Bethesda’s E3 keynote had some great reveals. Fallout 76 is getting a massive update, Doom Eternal has a release date, and Shinji Mikami has a new horror game.
Arkane is a studio best-known for the Dishonored series of action-adventure games, but the team is back with something very different. Called Deathloop, it’s a first-person game about two assassins caught in an “eternal struggle.”
It wasn’t just games on display. Bethesda also unveiled Orion, a new technology to improve cloud game streaming, that the company says will work with any game engine. It sounds impressive, and the developer demoed it on stage by streaming Doom the 2016 version on a mobile phone. A beta is launching later this year.
The sequel to 2016’s reboot of Doom looks as violent as ever in its new story trailer, which details some of the new locations you’ll be exploring and the demons you’ll be shooting. More importantly, it includes a release date: November 22nd.
Last year, Bethesda unveiled Wolfenstein Youngblood, a spinoff of the shooter series that adds co-op play and a distinctly ‘80s vibe. The latest trailer shows more of what you’d expect namely, lots of killing nazis. The game is launching on July 26th simultaneously on Xbox One, PS4, PC, and the Nintendo Switch.
Elder Scrolls Blades, which just recently launched in open beta on mobile. The free-to-play dungeon crawler will hit the Switch this fall, and it’ll support cross-play and cross-progression with the existing mobile iterations.
Fallout 76 didn’t have the best launch, but things have steadily improved for the online game, and Bethesda unveiled its biggest update yet, called “wastelanders.” The big change? Human NPCs, a mainstay of single-player Fallout games, are coming to the game. They’ll introduce new storylines! Perhaps even more surprising, the update will bring a 52-player battle royale mode, called “nuclear winter.”
Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami revealed his studio’s next project, an action adventure experience called Ghostwire: Tokyo. The premise sounds a lot like the Leftovers, only scarier: people have mysteriously vanished in the titular city, and it’s up to you to find out why and where. And while it’s a horror game, it’s not the survival horror experience the director is known for, with more action-oriented gameplay. It’s the latest release from Mikami’s studio Tango Gameworks, best-known for The Evil Within series, and is being directed by Ikumi Nakamura, who previously worked on games like Okami and Bayonetta.
Early ‘90s side-scrolling action series Commander Keen is back, but in a very different form. This time around, it’s a free-to-play, Saturday morning cartoon-styled mobile game, that will be available in soft launch this summer on both iOS and Android.
Over-the-top, post-apocalyptic shooter Rage 2 is getting a big expansion called “rise of the ghosts.” In addition to the typical additions, like new quests, weapons, and vehicles, the expansion will add a very important new gameplay element: mech suits. There’s no release date yet, but it’ll be available later this year.
