My excitement for Bethesda’s conference has been through the roof since Fallout 4s trailer launched not too long ago.
This year at E3 Bethesda are joining the biggest publishers with their own game showcase and I’m here to tell you just what they have in store for us in 2015 and 16!
DOOM
Developed in a new version of the id Tech engine used to develop previous DOOM titles and Rage the DOOM reboot promises to be about everything DOOM is ‘Badass Demons, Big F***ing Guns, and Moving really fast’
The opening trailer showed that id is still capable of producing some of the most beautiful environments in the industry with beautiful, warmly lit environments, particles of smoke, steam and electricity filling the air.
The trailer wasted no time to remind us what DOOM is all about; visceral combat and quick game-play. This is the DOOM we remember brought to the modern age, demons fell left and right to a variety of weaponry ranging from Super Shotgun all the way to the Chainsaw. Each one was shown to be capable of reducing your foes to a bloody visceral spray.
But it’s not just your weapons that are deadly, with a number of melee takedowns, such as putting your fist through a demon’s chest, smashing their face in with your fists, and brutalizing their legs so hard their thighs seemed to explode. These are just a few of the more notable ways of quickly finishing off a demon, as one does.
Weapons also seemed to have additional firing modes with the Heavy Assault Rifle changing from firing bullets to rapidly launching missiles.
It wouldn’t be a good shooter without a good use of environment, and I’m pretty excited by the ease in which you can move around in the levels they showed off at the showcase, with the player easily jumping and double jumping around to avoid fire and quickly dispatching foes.
Dispatching enemies will make them drop health and ammo, which is clearly highlighted on the screen and replaces the health recharge system found in other first person shooters.
In addition to singleplayer, the game will also feature an arena combat shooter that looks similar to the quakes or unreal tournaments of the past providing arcadey action packed fps experiences.
This will be supported by the newly created Snap Map creation kit that allows any player to easily create different DOOM maps and game modes.
Doom Launches Spring 2016
DISHONORED 2
by Arkane Studio
I was a little disappointed that we only got to see a beautifully rendered CGI trailer for Dishonored 2, but the trailer revealed some nice elements of the new world we can expect to explore in Dishonored 2.
The game will be set in a warmer climate to the previous game with the developers stating it is set further south than the first game. Enforcers roam the street dressed in white even shooting people in the streets, setting up a dystopia much like that of the first game.
A hunter quickly move across the buildings, quickly revealed not to be the assassin Corvo of the first game but a new additional protagonist Emily Couley, whose abilities seem to be different to Corvos’ with an almost tentacle-y twist to them.
The showcase announced that both characters would be playable and that they had different abilities, stories, and different ways of taking on missions.
The use of the Outsiders’ voice in this trailer has me pretty excited for the tone set for this game and I hope we get to see it sooner rather then later.
Release Date TBD
FALLOUT 4
Bethesda Game Studios displayed various concepts of environments, from the overall game and the level of detail being put into the environments of the game, with a great level of details and some really beautiful art pieces shown among a vast collection of different images. Shortly after which the showcase moved onto a gameplay demo.
New character creation tools allow you to sculpt and shape your character’s face by just selecting different parts of the face. This allows you to easily make lots of little changes with finer control than a slider provides. And yes, the rumors of a male only single player where wrong, with the ability to choose your gender and whether you’re the “Husband” or the “Wife” in the starting scene.
The player is introduced to a pre-war fallout, vault tech, and the stat system, with a quick registration form for the vault allowing the player to choose your attributes. A first in first person Bethesda rpgs is an all new voiced main character including saying the name of your baby (apparently one hundred of the most popular baby names are actually sayable by the main character?)
Third person and first person gameplay, the next gen version of the creation engine displays some beautiful environments and objects.
The demo showed the player returning to their family home after years in the vault. Dialogue is dynamic and can be done in third or first person, allowing the player to move around the environment while talking to NPCs. Companions are making a return to Fallout 4 with the Dog companion shown in the demo. Contextual commands can be given by telling your companion to grab objects or go to different locations that you look at.
VATS returns with a slow down of time instead of a total freeze of time, and it looks like the iron sight gunplay from Fallout: New Vegas is making a return.
THE DEMO
The demo closed out with a number of the environments we had seen at the start of the showcase through concept art rendered in 3D.
New pip-boy interface which is fully animated and no longer just a dull neon green inventory screen but also a game machine with in game mini games that is fully animated in its every use providing a nice personal touch.
Minor smartphone and tablet integration with a pipboy app.
Your character can scrape different materials from around the world together and rebuild the wastelands environments and building all in real time allowing you to easily build your own settlement attracting traders and other wastelanders.
A power system is also in the game, all of which is easily built together and works within the game. Things that seemed to have once required a stack of mods and a gaming PC are now just built into the core experience.
You can even set up turrets to defend your camp from raiders.
Brahmin Caravans, which take items between settlements, can also be set up and will wander around the wasteland.
All of this settlement crafting crosses over into other parts of the crafting system, with parts being taken from items found in the world and used to build towards different items. This gives each item more of a purpose than ever before. All that once useless clutter you’d find in a Bethesda game can be used to customise and modify items and weapons you come across into all you new items.
This even includes modifying your own power armour to mirror the iconic robotic suit of the Fallout series.
FALLOUT SHELTER
The game brings all the charm and humor of Fallout to a more social gaming experience by putting you in the role of managing your own vault full of little vault dwellers in this new game for touch devices.
You can even send off your Vault Dwellers into the wasteland with a log kept on the encounters and environments that your dweller visits.
Vault dwellers have to deal with issues in the vault such as fires and mutant attacks. Your dwellers can even reproduce and you get to name them.
The game demo showed what seemed like a variety of different actions you can have your vault dwellers take with comparisons to games such as FTL made during the showcase.
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That’s pretty much it for Bethesda this year, and I have to say I am pretty damn excited for the next year of gaming from them. Let us know what you think on twitter and in the comments!