In the ashes of the Electronic Entertainment Expo, amid the bloat and pretense of the games industry, always must there be a presentation... always must there be game trailers... and always must there be those who commentate. So it is that we find ourselves in the aftermath of this year's collected summer showcases, a cavalcade of announcements and information to parse in its wake. For my part, I set forth to note the games that stood out among the pack. Today, we go over the high points of the Future Games Show , the Xbox Games Showcase , the PC Gaming Show and, yes , even the Ubisoft Forward . Heaven help us all... Future Games Show The High Point: Duck Detective: The Secret Salami The premise of “riffing on the hardboiled detective story with talking cartoon animals” would be a fine selling point for a game in itself. The choice to also lean into a sticker book aesthetic, complete with characters hobbling around as barely moving objects in a scene? Now that's a fun time ...
On March 30th, it was made public that this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo would be cancelled. This decision was attributed to the strain of the ongoing plague and an increasing number of studios electing not to attend. This would be only the latest in a line of troubles faced by the long-running trade show. Setting aside that two of the previous three shows were also cancelled for similar reasons, the 2021 expo faced criticism for pivoting to an online-only interface that had technical issues, lacked vital information and came across as irrelevant in the face of individual game publishers' digital showcases. The last pre-pandemic show in 2019, meanwhile, was embroiled in controversy over the leaking of personal information for thousands of media professionals attending E3. It's not unthinkable that this latest cancellation will prove to be the fine point capping off a larger industry narrative: the decline and impending death of E3. Nevertheless, the gears of ind...