It is that time of the year again! E3 season is upon us, which means there is going to be a ton of predictions, live blogs, and reactions for the better part of the next week or two. We, of course, will be joining in the fray with coverage throughout next week. However, we still feel compelled to publish our own preview piece. The typical preview and prediction posts tend to be overdone; as such, we have decided to do something a bit off-center and fun. We are going to predict the reactions to E3 announcements, and we would love to see your reaction predictions in the comments!
Prediction #1: “It makes total sense for EA/Origin Access to merge with Xbox Game Pass!”
At the beginning of the year, a rumor surfaced from inside sources that Microsoft was pondering acquiring EA, among other publishers. While getting the entire EA suite of sports games as exclusives would be a huge get, there would be too much backlash from PlayStation owners. However, EA Access is exclusive to the Xbox One already and has gotten recent backlash for the lack of new additions to the service. Moreover, Origin Access, the PC version, has started to add non-EA games in recent months, some that are already on Game Pass. It makes much more sense for the two “Netflix but for games” services to merge than the two entire companies.
Prediction #2: “That brand new exclusive IP from Microsoft is a game changer!”
Let’s be honest here, Microsoft has taken a lot of hits lately with Scalebound being canceled and now Crackdown 3 being delayed yet again, among other things. With that said, we know Microsoft has stated that they are moving to a Nintendo-like announcement schedule where they will announce a new game only when it is ready to be released within the next year. With that information (and the fact they need a huge win), it seems to be the perfect time to announce a new exclusive IP that pushes Microsoft into a direction they have rarely gone down.
Prediction #3: “About time Sony announced some release dates at E3!”
I have been highly vocal about my distaste of the current E3 strategy from Sony of just showing video after video with almost no break or talking in between, while also almost never announcing release dates. With the news of no pre-show this year and the hope that they have heard the feedback from fans, it feels like this could be the year that we see them announce some release dates and maybe a few broader timeframes for a few of the games that are a bit further out, such as Death Standing.
And there you go, a few predictions from us that we had on the reactions to E3 announcements! Will all three happen? Likely not. Will any of them happen? Possibly. Is this a part of the fun we used to have regarding E3 before leaks started to ruin everything? Absolutely! Remember to drop your reaction predictions in the comments below and to watch this space next week for coverage on everything E3! (Ryan Williford)
Ouch That Hertz! 