EA is hosting their live streaming event from the Novo Theater with CEO Andrew Wilson. This is interesting because they keep cutting from their own EA Play event over to London with Peter Moore. They discuss the importance of “Play”. In some ways it seems they are attempting to take a long running concept and turning it into a buzzword. It\’s not necessarily a bad concept to play with, since in many ways they lead the way with multiplayer franchises and they may just be the ones who can grow the concept. They do give a nod to the fact that the new Titanfall 2 in development will have the one thing that was lacking from the first, an actual single player mode. Its certainly a good way to start it off.
We move on to coverage of Titanfall 2 with Respawn Entertainment’s Vince Zampella. A big announcement is that they are going multiplatform for this iteration so it’s no longer a Microsoft Exclusive. They discuss that they are adding in 6 new Titans, the trailer shows off an expanded ground combat focus with a couple of what almost seemed like grudge matches. They mentioned, or really just sort of gave a nod to expanded customization and character upgrading. It might be something they are holding back on until the system is more developed. More importantly, they say to go right to the official website found here to sign up for stress tests they will be running in the future. I find that they took a moment to highlight that, at least in single player from the trailers, there are a series of violent fauna that are likely to fight each other as possibly you. It\’s an interesting way to make the game more immersive when on foot. Though one big creature seemed designed to imply that they might be even more of a threat as well. It seems the story is of a Titan and an unauthorized pilot. It’s certainly a nice plot hook. A release date of October 28th, 2016 is given.
Madden 2017 is the next up. Another Entry into a long running series. They discuss many little ways they have improved the game itself, but the focus itself seems to be community driven. That\’s what has made EA Sports prosper over the years. We have updated rosters, but its the drive of competition that allows the games to truly stay fresh. And that’s what they really focused on. They cover how the Madden NFL 2016 is down to the final two players, Eric Wright and Zack Lane. They mentioned how ESPN 3 as well as ESPN 2 are both going to broadcast events running now. A side note, with TBS running E-League and CW having the Mortal Kombat tournament special, now is a major emergence of Professional Gaming on TV, which outside of a couple of long defunct G4 shows, I personally can\’t wait to see expand. They continue to announce a series of various competitions to deal with various user bases. Challenger Events, Premier Events and EA Major Events. For the general userbase, special functions and the big EA push for new events, each event type seems to be well suited to giving everyone a challenge they can enjoy.
Mass Effect Andromeda is really a gasp of fresh air for the franchise. We are given a tour of the new exploration in the Andromeda Galaxy by Aaryn Flynn. The question they are posing is how far will Humanity go. Apparently the answer is Andromeda. The gorgeous visuals are something I missed in Mass Effect 3. So much was war torn and there was such a dark bent reflected in the game’s visuals, I like seeing stunning vistas and having the thrill of finding new worlds. It’s the actual Star Trek Zeitgeist incarnate. The story seems to be humans need to find a new home, but they don’t really elaborate. We have primarily a helmeted character running through various scenes, and at least an Asari showing up. It seems the transit may have taken some time since it looked like cryo-sleep may have been involved. So it was seemingly a vague period of time into the far future. That make it a good starting point, since they have a blank canvas to work with while we already see they liberally give nods back to prior visuals, and I still love seeing N7 in a game. They do give us a behind the scenes look, and the motion capture work already shows a great attention to detail. It seems EA does a great job with this. Now they are telling us, we humans will be the aliens.
300 updates. That’s the number of updates that EA says they have released over the last year to tweak, improve and expand upon the games they have out to expand their playability and increase their life span. They are talking about their commitment to the fans and their experience. This is great. So many times a developer will either pander to a vocal minority or try to satisfy everyone. EA has hit their stride and they have been keeping fans happy and coming back. This is a perfect balance other developers are really hard pressed to match.
EA Play, one of the best announcements I will give mention to the fact they do have a plan to generate money for charitable causes with Play to Give. Any charity is a great idea, and such a big company spearheading this is great especially with the large community they are trying to shepherd. They led into the announcement with trying to push their services for access to free trials of older games in their vault, which does seem like a weirdly off beat to their fairly smooth proceedings. I guess that sort of evens out just for the impact the charity can bring.
FIFA 17, I’ll admit to not being a big Soccer (or more commonly Football) fan. This game has great looking set pieces. The actual characters look like they have a very plastic sheen. I’m not very worried, since the gameplay is what will drive sales for a soccer title. The crowds looked surprisingly detailed though, with so many individual people as bystanders and the actual scenery looking so good, I can overlook the characters having perfect texturing especially when in actual play everything looks so good together. Here is the part that even interested me. The fact that they are bringing in a bigger focus on story, and the mentoring from three legendary managers who shall be a big part of “The Journey”. They say this is revolutionary for the franchise, which is tied to Alex Hunter. The bragging that everyone will know that name seemed a little patronizing, but the narrative they are pushing is that you are building a newly rising star so I do see they have a point that this can be the attitude they start with. I can see the managers being used as a way to temper that. They are saying how they have developed a new Active Intelligence System to provide better competition from the AI. As a non player I doubt their was issues with the old system, so seeing a comparative study of the AI reactions when the game is released would really show how well it will work.
EA is pushing to publish for smaller developers. The developers retain the profits made, and EA will aid with the funding and grant what they say will be a certain level of security. I have mixed feelings personally. They can easily build a great game that wouldn’t have had a a chance otherwise. But I don’t know the specifics yet of what developers have to do to be approved. If it’s a fairly open system it is great, but it’s to be seen if that will happen. The game they are publishing called Fe from Zoink Studios under Klaus Lyngeled looks spectacularly. The art style is distinctive and stylized. It’s said explicitly that they will drop you into the world without holding your hand and let you explore. The player character is, not human. I can’t describe it since it’s an entirely new type of creature. Angular and fluffy perhaps? I will say the enemies do seem dark and imposing. The art style overall uses a dark color palette from what was shown with numerous purples. They seem to know exactly how to handle the ambient mood perfectly. So this is helping my faith in this new developer initiative. It may just work out if the quality is this good.
Star Wars. This is the part of the event I’ve been waiting for the entire time. We have Jade Raymond come out and discuss the current state of Star Wars with EA. We have running now the mobile Galaxy of Heroes, the MMO Old Republic and also Battlefront still receiving new updates. They talk again about listening to the players. Of course, they start to tell us about all of what they are working on. They say they have teams around the world working to build up Star Wars games output and they go as far to show it with a sizzle reel. Capital Games released Galaxy of heroes, and they start here. They show off the team hard at work trying to integrate as many characters and as much of the lore from across the franchise they can. Next we go to Visceral. Amy Hennig is leading production of what is a currently untitled (from what I saw) Star Wars title that is inherently its own thing drawing from the iconography and story premise while seemingly being an entirely new story unto itself. They finish talking about how D.I.C.E. is already at work on Star Wars Battlefront 2, and it will include maps based on the newer movies and from different eras while the first was entrenched firmly in the era right around the original trilogy.
Battlefield 1 of course is the highlight of this show. It has been blowing up the internet since it’s announcement, and the trailers they are showing look so vibrant. It\’s nice to see color after a generation of shooters with a color scheme best described as mud. The sheer volume of characters, artillery and vehicles they show are stupendous. They are saying I can pilot a Zeppelin or Ride a Train in game? Apparently they are calling them behemoths. They really haven’t held back. I have to wonder exactly the scale of the maps that they are using for this. They quickly cut to Jamie Fox and Zac Effron who will be leading a 32 vs 32 match apparently. It switches back promising at least an hour of footage after the event that I haven\’t yet watched. But it’s to show of the in game play, so it may be worth it to watch for that at least. They comment specifically on the destructibility of the environments, as well as dynamic weather leading to differing environmental hazards and strategies to play. They are discussing an open beta coming later this summer. This will be out October 21st. They did save their best for last.
Now, the final wrap up just comments on how many live demos will still be around the duration of EA Play and bid us fair well.
My own wrap up is really just one regret. Of the things I wished we saw was a new Dead Space. With Visceral working on a Star Wars title, they are busy right now. I can understand it. But this was, for at least two games, one of the best survival horror franchises a person could play over the last several years. I count three as more of an action game, though I digress. To avoid spoilers, the last game left on what I would consider an unsatisfactory note. I would like some kind of conclusion, even just a note to conclude the franchise otherwise. Or, at least a more games for the Survival Horror Genre. I am looking forward to seeing the sequel to the Evil Within from Tango.
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