Hello and welcome to the recap of Day Two of the Summer of Vidya, aka not-E3, aka Summer Game Fest. If yesterday was a confusing and disappointing mish-mash of space horror first- and third-person shooters followed by a slate of super interesting indie games, today… has been worse somehow. Three presentations, three opportunities to really sink into the meat and gristle of this industry, and three whiffs. It was bad out here, folks, and while I thought the Tribeca Games Spotlight would at least throw some spice into the mix, I have to say, compared to Day of the Devs, it still kind of fell short.
That being said, it was still the best overall presentation of the day. We started things off with Netflix Geeked Week guest-starring Geoff Keighley and it was genuinely one of the lowest-energy, lowest-effort things I’ve seen that man do in my life. He got mesmerized by a mobile game based on Netflix’s Too Hot To Handle for a solid three minutes, and I had to get up and walk away from my desk until they moved on. Unfortunately, while they did eventually talk about other stuff, the Vibe™ did not get better. Keighley was on autopilot most of the presentation, occasionally snapping out of his stupor to sneer at something his co-host, Mari Takahashi, said – as if he, a walking advertisement for Game Fuel, has any right to be smug.
Even with that frankly cringe-inducing dynamic, some games did get announced, as well as some shows based on games: Castlevania: Nocturne, which will feature Richter Belmont, is coming at some point in the future, as well as the frankly highly-anticipated Studio Trigger-animated Cyberpunk: Edgerunners. Dragon Age is also getting a TV show. Games-wise, Lucky Luna, a game developed by Snowman, and Poinpy, a game developed by Downwell creator Ojiro Fumoto, were the only real standout titles to me. For its part, Poinpy is available now as part of one’s Netflix subscription. This is a problem for me because I simply do not have a Netflix subscription.
Next was the Epic Games Showcase. Nothing was really all that offensive or buckwild. The thing that got the biggest rise out of me was the announcement of Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria, a game where you play as dwarves with your friends and rebuild Khazad-Dûm while dodging Balrogs. Aside from that, Shoulders of Giants, Gigabash and Splitgate all got new trailers and looked fun and then the fuckin Epic Games Showcase was over. Seriously. Done in 20 minutes, with a very chill look at Saint’s Row Boss Factory, a free download of the in-game character creator (and it looks sick as hell). Thank you Jesus, fuck.
That leaves the Tribeca Games Spotlight. Hosted by the Tribeca Film Festival, this is a show that is supposed to highlight interesting games that stand above and apart from their peers. Here’s how they did in terms of fulfilling that mission:
It did okay. The showcase gave us a look at two incredible games, Thirsty Suitors and Venba, and several other alright games. Immortality, by Sam Barlow looks mechanically fascinating, Oxenfree II: Lost Signals looks like more Oxenfree, which I love, American Arcadia is like We Happy Few meets The Truman Show meets The Running Man.
The thing I enjoyed about the Tribeca Games Spotlight was the interviews they did with the developers offering a bit of insight into the game they’re making. It was pretty cool to hear from the sound-designer of Venba, for example, who cooked a bunch of meals to get authentic cooking and simmering sounds for the game. I wish we had more of that throughout this week, but one downside is that there were fewer games on display in the show than other presentations.
Ultimately, I think Tribeca was the highlight of the day, followed by Epic Games Showcase due to length and then trailing in last was the Netflix Geeked Week gamer show. Please don’t make me watch more checked-out Geoff Keighley.
While we’re here, you should go buy the Queer Games Bundle. It’s $60 for nearly 600 games and such, and it’s got a lot of quality shit in it. Click here for more information.
And go read Oma Keeling’s essay on day 1 of the Summer of Corporate Enclosu- I mean Games. Click here.
Finally, I am extremely tired from just two days of this shit and there are at least two more days to go so if you want to support my efforts by buying me a coffee I’d appreciate it.