At the beginning of this week I spent some time talking about Watch_Dogs and explained that, this year, too many developers are having to split their efforts between making Gen4 exciting and making Gen3 stable. I expected only a handful of titles to get my blood pumping and make me excited about this year’s possibilities. I am extremely happy to say that I wasn’t entirely correct. I was partially right. The games that are Gen4 / PC exclusives were definitely the most interesting titles at E3. That being said, there were a lot of games that looked awesome. Ubisoft alone had some seriously amazing titles. Assassin’s Creed: Unity looks like a huge improvement over the previous games. It may not have the ship combat, but at least it’s making strides on the seriously stale land combat. Far Cry 4 has rideable elephants, which basically sells the game by itself (not to mention it looks beautiful). The Division has a ton of potential and, as I have stated numerous times already, the best tablet functionality of any game to date. And Rainbow Six… well, I’ll save that for a separate discussion. And that was just at a single company. Everywhere I went there was some game that was at least worth trying. But there were definitely some games that rose above the pack. So here are my top 5 games of E3 2014: 5. Dragon Age: InquisitionBioware has made huge strides since Dragon Age II. I don’t want to say I was disappointed by DA2, since there were some improvements (specifically in combat), but fortunately Inquisition goes a lot way to righting a lot of the wrongs of DA2. A huge, beautiful worldspace, more interesting combat and spells, more party members, more playable species, support for both genders, full voice acting for all species and genders, etc. etc. Without sitting down and playing through a couple of hours of this game, I can’t tell for sure that it’ll be exciting, but it would be impossible for me to say that I wasn’t looking forward to making some tough decisions in this game. 4. Borderlands: The Pre-SequelAfter playing 2 Borderlands games on 2 different platforms (PC and X360), I would have expected to be tired of the game. But from the brief chance I got to play through B:TPS, I’m extremely excited. The low gravity and oxygen deprived atmosphere slow this game down a bit, which is something it desperately needed to keep it from turning into a quake-style twitch shooter. I expect this game to be even funnier than its predecessors. 3. Lord of the Rings: Shadow of MordorThe gameplay showed Shadow of Mordor’s combat as a mix between Assassin’s Creed and Batman. Everything seemed smooth, so that alone would make this a mediocre/good game at worst (assuming everything works the way that they showed at E3). What makes this game great is its military hierarchy system. Each of the enemies fits into a chain of command. If you manage to grab someone, you can use them in a variety of ways. They can inform on other enemies, they can try to sabotage something, or they can try to assassinate someone else. It’s an extremely powerful system that is evidently completely randomized, which makes it so that you won’t see the same enemies in the same spot twice. On paper, this is an amazing idea with serious potential. 2. The DivisionThis ranked highly on my list last year and remains high this year. The combination of open world RPG elements, cooperative gameplay, third person cover shooting, looting / customization, and powerful story make this game a recipe for an excellent gaming experience. Not to mention this still has the best second-screen tablet functionality I have seen in any video game to date. After Watch_Dogs I am aware that this could be a potential disappointment, but for now this is still one of my most anticipated games of the year. 1. Far Cry 4I have to admit I am a bit biased with this one. I am a huge fan of the Far Cry series, so Far Cry 4 didn’t really have to do much to make it to the top of my list. However, that being said, the developers took everything that I loved about Far Cry 3 and made significant improvements. Driving mechanics felt smoother, the gyrocopter was a very different way to approach movement and combat, the player can now shoot while driving (I’m not sure how that will work during a high-speed chase), the world had a much greater variety in areas, there were random non-combat NPCs, and there was a greater emphasis on distinguishing the different playstyles. I am hoping that the story has improved since Far Cry 3 (which had an awesome first-half and a surprisingly dull second-half), but I won’t know for sure until it gets released. Either way, this game is at the top of my list to play. Unfortuantely, since I still feel very misled about Watch_Dogs, I still have to be weary about any of the games I saw at E3. Fortunately, a few of these games I actually got to try out myself, so I can be much more confident about those (Far Cry 4 and Borderlands specifically). I really hope that the rest turn out to be as great as I hope they are. But, as with everything, only time will tell.
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The Legendary Carmine
Andrew Clayton (a.k.a. The Legendary Carmine) is SSG's Executive Editor. He toils at the stone to make sure this site brings its readers valuable content on a daily basis. Like what we do? Want to see more? Donate to the site using the button below!
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