I was just tired from the two hour show or if I was so unimpressed that I didn’t have anything to write about it.
I thought the show was okay overall. There were some cool announcements and there were some trailers that got me excited about some games but there was a malaise of disappointment too.
I just don’t think this is really the show that it needs to be. As I said before, I think this is an aging model that is trying to hold on to something that doesn’t really exist anymore. It reminds me of that guy on TikTok who wears JNCO jeans and rollerblades around town with a Super Nintendo in his back pocket. I’m glad they are both around and doing their thing and having fun while doing it but there isn’t the luster there anymore.