Table of Contents

EA
Microsoft
Bethesda
Devolver Digital
PC Gaming
Limited Run Games
Ubisoft
Square Enix
Nintendo
Nintendo Treehouse

Square Enix’s E3 2019 Press Conference

I love a lot of Square Enix games, so their press conference is one I always look forward to. They already showed the Kingdom Hearts III DLC trailer and a new Final Fantasy VII Remake trailer at concerts ahead of time, so would their press conference beat that?

Oh yes. It did.

They started out with the Final Fantasy VII Remake, but it wasn’t just a simple rehash of the trailer. Instead, they gave us new footage and a closer look at the combat system – which uses “Tactical Mode” once your ATB bars have filled to slow time and choose actions from your menu. It’s basically a hybrid action/turn-based system, which is much more than I expected. It looks fantastic, and I’m really happy with what we saw.

The only thing I’m uncertain about is the implication that the first game (which releases on March 3) is solely Midgar. I didn’t really start to enjoy Final Fantasy VII until I left Midgar, so I was really hoping they wouldn’t do that.

Anyway, then they showed stuff from Life Is Strange 2, followed by Crystal Chronicles Remastered, which has a winter release date and added mobile version to the already-announced Switch and PS4 versions. Speaking of the Switch, The Last Remnant is out for the Switch… right now!

We also got a new trailer for Dragon Quest Builders 2, which looks like it’ll be fun and has a demo coming on June 27, as well as Dragon Quest XI S (still not sure what I’ll do, since I have the PS4 version already).

After a montage of games from the Square Enix Collective, they announced a new racing game called Circuit Superstars. Then they showed a trailer for Batallion 1944, followed by the announcement that Square Enix music is now available through music streaming services.

For me, it had slowed a little by this point, but they’d already shown a lot of great stuff. They followed the music announcement with a repeat of the Kingdom Hearts 3 DLC trailer from the other day. I already discussed it over at my KH Theories site, but I’ll share it again here.

Then they went to Final Fantasy XIV to show the new expansion, Shadowbringers. Normally I wouldn’t be too interested in MMORPG news, but I’ve gotten back into Final Fantasy XIV and am enjoying it.

Anyway, the trailer was pretty cool, and I’m excited to (one day, eventually) catch up to that in the story.

They showed some of Dying Light 2, then announced that Romancing SaGa 3 and SaGa: Scarlet Grace Ambitions are both being localized. (Not only that, but even the Vita version of Romancing SaGa 3 is coming west!) I’ve never played any of the SaGa games, but maybe I’ll try one eventually.

War of the Visions: Final Fantasy Brave Exvius is also being localized. I played a little bit of Brave Exvius, but I’m just not enough of a mobile gamer, I guess.

They announced a shooter called Outriders, showed another trailer for Oninaki (which I’m tentatively interested in), and then revealed…. Final Fantasy VIII Remastered! Yes, after being overlooked and skipped, Final Fantasy VIII is being remastered for the PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Switch.

Finally, they closed the show with Marvel’s Avengers. I’m not a huge Avengers fan, but I know people were really looking forward to seeing this.

I was really hoping to see something from Babylon’s Fall, but even so, I can’t complain. This was by far the best press conference of E3 2019 so far in my opinion. Tomorrow, we’ll see if Nintendo’s show can compare…

What did you think of Square Enix’s E3 2019 press conference?

Table of Contents

EA
Microsoft
Bethesda
Devolver Digital
PC Gaming
Limited Run Games
Ubisoft
Square Enix
Nintendo
Nintendo Treehouse

E3 2019 PC Gaming Show

The PC Gaming Show tends to include a lot of games I’m not particularly interested in, but there are some cool things as well. This time, they started out by announcing Evil Genius 2, but then moved on to Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines 2. I’m pretty interested in that one, since the first Bloodlines has been in my backlog for while a while. Paradox also released an extended trailer.

I’m not particularly interested in Starmancer or the newly-announced Chivalry II, but the game showed after those, Mosaic, looks like it could be interesting. They moved on to show Midnight Ghost Hunt, Unexplored 2, and a short montage of trailers including Mutant Year Zero, Conan Unconquered, and another one I’m excited for, Moons of Madness.

Conan Chop Chop was revealed to be an actual game rather than a joke, and then they showed Last Oasis, Age of Wonders: Planetfall, Zombie Army: Dead War 4, and Remnant: From the Ashes.

Two years ago, Griftlands was revealed and seemed pretty interesting. It’s changed quite a bit, now being a card-based roguelike, so I’m not sure how I feel about it anymore. After that, they showed Planet Zoo.

Then Yu Suzuki took the stage to introduce a new trailer for Shenmue III. I’m tentatively interested in Shenmue despite only watching playthroughs of the first two, but the trailer looks very, very Shenmue.

They announced a new game called Songs of Conquest, a Vermintide 2 update, a base-building game called Per Aspera, talked more about Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey, went through a brief montage of trailers, and then showed something called AutoChess.

A few times earlier, they’d mentioned that a love letter to classic JRPGs would be coming up, and then they finally showed it, an indie game called Cris Tales that involves some sort of time travel, from the looks of it. Cris Tales has a demo up on Steam, so I’ll be trying that soon.

After a new game called Valfaris, they talked about Borderlands 3 for a while, then Maneater, and then revealed a new expansion for Terraria. Then they showed some of Telling Lies, which is the next game from the developers of Her Story. They described it as “open world,” which seems mainly related to the amount of freedom you’ll have.

Then they showed Warframe again, followed by an unusual-looking game called Genesis Noir. After a cute stealth game called El Hijo, it was time for one I’d been waiting for: Baldur’s Gate III!

…Except they didn’t actually show anything new from it, just talked about how they came to be working on it and announced a tabletop game set as a prequel to Baldur’s Gate III. So that was a bit disappointing.

That concluded the PC Gaming Show, just in time for Limited Run Games!

Limited Run Games E3 2019 Showcase

Limited Run Games is great if you prefer physical copies of games that otherwise wouldn’t get them. They started out with Night in the Woods, a game I’ve been meaning to get for a while.

What happened next was the absolute best part of the press conference, as they defended the Vita in full JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure style, complete with a screen showing his Stand later on.

Anyway, the actual lineup of final Vita games was Deadbolt, Guacamelee, Super Mutant Alien Assault, Pix the Cat, Revenant Dogma, Mutant Blobs Attack, Rocketbirds, Atari Flashbacks, Super Meat Boy, Damascus Gear Operation Osaka, and Metal Slug 3. (I never heard of Revenant Dogma before, but it looks like my sort of game, so I’ll be looking into it.)

Papers, Please is getting a physical release, as is Power Rangers: Battle for the Grid. That last one is actually available now. They followed it with Hover and Transistor.

Next came another rapid-fire lineup, this time for the Switch, showing Rogue Legacy, Bad North, Dark Devotion, and Blazing Chrome.

They showed longer trailers for the next few games getting physical releases, Freedom Planet, Turok + Turok 2, Blaster Master Zero, and Red Faction.

In a surprise announcement, Limited Run Games is now supporting the 3DS. They announced the Atooi Collection, which contains Mutant Mudds, Bomb Monkey, Xeodrifter, Mutant Mudds Super Challenge, and Chicken Wiggle.

Moving away from the 3DS to FMV games, Corpse Killer and Double Switch are getting 25th Anniversary Edition remasters. They also announced realMyst for the Switch and a release date for Mercenary Kings: Reloaded Edition.

The biggest surprise might have been that LRG will have the exclusive Shenmue III Collector’s Edition (with limited copies, so you’d better be quick when the time comes).

Finally, they announced a collaboration to release Collector’s Editions of numerous Star Wars games, starting with Star Wars: Bounty Hunter for the PS4 and Star Wars for the NES/Game Boy (although it’s not clear yet if that’s coming to the PS4 or its original platforms or what).

Anyway, the JoJo reference alone made it worth tuning in to see what Limited Run Games had to say.

Did you enjoy the PC Gaming Show and LRG’s E3 2019 press conference? Tune in soon so we can discuss Ubisoft’s press conference, which is coming up next!