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Nintendo set up a massive screens for fans to play Super Smash Brothers Ultimate against one another

The Los Angelos Convention Center was buzzing with 60,000+ marketers networking, fanboys gawking at their favorite gaming franchises, and the click-click-click of zillion frantic buttons being pushed as gamers and journalists from around the world tried out the industry’s newest games for the first time.  I demoed lots of games, watched lots of trailers, and chatted with all sorts of video game makers, marketers, and journalist about what games they were most excited for in coming year.

Here are few pictures I took on the convention floor, but if you want to jump into the most anticipated video games just skip down.

Fans were getting  your picture taken with their  favorite video game characters

A rare lady journalist hit some zombies with a cleaver

Grown men standing around watching an animated trailer of two teenage girls making out. You know, standard video game convention  (The Last of Us 2 trailer)

Grown men getting very excited over Nintendo game props (Donkey Kong)

And lots and lots of grown men standing around playing video games (Destiny 2 Forsaken)

I’ve never seen so many flat screen tvs in my life, it was like Times Square and Woodstock had a really nerdy baby together.  Massive video game billboards punctuated by hired actors dressed as video game characters, with lines of fans who wanted pictures, promotional merch, and 15 minutes slots to play games.

The biggest game and console makers put on hour+ showcases covering their new and upcoming products, which means a lot of 40 to 50-year-old white guys nervously reading teleprompters in between playing video game trailers.   If you’d like to watch any of the big press conferences/showcases from Sony, Microsoft, Bethesdas, ect, Gamespot has them all on their youtube page. Bellow is summary of the most popular games that came out of those presentations.

To summarize the general sentiments of the convention:  Hardcore gamers still love and look forward to everything Bethesda and CD Projekt Red do, Nintendo fanboys didn’t get a lot of new games this year but stay loyal to brand,  Sony had the best exclusive games by far and the most VR, nobody seemed to be able to remember what Microsoft did other than play the Cyberpunk trailer, Fortnight is still inexplicably the biggest video game in the world, and everyone still hates Electronic Arts.

Now, here are the most anticipated games of 2018/19 coming out of E3:

1.Cyberpunk 2077

Polish gaming company CD Projekt Red are the darlings of the hardcore gaming community.  Their 2015 game the Witcher 3 won nearly every video game award worth mentioning, sold a zillion copies, and it never tried to monetize ingame features with loot boxes or other in-game purchasing tricks.  The Witcher 3 was a massive, intelligent, story driven, open world RPG based on Polish Medieval folklore, and it changed the way video game publishers will make games, forever.  CDProjekt Red’s next game is Cyberpunk 2077, it’s based on a book and role-playing game written by Mike Pondsmith, it’s a world that has been described as Blade Runner meets The 5th Element, meets Grand Theft Auto 5.  It’s been in production for several years, and probably will take another year or two more completion.  But the 45 minute demo they released at E3 blew the minds of the staunchest critics and fanboys.  All signs point Cyberpunk 2077 changing the gaming world, and giving fans hundreds of hours of next generation gameplay.  If you want a step by step recreation of the Cyberpunk 2077 demo, here is one from an expert critique.

2. The last of us 2

The award-winning story writing, emotional complexity, and incredible graphics of the first ‘Last of US’ game, had PS4 enthusiasts anticipating the second installment with high hopes.  The trailer did not disappoint.  It involves two teenage girls making out, then one of them quickly transitions into a machete infused murdering rampage.  Everything a young boy (ehem or grown man) could want in a post apocalyptic gaming experience.  Of all the games at E3, this game was mentioned most to me when I asked what stood out from the convention.

Naughty Dog (Los Angeles)
Known for:  Uncharted Series
PS4 Exclusive
Release Date: 2019

3.  Super Smash Bros: Ultimate

4. Assasins Creed Odessey

5. Phantom Doctrine

If you like turn-based games like XCOM2, you should be excited about this complex, espionage-based thriller out of Poland.  You get to run Spy networks like the CIA or the KGB, and later on even Mossad.  It’s all about solving state level covert operations with combat missions and collecting and studying evidence.  It’s a complex, dark, traitorous world that looks like a lot of fun.  I demoed this game in a club across the street from the LA convention center that people were calling ‘The Latin Hooters’…because it used to be Hooters, before someone bought it and gave it a latin hooters theme.  Picture a lot of red velvet and gold trim.  It was a hilarious place to play video games, any to read more about Phantom Doctrine go here.

CreativeForge Games (Poland)
PC, PS4 & Xbox One
Release Date: July/August 2018

7. Fallout 76

The Fallout series is another franchise that changed the way people thought about open world games.  The newest installation coming off the smash hit Fallout 4 looks very promising.  It’s adding live communal gameplay, and a much much bigger map.  Oh, and this time around you can launch nuclear warheads, so ‘yaay’.

Bethesda (Maryland US)
Elder Scrolls Series & Fallout
PC, PS4 & Xbox One
Release Date: November 14, 2018

9. Anthem

Racked by delays and developers walking off the job, this game has been both heavily anticipated and dreaded for a while now.  If it lives up to the hype it may revolutionize the way we construct combat movement and game worlds.  Flying around in an Ironman like suit ads so many dimensions to gameplay.  We all hope Electronic Arts doesn’t fuck this one up.

BioWare (Edmonton Canada)
Known for Mass Effect & Dragon Age Series
PC, PS4 & Xbox One
Release Date: February 22, 2019

10. Spiderman

People were skeptical as to whether Insomniac could solve the gameplay and control issues of past Spiderman games.  As it turns out, swinging from buildings and incorporating web play into combat is not an easy thing to do.  I got to demo this version and it felt like they finally nailed it.  2018 Spiderman should be a lot of fun.

Insomniac Games (Burbank CA)
Known for: Ratchet & Clank
Ps4 Exclusive
Release Date: September 7, 2018