Five Games You'll Definitely Hear About at E3

I was originally going to make a straight post of predictions for E3, but that’s boring. We already made a contest out of that. You can still enter, you know, and we’d much rather read your funny predictions than mine. Mine are boring.

But there’s a law on the books stating that any independent gaming blog must write at least forty five articles previewing E3, and, seeing as none of us will actually be there (I’ll actually be on holiday with my parents—suck on that, traditional media), we need to make up other fantastic content.

Like the five unannounced/unknown games we’d most like to hear about at E3. By that, we mean either games we heard about last year we’ve seen nothing of since, or games that flat out don’t exist yet. What you’d call a surprise. And boy, if I’m right, there’ll be some surprises.

Hit the more for a list!

1.)Golden Sun DS

You might remember last year’s E3, where Nintendo said we’d see a new Golden Sun in 2010. There were about two seconds of footage of Isaac running around and a splash screen. There was gameplay footage that amounted to Isaac running around in a pretty 3-D world, a battle system cut off by some mildly impressive summons. Fantastic. Told us a lot about the game.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdHp4o0s5Wg&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

And remember, this game is supposed to come out this year as a pretty big name release, and we’ve heard not a peep. Not a word from Nintendo, or nobody. And this is supposed to be a frontline title. Sure, we’ve seen a bit of it, but I fully expect it to anchor Nintendo’s DS lineup this E3. Or perhaps its 3DS lineup, which would make me cry the bitter tears of someone who refuses to buy the portable virtual boy.

Will it be good? I dunno. I have some reservations, namely in the fact that pseudo-3D always seems eye gougingly horrible on the DS, kind of like looking at old PSOne games now that we’ve seen graphics with more than one polygon per square foot. But we can be sure of one thing: we’re going to hear a lot about it.

2.) Call of Duty: Something or Other
I don’t mean Black Ops, either. We all know there will be what could gently be called an intense focus on Black Ops, because Call of Duty prints money.

However, I don’t feel Activision is content. One Call of Duty a year is nice, but multiple Call of Duties, that would be fantastic. They use that principle with all of their other franchises (see: Hero, Guitar), why not with their biggest cash cow? You’ll notice they have three separate teams working on the games, and my hunch (and the hunch of the internet) is that one is going to make something completely breaking the mold. By which I mean, something of a first person MMO. Whether it’s Sledgehammer’s, or the new game by Infinity Ward, I feel like Activision wants a new game out there to release in the interim, or at least hype in the interim. I also don’t think they have that much faith in Black Ops ability to catch the public’s eye. I don’t feel a hell of a lot of faith in it coming from Activision.

My speculation: a beta for an MMOFPS Call of Duty to happen in September and October, for a release in January or February, around the same time Battlefield: Bad Company 2 released. They will attach the beta key to a mildly failing property, like Spider Man: Shattered Dimensions. That’s how Microsoft dealt with Crackdown, and that’s how I see Activision trying to revive the Spider Man franchise.

3.) Final Fantasy VII Remake
Your first response will almost assuredly be, But Tom, everybody and all of their siblings at Squenix have said this isn’t happening! They’ve said it’d take an upwards of 40 years to make a VII Remake! What the hell are you babbling about!?!

Well I’m glad you asked. Firstly, no company denies something so vehemently unless there’s a kernel of truth in the rumors that they don’t want to come out (or unless the rumor is they’re making a rape game involving Tifa, Aeris, and Sephiroth, but no one’s doing that). I mean, Squenix has said, quite seriously, that it would take 40 years to make a remake in the style of XIII. Of course, they’ve also said that they’re never going to develop another game like XIII, so that’s not exactly the most damning thing to say. Higher ups have said they’d look into it. Making it sound like it’s far off.

And I don’t think it is. Square Enix loves money, and by this point they’ve reached critical mass on FFVII sales on the Playstation Network. They’re not moving many more. They are in prime considering murdering…err…remaking one of the best RPGs of all time, and it’ll happen at E3. And when it does, remember that I called it first.

I’ll even go a step further. Square Enix doesn’t want to make a game in the style of XIII. What they want, I think, is a cheaper alternative, where all the graphics don’t have to be completely reimagined. What’s a cheaper alternative, graphically, where there’s a built in userbase of millions, many of whom haven’t even played VII? A platform where a retro game (that I despise) has sold millions of copies in the U.S. and Japan recently? The same platform the new Dragon Quest is being released on.

That’s right. And if a Wii remake of Final Fantasy VII actually is a thing that happens, I fully expect to be worshipped as your new god. My second guess would be a DS remake, because that too would require no major makeover, but I’m really feeling the Wii remake. Squenix has a lot invested in the DS, for sure, and it wouldn’t require a lot of effort to port it (it looks about as crappy as most 3D DS games) and would be consistent with their policy of printing money the cheapest way possible, but I feel like they think their fans want an honest to god remake, and the Wii offers them the easiest way to do that.

4.) Devil May Cry 5
I don’t know quite how radical a prediction this is, because the rumor mill has said that Ninja Theory (developers of Heavenly Sword and the upcoming quality looking Enslaved) is making it for Capcom, but it seems the kind of Western centric game that would be fantastically revealed at E3, which is a western event.

Devil May Cry 5 has some weight, too, and could help Capcom pretty tremendously. A big reveal, especially for the Fall, would be in their best interests, and get some real, serious hype behind it and their other projects.

And it doesn’t seem that unlikely, either. In the wake of a rather mediocre game in DMC4, a status quo reveal wouldn’t cut it. They need to hammer home that this is a new studio, new blood working on a classic franchise that hit a rut. Guys who understand action, and the series, and how to make an intense, brilliant action game.

What better way to do that than E3?

5.) Legend of Zelda: The New One
Something akin to this will happen:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqjAvQORTow&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Well, not quite that, but this was the easiest prediction to possibly make about a game we don’t know jack about. A new Zelda is a thing that is happening and god knows we will see it two weeks from now. This is a slam dunk. The easiest thing we could ever predict.

The question is, will it take a lot of chances? Will it be a Zelda game outside of the mold, like Majora’s Mask, or will it be yet another Ocarina of Time clone? My money’s on the former, actually. I feel like there were enough off the wall ideas in Twilight Princess that that might be the direction the team really wants to go in, and I feel like, after they released a successful, bland Zelda, that their next objective is a more out there game, to be released by the end of the year.

That’s it, folks. Your mileage may vary on these predictions, but I’m confident in at least three of them showing up. Your honorable mention, your #6, if you will, would be Pikmin 3, but I felt that was a little too obvious and not all that exciting, anyway. Mostly because I didn’t enjoy Pikmin. Sue me.

Check back with us for more content, both about E3 and about other, less new things.