Day two is over and done with at last. I have a couple other standout games that I’ll eventually turn into separate articles, but here’s some other incredibly valuable awards to announce for all the fine exhibitors at the show.
The award for game with best inflatable decoy guard goes to: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (Kojima Productions)
The Phantom Pain didn’t appear to be playable on the show floor, but it was demoed several times on a big screen in front of Konami’s booth.
There’s really not much to report although I will mention the demos I watched had a much greater emphasis on full-scale combat than I had seen so far from the game (or even than I had seen in Ground Zeroes for that matter). The standout event though happens when Snake rounded a corner and found himself face to face with an opponent who…did nothing? At first I thought the game had glitched out but then the player hit it with an empty magazine revealing that it was in fact a decoy enemy.
If Ground Zeroes and its uterine nuclear devices were a little too heavy handed for you, maybe the Phantom Pain can bring back some of that classic MGS goofiness.
The award for game with the most bizarrely ornate booth goes to: Farming Simulator (Focus Home Interactive)
Perhaps you too have wondered aloud as to just what exactly people see in the Simulator games. Maybe not, maybe I’m the only one who doesn’t get it and their popularity makes perfect sense.
Either way the Farming Simulator booth had it all. A barn, a tractor, sexy farmers, a man dressed as a cow. Each of the four core E3 booth pillars are represented with great ease here. Spectacular.
The award for game with most hadoukens goes to: Street Fighter V (Capcom)
I played Street Fighter V.
I picked Nash. I lost. I should have picked Ryu.
I really wish I had more here. It’s Street Fighter, and to be honest if you held it up next to 4 I probably wouldn’t have been able to tell you the difference.
Capcom’s booth was pretty must as disappointing as their lineup. The highlight was a gigantic stage where people could go up and pretend to fight some guy dressed as M. Bison. Frankly I’d go to an entire event of just that.
The award for the best reason to break some glass and get thrown out of the show goes to: The Pip Boy from Fallout 4 (Bethesda)
Fallout 4 isn’t playable on the floor. In fact the entire Bethesda booth is kind of bare considering they probably have the biggest game at the show. I made a point to drop by and see Todd Howard and crew talk about the game further and I was surprised when they showed almost next to no unseen footage (or even footage at all for that matter). You certainly wouldn’t know the game was due out in five months.
They talked a little bit about some of the new challenges the game had introduced to them, such as working for the first time with a fully voiced main character. There was even a cute little moment where the lead actor seemed to finally realize just how many people he beat out for the role.
Still, the entire time they were talking I couldn’t help but think about stealing the glass-encased Pip Boy behind them. I guess there’s still tomorrow.
The award for game that actually appears to be playable goes to: Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate (Ubisoft)
‘Ello there. Can I get ya a spot o’ punchin?
One of the big warning signs for me that Assassin’s Creed: Unity was in trouble was how little you saw the game in a playable state at trade shows leading up to its release. PAX Prime simply had a trailer for everyone to watch and that was just a couple months before launch.
Conversely Syndicate is playable on the show floor this year and looks to be running off PS4s with pretty good performance. Don’t get me wrong, there’s still a perfectly good chance it will release as a buggy mess but if you were looking for any reason to have your fears assuaged this might be it.
Until tomorrow then!
