E3 2016 is now in full swing as of Sunday 12th June, starting off with EA's press conference at 9pm BST last night. This show was a little different from what EA normally do as their conference was not within the main line up day of E3 with Microsoft, Sony and the other companies.
EA decided to split their conference over two locations, Los Angeles and London. Where both revealed new titles that would be coming out later this year as well as 2017 and 2018. To start off the viewers were given an idea of what would be shown throughout the hour long conference, giving a taste as to what would be coming.
Titanfall 2
Starting with the sequel to their mech and pilot based multiplayer game from 2014, EA showed the viewers what Titanfall 2 had to offer. They showed various new aspects of the combat system, new tech the pilots can use and confirmed the inclusion of 6 brand new titans that the player can use, all with unique abilities. They also stated that before its release the game will be having stress test multiplayer matches to make sure the game works completely as it should.
Sign ups will be available soon for the stress test on the Titanfall website which can be located here.
The biggest announcement for Titanfall 2 however was revealed yesterday before the conference but a trailer was shown within it. This was the announcement of a single player campaign for Titanfall 2, taking the elements and lore of the universe and expanding upon it to give players a better understanding of how the Titanfall world works.
Titanfall 2 will be coming to PS4, XBox One and PC on 28th October 2016.
Madden NFL 17
Next up was Madden NFL 17, coming to PS4 and XBox One. It showed how the game looked and was primarily talked about over on the London side of the show. However not much coverage was written up about this due to not really playing sports games.
Mass Effect Andromeda
Continuing on from after the events of Mass Effect 3, this new title in the Mass Effect series has picked up a lot of hype. Those who are working on Andromeda disclosed some information about the title.
The story starts with many ships leaving Earth to colonise within the Andromeda Galaxy. The players character travels in hyper sleep and awakens once they arrive. From there the player is greeted by a vast galaxy filled with new planets, new species and new technology for them to discover. Where in this game it takes the focus of you being the Alien.
It is a completely new adventure to the Mass Effect series and the developers specifically stated that it is giving the players more freedom than the series has ever given before. Whether this means that all the landscapes of each planet are traversable or more freedom within the story and how it progresses remains to be seen.
Mass Effect Andromeda is being created in the Frostbite engine to give it the best experience for players to enjoy. More information will be revealed in the Autumn/Fall.
Play to Give
An interesting announcement EA made was their 'Play to Give' initiative, they announced they would be donating $1 million to five different charities in order to celebrate the global gaming community and to give something back. The five charities are Code.org, Code2040, HeForShe, the National Centre for Women and Information technology, and lastly Special Effect.
To add to this EA is adding in game challenges that link to these charities, by completing them players can receive in game rewards. Games such as Battlefield 4, Star Wars Battlefront, Fifa and Madden will have these challenges for the player to complete.
Fifa 17
Moving on from the Play to Give initiative, EA announced their next Fifa title. They stated that premier league managers will be in the game as well as a "story mode" called the Journey, where the players will follow the career of Alex Hunter.
EA Originals
A fantastic scheme that EA has set up, following on from Unraveled that was present at E3 2015. EA has set up the EA Originals initiative to help small developers get their games out there for players to enjoy, they will be helping them with everything from development, to marketing, to publishing.
Fe
Continuing from the EA Originals, a developer from a small company named Zoink came on stage to discuss their title 'Fe'. A beautiful looking game where you play as a small creature in a forest called 'Fe'. This is a game about a personal narrative with nature, there is no speaking in the game as it is all sound based. Using Fe you can communicate with everything in the forest, everything has its own song for the player to learn and communicate with the world around them. The player must learn songs in order to progress, however the developers have set the stage for 'Fe' they will not be hand holding the player through as they want them to have their own experiences and learn for themselves.
The story is a metaphor for the destruction of nature, the enemies known as 'The Silent Ones' come in and want to make the forest silent forever. Not much else was stated about the game but it looks like a beautiful title, very artistic and stylised and hopefully more information will be revealed soon.
Star Wars
Not much was said about the Star Wars games, they showed how more and more players were getting involved with Battlefront and Galaxy of Heroes. They then went onto talk about two new Star Wars titles that will be coming, the first is a completely new narrative within the Star Wars universe as an action adventure title, which will be released in 2018 and this will be created by Visceral Games. The second is being created by Respawn Entertainment, which is going to be a third person game.
Battlefield 1
At the end of the conference EA finished with Battlefield 1. Set in World War I and made in the Frostbite Engine, Battlefield 1 looks like a great experience and an interesting setting for the game comparing it to other battlefield games.
With dynamic weather and completely destructible environments, it makes every battle unique and will make the player have to change their style to fit the changing weather. Horses, Planes and Zeppelins were shown to be in the game along with a wide variety of WWI style weaponry which looks fantastic.
There are maps that allow 64 players on them, 32 on each team. After the conference finished, there were stations for players to try out Battlefield 1 for themselves on these 64 player maps.
This covered the end of the EA press conference for 2016. They showed some interesting titles and gameplay of what they have coming up within the remainder of this year and the next couple of years.
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