When I woke up today, I knew Bethesda would show something special at E3...I also knew they would show Elder Scrolls Online. You see, I thought Elder Scrolls Online would just be another PC MMORPG, destined to get lost in the waters of WoW, SWTOR, GW2, and EVE Online. But when I finally had my coffee and really woke up, I came to find out it's also a CONSOLE MMORPG. Now we're talking, Bethesda. My PC and console are about to have a beautiful MMO baby. Hopefully it will have all its fingers and toes.
Then Bethesda trotted out a new IP and a reboot of a classic. Bethesda, you are too kind good sir, but these are the people that brought us Skyrim. I should have known they were working on something special. Elder Scrolls Online just may turn out to be that something special.
The Evil Within
Bethesda is ready to recharge the horror genre with a brand new IP that is old school, stealthy, strategic, and most of all...pants-poopingly terrifying. Go ahead and watch the trailer. Then come back here and we’ll talk about the naked chick with four arms that seeped up out of a pool of blood. Do you want to fight that thing? I don’t think so. This game is swinging for the fences to scare the shit out of you, and it is well on its way.
The real core of the game is going to be stealth and strategy. You have limited ammo, you can be injured and slowed down, and this game is going to mess with your head. Imagine standing in a hallway when a wave of blood suddenly rushes around the corner and knocks you not only down, but into a trippy and creepy whole new area. One minute you are in a hallway, next minute you are somewhere else completely. The Evil Within’s goal is to do everything it can to throw you off balance and keep you on the edge of your seat and from what was shown at E3, it is going to succeed in doing just that.
The Evil Within releases on PC, 360, PS3, XBoxOne, and PS4 sometime in 2014.
Wolfenstein: The New Order
Do you remember the first ever FPS game you ever played? There’s a good chance it was Wolfenstein 3D, and Bethesda is bringing the game around again, this time with even more Nazis to kill. Except in this world, the Nazis won the war and are using a powerful new technology to bend the world to their will. Your job is to kill those Nazis. You’ve done it before and now it’s time to do it again.
This new game is set in the 1960’s and you are B. J., the original bad ass from the original game. But after your last Nazi killing spree, you ended up in a coma for 14 years. When you wake up in a mental institution, you have no idea who you are or what is going on, but the Nazis have come to kill you. This is where the game takes the typical FPS formula and runs with it. Kill a wave of Nazis, and move through the level. Rinse and repeat. It may not be new or different, but who doesn’t like killing Nazis?
Wolfenstein: The New Order releases on PC, 360, PS3, XBoxOne, and PS4 by the end of 2013.
The Elder Scrolls Online
Ask most gamers what they thought about this game after E3 last year and you will probably hear a whole bunch of “mehs." But Bethesda is righting the ship, and The Elder Scrolls Online may just end up stealing the show when it comes out next spring.
This is not your typical MMORPG. First off, it is coming out on the new consoles! “Big deal," you say? Yeah, it is a big deal. 200 PvPers attacking a castle together on a console is a huge deal. Action-based tactics in an optional first-person view (just like Oblivion and Skyrim) is also huge. This isn’t a target-based MMO. Bethesda wants it to play as much like its predecessors as possible with weapon wielding, blocking, and dodging just like it has always been in the Elder Scrolls series.
The game starts off in Daggerfall, which will sound familiar to any fan of the Elder Scrolls. All of Tamriel will be playable however, which means you will loot and quest your way through Cyrodiil, and Skyrim again as well. A whole new huge, lush, open world is going to be out there waiting for you and your friends. Let me say that again. Now you can quest with your friends in the world of the Elder Scrolls, and there isn’t much more out there exciting than that.
Bethesda is also making a point to not dumb the console versions down. They are saying that the consoles can more than handle their new game, and that there will be no difference between the PC/Mac and console versions. PC and Mac players can play together, but XboxOne and PS4 players will still be sectioned off in their own worlds. This is a game to be excited about now.
The Elder Scrolls Online releases on PC, Mac, XBoxOne, and PS4 in Spring of 2014.
