This year has been a real return to form for E3 in my opinion. Previous years have had little to excite or entice me but the 2021 presentations have left me struggling to pick which five games I am the most excited for. Well, pick I must, and here are the five games I have settled on that I need as soon as possible!
5) Elden Ring
Why am I talking about this game? Soulsbornes and I don’t get on, and even when I’m not completely hopeless at them my lack of patience when it comes to difficulty means I don’t tend to get very far. That said, I have to say I truly adored the look of Elden Ring when gameplay for it was finally shown off. The world looks as inviting yet hostile as previous FromSoftware games, but as I have learned during my recent adventures with Remnant From The Ashes, if I can lean on other players in co-op then I will absolutely do that.
I doubt it will be a day one purchase for me (to give others the chance to enjoy it before they end up carrying me through) but I’ll certainly wind up on it eventually. See, I can be a team player when I want to be..
Elden Ring is currently scheduled for release on 21st of January 2022.
4) Battlefield 2042
I don’t tend to dip into Battlefield games early in their release cycles but I can tell that 2042 is going to be the exception here. The huge 128 player battles shown off in the gameplay trailers look as cinematic and chaotic as you could hope for with the new addition of natural disasters occurring during matches to change, and occasionally level, the battlefield in spectacular fashion being a welcome arrival.
Ejecting from a fighter jet to fire a rocket launcher seems like a strange trade-off, but the fact you can get back into your jet at high altitude had my jaw land in my lap.
I’m not so keen on the lack of a single player campaign for this entry in the franchise but with all the carnage shown off in the videos we have seen thus far I’m willing to consider it a fair exchange.
Battlefield 2042 is out 22nd of October 2021.
3) Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin
‘I only know one thing, I want to kill Chaos. I need to, it’s not a hope or a dream, it’s like a hunger or thirst’. This game looks and sounds ridiculous, though with its unintentionally funny trailer it has me completely hooked on the idea of it. I would love to play the demo but it launched broken on PS5 so I think I’ll have to hold off for a couple of days.
I do wonder why there needs to be four Final Fantasy games in development at once, but as the fourth is a game featuring a man constantly screaming ‘I want to kill Chaos’ I can get behind it. I’ll admit that a part of me hoped early on during the trailer that the best Esper from Final Fantasy XII was getting its own spin-off game for some reason, but no such luck..
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin will be released sometime in 2022.
2) Life is Strange: True Colors
I will be referring to it as ‘True Colours’ going forward because I’m stubborn, British and spelling is important to me..
Life is Strange: True Colours looks exactly like what the franchise needs right now; firstly because it is removing the episodic format entirely and releasing as a full game at launch, and second because it looks gorgeous graphically. Life is Strange 2 looked okay for its time but True Colours looks absolutely beautiful, and the way that protagonist Alex’s powers blend into the art style of the game is a *chef’s kiss* artistic direction.
I cannot wait to jump into this game as well as the remasters of the original Life is Strange and Before the Storm as I hugely enjoyed both of them the first time around, and have been looking for a reason to revisit for ages now. Life is Strange: True Colours releases on 10th of September this year.
1) Forza Horizon 5
All I was hoping for from E3 2021 was for confirmation that the rumours and leaks for a Horizon game set in Mexico to be true, and for the game to launch this year, and so you can imagine my delight when both of these were proved to be correct. The trailer, gameplay and developer interviews shown so far have me in a state of the Fry meme from Futurama ‘shut up and take my money’ and 9th of November cannot come quick enough!
The game looks stunning, showing off a perfectly picturesque and diverse map which I miss from Forza Horizon 3, and the introduction of storms in the open world is something I am very much looking forward to being thrown around by.
Honourable mention to Redfall, as I love Arkane Studios and so will certainly be jumping straight into this shooter when it is released Summer 2022.
Those are my favourite announcements from E3 2021, you can check out Luke and Will’s choices here and join in with my countdown to the day Forza Horizon 5 releases (145 days from the date this goes live). Let me know which E3 games you are the most excited for in the comments and I’ll be back next week with another article so will catch you then!
