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britesparc · 4 years

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Weekend Top Ten #437

Top Ten Predictions for the Xbox Games Showcase

So I wasn’t going to do this. I had my “Games Month” in June; that was supposed to be me getting it out of my system whilst the various publishers and platform holders held their Not-E3 video livestreams. That was supposed to take the place of my usual semi-serious lists of E3 predictions; a variety of more generalised run-downs of Stuff To Do With Videogames rather than me saying “A New Perfect Dark” ten times.

But then Microsoft’s “Showcase” event turned out to be the back-end of July, the videos and livestreams kept on pouring in, and I found myself ever devouring more salacious rumours of what games were upcoming, especially for the Xbox Series X. I have even found myself reading – shudder – Reddit.

I know.

Anyway, from being a simple thought experiment of “I wonder what games will be out when the Series X launches?” through to me imagining a blow-by-blow runthrough of the July 23rd event, I guess you could say that I am excited despite my better judgement. I think my problem with videogaming as a hobby is that I retain my fanboy enthusiasm from when I was a ten-year-old eagerly awaiting the next issue of The One Amiga, frantically swapping all eleven disks of Monkey Island 2, but I’m a grown-ass man with a mortgage and two kids and I just don’t have the time. I love reading websites like Eurogamer, and going on forums and checking out Twitter threads and all that, devouring news and titbits about all manner of gaming ephemera, and I often think when do these people have the time?!

Now look, I know hobbies, if you commit to them, can be expensive in terms of money and time. I have friends who collect Transformers toys, and let me tell you, that shit ain’t cheap. But daisy-chaining triple-A RPGs together feels like a lifetime commitment. I’m still playing Mass Effect Andromeda and Titanfall 2. I’ve just started Breath of the Wild and I’m waiting to kick off The Witcher III once I complete something else. I operate about two to three years behind the curve, and with work and kids and other commitments I struggle to find space for the oodles of games I do have, especially because most of the time I just end up on Civilization VI again. And yet…

The lure of the new still excites me. I really want to play all those Sony games on a Sony console that I don’t even own. I’m fascinated by the divergent next-gen philosophies of the big three platform holders. I can’t wait to see what the games I already own will look like embiggened on a 4K TV thanks to a suitable next-gen console. And so I keep consuming this stuff, keep wanting to try the latest thing, keep wanting to be part of the narrative. I’m still excited.

Therefore I’ve decided, against my better judgement, to offer up a prediction list like I usually do at E3 time. This one is just focussed on the upcoming Xbox Showcase on July 23rd. I doubt I’ll do one for the two remaining big showcases in August – I believe both Sony and Microsoft are doing one apiece, where we might finally hear prices of these damn things – because I think by the end of the month all the big game news might finally be out there. Aside from guessing how far off £500 both machines land, I think we’ve probably heard all the major announcements. Maybe I’m wrong! I’m wrong quite a lot! But that’s part of the fun.

So here we go: ten things that probably aren’t going to be announced next Thursday!

Halo Infinite opens the show – and is playable: we know that Halo Infinite will debut some campaign gameplay. As more-or-less a known quantity (even if we don’t know exactly what it’ll look like or how it’ll play), kicking things off with Xbox’s biggest star makes sense and won’t deflate any surprises. What I think might happen, though, is the announcement of some kind of multiplayer demo or closed beta, maybe only for Game Pass subscribers or something. They’ve done it before with Halo, so it’d be nice to get a chance to play one of the year’s biggest games early.

Hellblade 2 in-engine trailer: Senua’s Saga looks amazing so far, with a phenomenal launch trailer that displayed vast landscapes, intense detail, and some truly awesome facial animation. There’s a lot of speculation that, whilst the trailer was apparently in-engine and running in realtime, it was a fancy cut-scene with “hero assets”. I might have missed a memo somewhere, but I don’t think Hellblade 2 has been confirmed as a “launch window” title; as such, I think it will end up a Series X exclusive (as in, not appearing on Xbox One) and be out Christmas 2021. As such we won’t see a considerable gameplay chunk as with Halo, but we will see some proper in-engine footage – not a cutscene – running on Series X hardware.

Fable IV is out next year: is it an open secret at this point that Playground Games is making a Fable game? I guess maybe they’re not. Maybe there’s not even a new Fable at all. But I think there is, and I think Playground are making it, and I think we’ll see it next week. I guess it probably won’t be coming too soon; maybe Christmas 2021? So I think there’ll be a launch trailer of some kind – hopefully a Hellblade-style in-engine one rather than a rendered movie – but it’ll be a pretty big to-do to close out the show (unless there’s some other surprise “…and one more thing”).

Minecraft ray-tracing: we’ve seen it before, and I’m not sure how much time it’ll take up in the run of things, but I think Microsoft will confirm that there will be a ray-tracing graphics update for Minecraft on Series X. It’ll be part of some other line-wide update, of course – maybe the fabled “Super Duper Graphics” update that was cancelled once before – but Series X owners (or PC owners with the right hardware) will get lots of lovely rays to trace.

Gears Tactics on Xbox this Christmas: the Coalition said their piece about Gears 5 on Series X this week, so I don’t expect them to have a huge presence on Thursday (Gears 6 presumably being too far off), but I think we’ll get a trailer for the excellent Gears Tactics running on Xbox, and confirmation of a Christmas release for one of my favourite PC games of 2020.

Cyberpunk 2077 on Series X: all the footage we’ve seen of Cyberpunk thus far has been – I do believe – running on high-end PCs. CD Projekt Red should have a presence on Thursday, and I think they’ll debut footage – actual proper gameplay – of Cyberpunk running on a Series X. I think we’ll also see further evidence of a cosy relationship with Microsoft, as they announce something – maybe exclusive DLC – as well as just maybe some Cyberpunk-themed Series X hardware. I also think they’ll announce a Series X update for The Witcher III: Wild Hunt.

Big Double Fine blowout: Microsoft’s purchase of Double Fine really excited me, because I’ve been a big Tim Schafer fan for decades. Aside from Psychonauts 2, we don’t know a great deal about what they’re up to. So I think we’ll see a lot of Psychonauts, as well as confirmation of a Christmas release. We’ll also get confirmation of classic LucasArts remasters – Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle, and Grim Fandango – as well as something else. I’m not sure what. A remaster of the first Psychonauts? Brütal Legend 2? Scurvy Scallywags Series X? what I don’t think it’ll be, however, is any kind of Banjo Kazooie game, because I don’t really think Microsoft bought them to work on existing IP. I think we’ll see something new.

Third-party shenanigans: aside from Cyberpunk, I think we’ll get at least one other extended third-party trailer. Maybe Destiny 2, given the first game’s apparent preference for PlayStation? Maybe one of those military shooters everybody likes but me? Splinter Cell, which is becoming the perennial white elephant during Ubisoft presentations (and obviously has prior as an OG Xbox exclusive)? Or maybe we’ll see something like the announcement of Red Dead Redemption 2 as a Smart Delivery title. That would be pretty cool.

Japanese presence: I’m not sure what exactly, but I think Microsoft will make moves to entice the Japanese market. Perhaps it’ll be like the early days of the Xbox 360, when they published the likes of Blue Dragon. Maybe we’ll see a Western release of some venerated Japanese franchise. Or maybe some other sequel or reboot. Maybe it’ll even be the rumoured announcement of some kind of exclusive partnership with Sega? Who knows? Regardless I think we’ll see evidence of Microsoft making more of an effort in Japan; I think this will be part of a strategy to encourage Japanese gamers to subscribe to Game Pass/xCloud rather than buy more consoles.

One last thing: there’ll be a surprise. Everyone’s predicting everything, but I still think there’ll be a surprise. After the dust settles, good old Phil Spencer (t-shirt prediction: Viva Pinata) will leave us with a little something… a tease, a subtle tease, maybe even just a logo or character reveal. It could be a returning franchise, it could be The Initiative’s debut game, but I’d wager it’s something unexpected, something we’ve never heard anything about. It’s something that’s a long way off, but it’ll have a style or a hook or a brand that instantly makes everyone excited, and will bring the curtain down. Microsoft has largely done a good job establishing itself as a solid platform the last three or four years, but it’s sorely been lacking in mic-drop moments as hardware news is teased and studio acquisitions have taken time to bed in. So whether it’s Joanna Dark, a Mech, Banjo, or something I can’t fathom, we’ll leave on a high.

There we go: ten relatively reasonable, moderately level-headed predictions. I don’t think there’s anything too crazy there. I’ve not gone all-in on a huge Perfect Dark blowout, or Viva Pinata returning, or Microsoft buying Sega or Warner Bros or whatever else could be dreamed up. I’m sure there’s other stuff too; probably some gameplay from previously-announced titles like The Medium or (hopefully) Scorn, that really show off Series X capabilities; no doubt a montage or two, probably of some ID@Xbox games; Forza Motorsport 8, I guess, and I’d wager some info on Flight Simulator on Xbox. I do hope they make the whole presentation look nice though; Sony’s one, where they finally revealed the PS5 hardware, was excellent, with just enough talking-head developer stuff and those lovely idents that served to whet the appetite and tease the eventual look of the machine. We know there’ll be no new hardware or discussion about evolving services, so really all we’ve got to look forward to are games, games, games, which makes a nice change from the reveal of the Xbox One all those moons ago.

Okay, so my absolute crazy just-for-me wish? Well, things are getting thin on the ground now, as the big things I always want from Microsoft – Fable, Crackdown, Perfect Dark – have either happened or are strongly rumoured. Viva Pinata is next on that list, but beyond that? How does Black and White Infinite sound? That’s right, baby, next on my list – Lionhead rebooted!

#top ten #microsoft #xbox #xbox series x #halo infinite #games #gaming #xbox showcase

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