Alright, that’s me signing off for now. Here’s a quick schedule for the rest of the E3 press conferences and what to expect from them:
- Bethesda - tonight at 5:30 PM PT/ 1:30 AM BST: more on Doom Eternal and Wolfenstein Youngblood, probably nothing more on the next Elder Scrolls or Starfield
- Ubisoft - tomorrow at 1:00 PM PT/ 9:00 PM BST: at least two interesting new games, both of which have sadly already leaked and one of which might be of particular interest to those of us envisioning a grim post-Brexit future
- Square-Enix - tomorrow at 6:00 PM PT / 2:00 AM BST: the premiere of a new Avengers game will be the star here
- Nintendo - Tuesday at 9:00 AM PT / 5:00 PM BST: the scoop on a bunch of upcoming Switch games, from Pokémon to the Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening remake to (I hope) Animal Crossing.
Keep an eye on the Guardian Games channel for all the rest of the news from the show.
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The biggest news from Microsoft's E3 2019 conference
Now that it’s over, here’s the most important news from the night:
- Project Scarlett, the next-generation Xbox, will launch in “Holiday 2020” (in time for Christmas). Greater processing power and a high-performance SSD will give it the ability to both stream games seamlessly, and potentially eliminate load times.
- Microsoft’s Project xCloud service will also allow subscribers to play Xbox games anywhere, on any screen, streamed from the cloud - from this October.
- Halo Infinite will be a Project Scarlett launch game.
- Bleeding Edge, a new 4-versus-4 multiplayer brawler, is coming from Ninja Theory this year.
- Cyberpunk 2077 stars Keanu Reeves. Keanu Reeves!
- Xbox Game Pass Ultimate combines several Xbox and PC games services for $14.99 a month: Game Pass, which gives you access to a library of 100+ games, and Xbox Live Gold, which lets you play and talk online
- Microsoft has added to its video game development empire with the acquisition of Tim Schafer’s studio, Double Fine
- Gears of War 5 is out on September 10th on Xbox One
- This post was amended on 11 June 2019 to correct the release date of the next-generation Xbox.
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Here’s Halo Infinite in all its glory:
That’s a wrap for Microsoft’s E3 conference. I was expecting more on Project Scarlett to be honest, including a non-codeword name, but with so many games to digest in the meantime I can happily wait a while. Will have that full Halo Infinite trailer for you shortly.
Halo Infinite will be a Project Scarlett launch game
Halo returns in autumn next year to launch a new generation of Xbox consoles. The trailer shows a marooned space soldier forlornly watching old messages from his family, when Master Chief shows up outside his craft, suspended in the void of space. He’s fixed up and brought back to life, and the iconic shield bar appears at the top of the screen...
Project Scarlett is about power and performance, says Phil, where current consoles were about power. Scarlett is all about the ability to stream games as well as play them on-disc or from a download.
Microsoft announces next-generation gaming console
A new Xbox console, Project Scarlett, will be out in 2020.
From a processing perspective it is 4x as powerful as the Xbox One X, promising “resolution and framerates that we’ve never seen before” - 8k capability and 120fps. It’ll have a bespoke solid-state drive that delivers a 40x performance increase. What does this mean for players? No loading times and extremely high-end graphics. The word “seamless” came up about 12 times.
For those of us who really care about having a console, though, rather than a cloud service that streams anywhere, Microsoft has developed a cutting-edge new Xbox. Here we go.
Okay, here we go: Project xCloud is Microsoft’s cloud-streaming technology, and as of this October you will be able to use it to play your Xbox games anywhere, whether on a console at home or on another screen via streaming.
Phil Spencer is back. If we’re going to get a substantial next Xbox announcement, it’s going to be now.
Oooohohoho, here’s the new Hidetaka Miyazaki/FromSoftware game they’ve been working on with help from George RR Martin! The Elden Ring looks somewhat more colourful than Bloodborne and Dark Souls, a bit more Western-fantasy, and I’m here for it. There are still trademark FromSoft themes of flame and decay at work in this trailer, of course. No release date for that.
Another quick few trailers (is anyone else getting trailer fatigue by now?): Tales of Arise is coming to Xbox in 2020, Borderlands 3 is still happening later this year, and Microsoft has partnered with Smilegate to bring China PC hit CrossfireX to the console next year (it’s a first-person shooter, in case that wasn’t clear from all the men with guns in the trailer).
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Some quick analysis so far: the Xbox One launched at a time when Microsoft’s games division seemed to have no idea what it was doing, and thought it was a great idea to make the Xbox a kind of sports and TV entertainment hub with an always-on camera staring at you all the time. After they got rid of executive Dom Mattrick and replaced him with Phil Spencer, there was a slow turnaround towards the games-focussed approach we’re seeing tonight - but the games industry being what it is, it’s taken several years for the fruits of that change in strategy to appear.
Here’s that distressing Gears of War 5 trailer from earlier:
Sega has something to show: it’s Phantasy Star Online! I haven’t thought about that series in about 6 years. The free-to-play Phantasy Star Online 2 - which has been out on other platforms and in Japan for a long time - will be coming to the West via Xbox next year.
For some reason, my favourite driving game ever is getting an expansion that turns the whole thing into Lego. Forza Horizon 4’s Ralph Fulton is now standing next to a Lego sports car to tell us more about the Lego Speed Champions expansion: it’s out this week.
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Dying Light 2 - a more story-focussed follow-up to developer Techland’s zombie-dismemberment parkour game - is coming Spring 2020.
Alright, we can all have a breather now whilst Microsoft shows off a car-advert-esque commercial for its new pro controllers. We’re adding trailers to the liveblog where we can.
Why has this E3 conference turned into an episode of Robot Wars?
Gears of War 5 gets a release date
This Gears of War 5 trailer is giving me the absolute heebs. It’ll be out on September 10th - or, annoyingly, 5 days earlier for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers.
Flames and smoke appear to be engulfing everyone in the theatre for dramatic effect as a camera is lowered beneath the stage to show new footage of the game. These monsters look rather different (and more artificial) than the OG Gears Locust hordes. A new mode, Escape. is an “aggressive 3-player co-op experience”.
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Anthony Tan’s heavily Studio Ghibli-influenced game about magical (?) deer exploring a seemingly post-human world also looks super interesting.
This looks interesting: 12 Minutes, an interactive thriller about a man trapped in a time loop. (trailer incoming)
A new Dragonball Z action-RPG game is coming next year and I have nothing more to say about it because I barely knew what I was looking at. I’m so sorry, anime fans.
TT Games is making a new Lego Star Wars game for next year, spanning ALL NINE films.
A new trailer for Psychonauts 2 shows a game exactly as weird and rough-around-the-edges as I was hoping for. If you’ve never played Psychonauts, do yourself a favour and pick it up for about £1, it’s one of the strangest and best platformers I’ve ever played.
Wow, what a turnaround for Tim Schafer and his Double Fine studio over the years. From Psychonauts getting dropped and almost cancelled (by Microsoft, I should add) in 2005 to, presumably, an acquisition worth MANY millions.
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Matt Booty is here to remind us that Microsoft has added 7 new studios to its portfolio in the last year. (We know, Matt, you own all the things.) And now there’s another: Double Fine Productions, a huge acquisition for Microsoft.
Another blast from the past now in the form of Age of Empires 2: Definitive Edition, now in 4K with remastered audio. I hope they’ve replaced the godawful Scottish accents in the tutorial.
There have been some, let’s say, warm responses to Keanu’s appearance at the Xbox E3 event...
I'm crying. Like, legit crying. pic.twitter.com/WALt51R9st
— Hollie Bennett (@HollieB) June 9, 2019
IM LOSING MY SHIT IN HERE pic.twitter.com/UoXf4ciwo2
— Cat Karskens @ E3 (@saikocat) June 9, 2019
I AM FUCKING DEAD #cyberpunk2077 #E3 #e3xbox
— Rachel Weber 🔪 (@therachelweber) June 9, 2019
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This is rather unexpected - a new Microsoft Flight Simulator game taking centre stage at an E3 conference. It looks extremely beautiful, to be fair, a world away from the janky version I had in 1999
Now there’s a new confusing but good-value subscription option: Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, which comprises Xbox Live Gold (to play online) and Xbox Game Pass (for free games), on both Xbox and PC, for $14.99
Borderlands: The Handsome Collection, Hollow Knight, Metro Exodus and Batman Arkham Knight are all being added to Microsoft’s game subscription service, Xbox Game Pass. As was previously announced, the service is coming to PC (launching today in beta), with a specially selected range of games - including the Master Chief Collection.
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We’re adding in trailers as we go here - give the page a refresh to see ‘em.
I’m rather liking these indie games - the hand-drawn RPG Time: The Legend of Wright has a distinct Media Molecule feel, and before that we saw a cute-looking adventure game in which you toddle about with a cat. Trailers for those incoming. We’re also seeing the now-customary showreel of indie games, with about three seconds of footage for each.
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Oh good lord, I keep forgetting that Battletoads was ever a thing (and that it’s coming back), but here we are.
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Cyberpunk 2077 gets a release date
It’s 16th April 2020. Can’t wait. Here’s that trailer, featuring KEANUUUUU:
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Keanu seems charmingly convinced on Cyberpunk 2077 and its branching narratives. “The game is gonna be breathtaking,” he says. Someone in the crowd shouts back “You’re breathtaking!”
And KEANU REEVES!? That’s a get!
Now for an update on possibly the most-anticipated game of this whole show (that we know about): Cyberpunk 2077 from CD Projekt Red. Grimy neon, shady deals, drugs and, of course, extreme violence.
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Ooh, now for a world premiere: it’s Blair Witch game, set in 1996 and developed by Bloober Team (of Layers of Fear). There’s lots of mist and shaky first-person footage and torchlit terror.
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No new Xbox platform announcements yet, though - instead here’s more footage of Respawn’s new single-player Star Wars game Jedi: The Fallen Order, which does look bloody excellent. Lightsabers, humour, Titanfall-esque free movement... I’m here for it. And also for the ginger Jedi. That’s out 15 November this year.
Phil is talking up his favourite “two billion gamers worldwide” statistic, which he likes to bust out at every opportunity. Microsoft’s mission now, he says, is to connect people to games wherever they are, whomever they’re with - a post-platform approach, reading ever so slightly between the lines.
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Head of Xbox Phil Spencer is here to address the almost uncomfortably adoring crowd (“WE LOVE YOU!!!” screams one particularly enthusiastic fan).
Ah yes, Minecraft. (Microsoft owns EVERYTHING.) Minecraft Dungeons is block-building meets Diablo - we’ve seen it before, but it looks cute. It’ll be out Spring next year, with 4-player local and online multiplayer.
Ninja Theory (also now a Microsoft studio) is here to show Bleeding Edge, a new multiplayer melee combat game with a distinct DmC vibe: a bright acidic palette, bone-crunching action-violence and an unashamedly eccentric look. Here’s the trailer:
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The first game shown is a dystopian, colourful science-fiction affair. “This is Halcyon, the further colony in the galaxy, proudly owned and operated by corporations.” It’s The Outer Worlds, a new role-playing game from Obsidian (a recent Microsoft acquisition). It’ll be on Xbox Game Pass, on PC and Xbox One.
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Microsoft's E3 2019 Xbox press conference begins
A packed theatre in LA cheers as we’re shown a reel of recent Xbox games, from We Happy Few to Forza Horizon, and a glimpse of Master Chief.
In the room, a disembodied voice has just announced “This programme contains titles rated M for Mature”, to a wave of applause and cheering from the crowd, reports Alex. Yay... video games....
Just a few minutes to go now. Personally I very much hope we finally see the new Fable game that I’ve heard is in development at Playground. (ALLEGEDLY.)
Speaking of cloud-based streaming services: Google decided to spill the details of its own video games subscription service, Stadia, a few days ago. Long story short, you’ll pay £8.99 a month for a small selection of games and a la carte prices for more. Google is currently the main competitor to Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass service, so it’ll be interesting to see how they compare.
Developers are posting from the Xbox venue. Here’s the crew from Rare, so we can expect some kind of Sea of Thieves announcement.
Our billboard #SeaOfThieves pirate is in good company with this excited @Rareltd crew! #XboxE3 #E32019 pic.twitter.com/TwpvMKdywK
— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) June 9, 2019
We can expect the other big game publishers to show up in style, too - without wanting to upset anyone who considers an E3 leak a spoiler, the broad-stroke details of a big game from Ubisoft have already made it out into the open. Bandai-Namco’s new announcements have also leaked, and are very likely to show up at this conference.
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Now: let’s talk about what Microsoft has to show. Two things are relatively certain: we’ll learn more about Project Scarlet, the company’s upcoming new Xbox console, and we’ll get a firmer idea of the cloud-based subscription services that Microsoft has been talking up for the past year or so.
The house of Xbox has also been on a mad studio-acquisition run for the past couple of years, and we are likely to see what those studios have been up to under their new owners. Head of Xbox Phil Spencer promised 14 new first-party games at this conference, which would be a record. Expect plenty of new games alongside updates on Gears of War 5, Halo Infinite and the other long-standing Xbox franchises.
Here’s a photo from our tech editor Alex Hern, who’s in the room early for Microsoft’s press conference. It’s kicking off in 35 short minutes.
Some more wee news nuggets from yesterday’s EA show:
- FIFA 20 will have a street football mode called Volta Football, much to the delight of FIFA Street fans who have been languishing for years
- The unstoppable Sims 4 is getting a new expansion, Island Living, that brings a tropical setting, water sports and, uh, conservationism to the game, available on 21st June (16th July on consoles). There’s also a Pride pack featuring queer costumery and gender-neutral toilets.
- Some new EA-published indie titles were announced: Lost in Random, from the developers of Fe; British-made Rustheart; and an as-yet-untitled new game from Hazelight, makers of co-op prison-break game A Way Out
- Battlefield 5 is very much still a thing, and will be getting a Pacific-themed chapter this autumn
- Runaway battle royale hit Apex Legends’ second season begins July 2nd, and brings with it a new playable hero: Wattson. Take a look:
Before we start speculating about what’s ahead, though, let’s take a look at what’s happened in the run-up to E3 2019 so far. EA is holding its own separate event in LA, EA Play, as it has done for the past couple of years. The games shown were all known quantities - Battlefield 5, The Sims, Apex Legends, FIFA - but we did get a look at 15 minutes of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. Here’s that footage:
Hello and welcome to day one of E3 2019! I’m Keza MacDonald, video games editor, and I’ll be guiding you through today’s events (or tonight’s, if you’re in the UK). Microsoft’s press conference kicks off in about 45 minutes and with Sony absent this year, it will be the biggest video games news event of the week.
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