Trailer Watch: Microsoft Media Briefing @ E3 2013

It’s the 2013th annual Electronic Entertainment Expo! Sadly I’m not able to be there in person nor watch the briefings/press conferences/90 minutes adverts live. I’ll be as prompt as I can with Sony’s briefing but it’s on at 2am local so expect it tomorrow. Anyway, on with the Microsoft Media Briefing!

So, after the less than well received announcement for the Xbox One just a couple of weeks ago Microsoft are first to the stage for their 2013 E3 press conference. As videos become available I’ll update and add them to this post but for now I’ll mostly be talking about the major reveals and announcements in order.

First thing that happens is Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.

I don’t know how I feel about MGS V, I felt the franchise lost it’s footing in a big way after the third game and there’s only so much time in the whole of my life to tolerate Hideo Kojima’s nonsensical, logic defying plots. That being said, the trailer looked pretty goddamn awesome and it has some interesting features (real time weather is FINALLY happening!) so who the hell knows, it’s more Metal Gear Solid and it’s on the Xbox One, take it as you will.

Highlight of the segment: Hideo Kojima takes the stage says “Xbox One will make Metal Gear shine” then promptly leaves.

The Xbox 360 is getting a cosmetic upgrade, expect it to be a budget version of the 360S that hit shelves at the same time as the Kinect.
Xbox Live is following on from Playstation Plus and is offering free games, the first two are Halo 3 and Assassin’s Creed 2.

Hugely and bafflingly popular pseudo-MMO with tanks and micro transactions World of Tanks is coming to the Xbox 360, which means it likely won’t work on the Xbox One. I… Uh.. Yay?!

Following an announcement that confounds me there is a look at a pretty cool looking platformer Max: The Curse of the Brotherhood looks like it’s likely to be a fair few people’s last 360 game. It looks pretty interesting for what it’s worth.

Dark Souls 2 coming for the Xbox 360 for everyone who hasn’t cried into their cereal enough over the original and the previous game Demon’s Souls.

The Xbox 360 is dead to most though and it’s time for the Xbox One to take over.

First announcement for the Xbox One (aside from MGSV) Ryse, a mash up of the two great series’ that contained the phrase ‘of war’ at the end, I have to admit it looks pretty cool. The game is being played live on the stage, that makes it even more impressive – I’m looking forward to this game far more than I was expecting. Oh and it’s on the Cry Engine, so expect it to look goddamn beautiful.

HOLY SHIT A NEW KILLER INSTINCT! Oh hell yes! Sorry, I mean oh look Rare actually made a game that doesn’t look awful and it involves them going back to their old fighting game IP. This looks great and if it plays well could easily be the fighting game for the Xbox One.

Insomniac have made an Xbox game? Huh, interesting. It looks interesting though, Sunset Overdrive. Parkour, zombies and multiplayer. I’m sure there’s an Xzibit meme in there somewhere.

Forza 5, is a think and once again Gran Tourismo’s young upstart of a brother proves how much of an alcoholic drop out his older sibling has become, real McLaren on stage, rendered McLaren in game and it looks BEAUTIFUL! Cloud based AI that’s ‘smart’ and learns from how you play, your friends can play against an AI version of you that copies your driving style when you’re offline. Their name for it is ridiculous so I won’t be typing it thanks very much.

Minecraft is coming to the Xbox One. No shit.

Quantum Break makes an appearance and Remedy have apparently gone insane, saying that they have “set out to blur the lines between gaming and television.” there is a TV show that adapts to what you’ve done in game, and is about time travel. So, 2013 will mark the return of FMV? Wing Commander anyone? Honestly this game does seem pretty damn awesome even if I’m hugely skeptical that anything they’re talking about will work anything like it’s supposed to.

Cell shaded game D4, we’re committed to indie developers, there’s Mojang who’ve sold more copies of Minecraft than Blizzard have of World of Warcraft and there’s these guys too! Indie darlings Phil Fish and Jonathan Blow are both conspicuously absent. After Phil talked about killing himself if Fez never got released though I’d be dubious about putting him on stage too.

Project Spark looks like a peripheral free for all, GET A MICROSOFT SURFACE AND SMART GLASS AS WELL AS A CONSOLE AND YOU CAN BUILD WORLDS YO! Uh, Minecraft was on stage about 10 minutes ago. All told it looks interesting, I feel like I’m saying that a lot but so far nothing besides Killer Instinct has made me go insane yet. This looks like Xbox’s attempt at littlebigplanet. If it comes out even half as good as that I’ll be a very happy man.

Speaking of Smart Glass there’s now a demo for that and how it works with games. I have to admit it looks cool. They start playing Ryse when all of a sudden a Killer Instinct game is ready, 20 seconds later and they’re online and kicking ass. The producer is humiliating the community manager. They show off video uploads to the cloud and it looks like a good way to produce video content. The comminuty manager takes over, she yells “Broadcast” twitch pops up at the side and she humiliates the producer. No smack talk she just kicks his ass. Probably one of the best bits of the entire briefing so far as it felt the least scripted and awkward. The switching between applications and games was incredibly fast and pretty damn impressive.

A few announcements start coming in thick and fast, my internet started stuttering at this point so we’ll switch to opinionless bullet points as that was pretty much all I could do.

No limit on friends lists
Only one XBL subscription needed per house as it can be shared
Microsoft points are gone and replaced with local currenc
Technical difficulties as a demo goes silent. Crimson Dragon looks pretty cool though, I bet it will be a right royal pain in the arse to control.
Dead Rising 3! It’s a thing, it’s Xbox Exclusive. It looks amazing.
The Witcher 3 also for Xbox One.
EA look like idiots when the Battlefield 4 demo fails, the guy on stage was utterly clueless. HIGHLIGHT OF THE SHOW!
Black Tusk are making a game, gee, thanks for that.
Halo is coming to the Xbox One. Bookies all over the world will be devastated…
Pricing! $499, €499, £429. November release.
Respawn (aka the guys who made Infinity Ward not shit) announce their debut title Titanfall it’s Gears of Gundam and I have to admit it makes Call of Duty: Ghosts: we have masks! Look like the wet fart it really is.