The first day of E3 2014 is over. I managed to see 9 games in the brief time I had. There are definitely some "game of the year" contenders on this list. Here's just a brief overview of what I saw today. Evolve For Gamers: Evolve is a ton of fun if you have a team of players who know what they’re doing. If you’re the monster, you don’t have to rely on anyone, so the objective is pretty simple. If you’re the humans, though, you need to rely on each other at all times. The monster moves quickly so you’re going to have to anticipate his movements and cut him off. The game was fun even though my team lost, but I question the replay value of the game. Leveling up and unlocking new equipment and abilities only goes so far. I expect there will be more than a single mode, but so far we’ve only seen the monster vs humans mode. For Parents: Blood was definitely present but overall it was pretty mild. There is some gore when the monster eats random creatures, but I didn’t notice any gore caused in combat. There may be some extremely mild substance use with health items, but overall the game was straightforward. I would expect this to be appropriate for ages 12 to 14. Dying Light For Gamers: Comparing this game to Dead Island is very appropriate. The core gameplay elements are almost exactly the same. Melee combat and crafting is key to survival. The differences between the two games are subtle, but someone who played a lot of Dead Island will be able to pick up on it. Combat is much more difficult, which means tearing through enemies like paper (which seems common in Dead Island) doesn’t happen in Dying Light. I desperately needed a good tutorial in order to figure out things like the crafting system, but overall Dying Light seems like a much cleaner, more fun version of Dead Island. It’s higher up on my list than Dead Island 2 right now. For Parents: Without any sort of story, I couldn’t be able to tell exactly how much sexuality or substance use was in this game, but this game includes constant violence with substantial amounts of blood and gore. If you take a look at my Dead Island review, the content is very similar. I expect this game to be appropriate for someone 18 years old. Assassin's Creed: Unity For Gamers: Initially I saw this game and thought, “Wait, no more ships?” But after seeing the gameplay demos, I can see why there weren’t any more ships. The single player of this game includes full 4 person coop, which makes a huge difference in the gameplay. Stick with 1 to 3 reliable partners and the different challenges become much more engaging. Add the new “crowd” system in the game (all of the civilians are individuals and can react in sometimes unpredictable ways) and the revamps of the old blending and hunting mechanics and this game seems to improve significantly on all of the problems its predecessors left for years. This gives me hope for a positive overall direction to the Assassin’s Creed franchise. For Parents: While sexuality and substance use maybe a relatively insignificant factor, violence is going to be huge in Assassin’s Creed: Unity. There was a ton of fairly brutal blood and gore in the gameplay. At the end, the player watches in first person as a character is decapitated and has his head placed on a spike and hoisted into the air. It’s pretty gross. I expect this game to be appropriate for 16 to 18 year olds. Alien: Isolation For Gamers: I really wish that the developers had given us the first chapter or something to play instead of a “challenge level”, but unfortunately that’s the way they decided to go. This made the game seem extremely difficult, which kind of ruined the fun. You’re thrown into the gamespace without knowing how to craft, so using a flamethrower is pretty much your only chance at survival. I can see the potential for this game being fun though. It’s not much of a jumper since you can use the motion tracker, but it’s still very suspenseful. You can never kill the alien no matter what, so it’s just a matter of conserving the equipment you have until you desperately need it. For Parents: Blood and gore were present in the level but this game is purely about survival, not combat. As a result, the violence was basically nonexistent. I would expect this game’s content to be appropriate for 12 to 14 year olds, but the scary images might play a factor. Lord of the Rings: Shadow of Mordor For Gamers: This is extremely high up on my “Best of E3” list. Take the climbing and semi-stealth elements from Assassin’s Creed, mix them up with the combat from the Batman Arkham games, and throw them into Middle Earth and you have a small taste of what this game is like. All of the enemies are “procedurally generated”, which means you aren’t fighting the same enemies twice. If you’ve played Borderlands, you know how you never get the same loot every time you open a crate. This game takes that same basic idea and uses it for its enemies. It’s an awesome system that I’m extremely excited for. Barring some horrible bug issues or some random mechanic that isn’t being demonstrated this year, this game is definitely a preorder for me. For Parents: Blood is a pretty significant factor and gore was present in the form of decaptiations, but substance use and sexuality seem to be completely absent. Unless there’s something hidden deep within the story that isn’t being unveiled yet, I expect this game to be appropriate for 16 year olds. Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn For Gamers: This game has been out for a little while now, so seeing it again on the floor surprised me. I gave it another try because I wanted to see what the differences were between this year and my demo last year. Unfortunately, not much has changed. They tasked us with a very challenging boss battle, which was made more challenging because we didn’t really get to pick what team members we were placed with. Some team members knew their role fairly well, others seemed less than reliable. Talking with some of the other people in line revealed that the game was fun for the hardcore fans but lacked the content to keep players interested for more than a month or two. In my experience, it looked like fun, but if I’m going to start playing an MMO it’ll probably be The Secret World or The Old Republic, not this game. For Parents: MMOs are tough to review, since there is literally hundreds of hours of content. However, from my very brief gameplay experience the violence and substance use seemed very low. I would expect this game to be appropriate for 10 to 12 year olds. Nosgoth For Gamers: The multiplayer FPS scene is an extremely crowded genre. Adding another free-to-play game seems ill-advised right now. Nosgoth shows a lot of potential, and being the vampires was definitely fun, but the “free-to-play” scares me away from this game. Unfortunately, I don’t see many ways that this game can keep from becoming a “pay-to-win” system. I am going to keep track of it via the beta, but right now the content just doesn’t support the idea of putting any money into this game. For Parents: This game definitely had blood but I didn’t notice any gore. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t any, I just didn’t see it when I was playing. It’s pretty fast paced and after you kill a player you’re not sticking around to see if he’s in one piece, you’re turning around to see if someone is right behind you. I would expect this game to be appropriate for ages 12 to 14. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt For Gamers: I have to admit, the intro chapter for the first Witcher game lost my interest and I have yet to pick it back up again. That being said, Wild Hunt’s demo reminded me that I need to give it another chance. The vast open-world combat and the emphasis on quests and character interaction make this game very interesting. It might not be as much fun for me as Skyrim, but it is definitely worth a shot. And boy does it look gorgeous. For Parents: The Witcher games have a history of intense violence, sexuality, and substance use. From just the trailer I can already tell that these elements will all be back in force. I expect this game to get a solid 18 years old. The Crew For Gamers: Last year my demo for this game was in an empty, singleplayer world and the game suffered significantly for it. This year I played with other gamers and it definitely helped. Unfortunately, the fun in this game was standing next to a friend and cheering each other on, an experience that is much more difficult to replicate online. The core elements of the game are solid, but I think the execution is going to feel flawed. This game needs some good AI to act as placeholders for crew members. Without it, I’m not sure I could recommend it to a person that doesn’t have a “crew” already lined up in the real world. For Parents: This is a racing game, pure and simple. There wasn’t any blood anywhere in the game. I expect this game to be appropriate for 8 to 10 year olds. Far Cry 4 For Gamers: My time with Far Cry 4 was very brief, and I may give this game another try since there were technically three demos. I decided to storm a fortress, because I love the idea of running and gunning more than stealth. The game performed very smoothly compared to Far Cry 3, which sometimes felt clunky in open combat, but the overall feel was extremely similar to Far Cry 3. That being said, there are rideable elephants. And you can make the elephants charge into enemies and vehicles. If you hit an enemy, it’s an instant kill. If you hit a vehicle, it goes flying and everyone inside it gets wrecked. It’s awesome! Best vehicle I have ever used in a video game hands down. For Parents: The Far Cry games have become a lot more twisted. If I judge this game based purely on the gameplay, it’s a pretty simple game. There is never any gore, and blood is sometimes present in minimal amounts. The melee executions get a bit bloodly and gruesome, but nothing too over-the-top. However, the trick is in the story-based content. Far Cry 3 really pushed the envelope in a lot of departments, and while I’m hoping that Far Cry 4 tones it down a bit I’m not sure that will be the case. If Far Cry 4 is anything like its predecessor, it will be appropriate for 18 year olds. I'm hoping to see even more tomorrow. Be on the watch for reviews of three Bethesda games as well as at least one more Ubisoft title. Other than that, it's anyone's game!
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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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