I’m not often impressed with E3, but this year’s show was pretty damn good. There were welcome surprises through the course of the event, from the return of beloved IPs to entirely new reveals. More interestingly, though, there was a pretty sizeable presence for online games. Not quite MMOs, but as close as we can get these days. This week, we’ll be highlighting some of the best online games of the show.
#5 The Crew 2
I was never a huge fan of The Crew, but that’s mostly because it just wasn’t my cup of tea. The original game was packed with activities and made for great virtual road trips with friends, even if the cars didn’t handle so well. With Ubisoft’s reveal of The Crew 2 at E3 2017, it looks like the team is dialing everything up to 11 by making use of the massive world not just for racing/driving cars and bikes, but also boats and even planes, too. It’ll probably be a tough challenge to nail all of those down in one game, but if Ubisoft manages to figure it out, it should definitely be a worthy sequel.
#4 State of Decay 2
Zombie survival games don’t have such a great reputation these days, but Undead Labs’ State of Decay in 2013 was an interesting and unique take on the genre. The original State of Decay combined elements of your standard zombie survival shooter with aspects of sim games. Planning out and maintaining your base was just as critical as your marksmanship skills in State of Decay. You even had to pay attention to your relationships with other survivors. The one missing bit was the lack of online co-op, but the sequel’s got it. If everything else turns out to be mostly the same as the original, the co-op alone would make the game worth picking up.
#3 Sea of Thieves
We’ve covered Sea of Thieves a ton here at MMORPG.com and the game looks better and better every time we see it and E3 2017 was no exception. The demo shown gave us a great slice of the sort of co-op adventures we can expect to find in Sea of Thieves while also impressing us on a technical level with its awe-inspiring water effects. You can even launch yourself ashore via your ship’s cannons. What’s not to love about that?
#2 Monster Hunter World
The Monster Hunter series is beloved around the world for its compelling cooperative monster hunting gameplay. Monster Hunter World is significant in that it’s the first Monster Hunter to be developed for a powerful console since the PlayStation 2. The entries since then were on platforms such as the Wii and 3DS handheld. World will be available on the PlayStation 4 and XBOX One – but the most exciting reveal was the fact that the game will also be making its way to PC. That’s right; we’re getting an actual Monster Hunter game. Awesome!
#1 Anthem
Bungie made a huge splash with Destiny in 2014, arguably spawning an entirely new genre of sorta MMOs commonly referred to as the “loot shooter” or “shared world” shooter. We’ve seen studios such as Ubisoft tackle the formula with The Division, and obviously we’ve got Destiny 2 coming this year, but it’s been rumored BioWare would taking its own stab at things with a new IP and that rumor was confirmed at this year’s E3 with the unveiling of Anthem.
In Anthem, players take the role of exosuit wearing Freelancers eager to explore the dangerous world that exists outside the game’s walled city. Javelins, the aforementioned exosuits, can be customized to fit your playstyle with gear you pick up, and you can even use them to fly across the world, dive underwater, or survive deep underground.
The game looked absolutely gorgeous running on EA’s Frostbite engine, which should come as no surprise to anyone, but what we think will truly set the game apart from its peers is BioWare’s knack for excellent storytelling. Destiny may have been a good game, but it was a bit weak to say the least when it came to storytelling, and this is one area where BioWare has a serious advantage over its competition.
Got your own picks for this year’s E3? Share ‘em with us in the comments below!
