Hello and welcome to Blacksci-fi.com’s coverage of the Electronic Entertainment Expo. or what industry folks call E3. This is arguably the biggest conference for the video game industry, and all the major players come ready to announce upcoming projects, games, and hardware that further consumer excitement and set media buzzing with all the goodies that are coming soon. Sit back and relax, while BSF gives you the relevant geeky news comes out this week. Next up on the list: Ubisoft.
Just like it’s rival Bethesda, Ubisoft came to this E3 with two known big games of its own. The Division 2 has been a known entity for a while, but many are curious if the next game can carve out its own distinct niche as games like Destiny 2 and the upcoming Anthem have the same style of game, but with futuristic settings. Assassins Creed: Odyssey was annouced just before E3, but nothing in the way of detail was known. Let’s take a dive in to Ubisoft’s presentation to see what was learned.
Division 2
Ok, so this game looks exactly like Division 1. The graphics look the same. The gameplay looks the same. The UI even looks exactly the same. For fans, however, this may not necessarily be a bad thing. The first game was hard to get in to, but once the patches came in and some areas opened up, the game really came into it’s own.
Division 2 expands on the story from the terrorist attack in New York during the winter time. It is now summer, and civil war has broken out in the United States. The story now moves to Washington D.C., home headquarters of the Division, as the user will battle with friends against the various factions littered across the city. The typical grindy level up is back, but now specialization trees have been added to give the player a more refined skill set to use when teaming up with friends.
Assassin’s Creed Odyssey
Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey takes players on a journey to ancient Greece during the volitile time period of the Peloponnesian War. They will interact, battle, and assassinate for either Athens or Sparta, immersing themselves in an open world that is made up of a bunch of water. Users will navigate the seas, ride on horseback, and leap across buildings with their…ok so this sounds like every Creed game ever, just in Greece this time.
Only it’s not! Odyssey takes place before the Assassin’s existed, so it’s not tied down to the lore of other games. This time, the game is about choice. The very first one is that one can choose to play as either a man or woman and shape their story the way that one wants to. Dialouge trees have been added to help mold characters to tell the story that you want told. Gameplay has also been refined, with the sneaky, shifty gameplay of the past coupled with the loud and proud swordplay showcased in last year’s Origins. One of my favorite moments was watching Kassandra, one of the main characters, fighitng in a huge battle like something out of Dynasty Warriors. And then in the middle of the battle, a boss character comes looking to fight her all while NPC characters are still fighting around her.
A narrative driven story design coupled with different playable characters, different fighting styles, land or sea battles, and possible love interests? I cannot wait to check out this game when it comes out on October 5th of this year.
Beyond Good and Evil 2
I’d like to take a moment to just point out that I will buy this game just to play as Shani, the pilot in the trailer. Finally, a playable black female character! Representation matters folks. Ok, ok so now that I’m off my soapbox this game looks amazing. Graphically the humanoid animal characters look amazing with vibrant expressions and in your face personality. This game came out on the original Xbox 15 years ago, and wow have they updated the premise, storyline, and vision for the future.
Final Impressions
Kudos to Ubisoft for their beginning presentation. I mean, how fun was the Just Dance 2019 band and dancers? Extra cool points to whoever decided to have a dancing bear.
I know nothing about Starlink: Battle for Atlas, but I need a Nintendo Switch so I can play as Starfox in this thing. That was a cool console exclusive announcement.
For the VR fans, Transference looks like a creepy, yet amazing experience. The bluring between fnatasy and reality could make for a trippy time, full of mind bending puzzles and sudden jump scares.
That concludes BSF’s coverage of Ubisoft. Stay tuned throughout the week for more updates.
Ryan Files is an avid comic book and video game consumer, reviewer, and critic hailing from the boondocks of Illinois. He has taken his ethnographic cultural studies background and applied it to his love of geekdom. He is a huge Star Wars nerd, Castlevania
