E3 Day One: Great Beginnings, Or Dead Air? (Part 2)

​     So on a subjective basis it can be said that the EA conference for E3 2016 was not as good as it could have, or truthfully should have been, can one say that the conference for Bethesda was better? In a word, yes, and there are a decent amount of reasons for this to be the case. Most simply is the pacing of the presentation, while it may not have been as well paced as their conference the previous year, when compared to EA, it is heads above it in that respect. Once again the presentation started with the old X-Play crew (Adam Sessler, and Morgan Webb) getting the crowd prepared with their banter that still works well, while this part of the conference started it off slow, you could tell it was more of a way to keep the audience preoccupied with small info dumps,including the announcement that Fallout shelter was being updated, and being brought to PC later in the year, as well as info about the card game 'Elder Scrolls: Legends'. 

     Though once the conference started, it started with a bang, that being of Quake: Champions. At a cursory glance of what the trailer reveals, its seems as though it is somewhat of a hero shooter,while seemingly retaining its multiplayer, arena shooter roots that were introduced in Quake 3 Arena. Other than the fact that it is going to be a PC only game,not much info was given other than more shall be revealed at this years' Quake Con. While it was previously mentioned that this conference had a better time with their pacing and presentation there were still some hiccups throughout the show, that do make some sense due to it being a trade show by name, it still felt as though a bit too much time was given to patting their own back which had the tendency to slow things down considerably. Other than that tendency, and spending a bit too much time on the Elder Scrolls themed card game, the presentation picked up some steam, and seemed to retain that energy through till the end.

     The next thing to be talked about was the upcoming DLC for Fallout 4, two of them are for the workshop part of the game, while both look interesting, especially the Vault Tec workshop (which allows you to build and run your own Vaults) the real meat of that is the reveal of the Nuka World DLC, which is apparently a Nuka Cola theme park. While there was not a lot of actual information of the DLC other than the individual trailers, the brevity of the presentation was appreciated overall. Someone from Arkane Studios came onstage and showed off a trailer and a bit of information about a reboot/re-imagining of the game series 'Prey' which is seeming to go for a bit of a sci-fi shooter, thriller vibe with the story. The gameplay looks interesting and more information is easily anticipated for this title. After that they announced new free updates coming to doom, and the first info given about the first piece of multiplayer DLC for the game, it was announced that they will allow people to download Doom on all platforms for free to play the first level for free, which is their new form of 'Shareware'. After some ESO (Elder Scrolls Online) info, mainly about the new DLC, and some more pacing issues about the plans they have for VR (more specifically focused with the HTC Vive) they ended the presentation on a gameplay demo for Dishonored 2. While the new stuff with Emily was cool, and the new graphics engine was beautiful, the presentation felt slightly rushed. It can be said that the beginning of E3 2016 didn't have the same power that it did last year, and EA having a less than stellar showing, overall the Bethesda conference built a bit of the confidence back, even with its pacing issues and abrupt end, there is enough to be excited for to keep watching till the end.