Welcome to Not-E3 Announcement Season

It’s June! And you know what that means. It’s LGBTQ Pride Month, sure, though in a performative sense for companies that raise the flag for the month and unceremoniously take it down while largely forgetting about what the group is fighting for during the rest of the year. That’s not what this post is about, as the title says. It’s E3 month! The month in which Electronic Entertainment Expo occurs, one that collects many of the best announcements from video game developers and publishers. Or, it would have been if E3 and the Entertainment Software Association hadn’t tripped over their own feet, though it’s not entirely their fault. The event was cancelled this year, through the in-person and digital forms.

That doesn’t mean the month of announcements is going away. The landscape this month will be similar to 2020, where a bunch of publishers and organizations will make announcements during events if they’re not hosting them personally. At least they’ll be more organized this time around. Third-party publishers have flocked to Summer Game Fest, an announcement event hosted by Geoff Keighley that’s more honest about what it is than the ironically-named The Game Awards. Another E3 tradition that’s preserving involves games being announced and revealed before the main events actually happen, because some companies can’t wait.

A new trailer for Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet dropped to start off the month, which clarified its new features alongside showing more of the games in action. Among the biggest new features will be multiplayer co-op for the campaign, to play through the experience with up to four other accomplices, unless the wording on the official website is being generous. The site also elaborates on how open the game’s world will be, with players having the option to travel to multiple locations while not being dictated by the story. The “hot” instructors Professor Sada and Professor Turo for Scarlet and Violet, respectively, were also shown, alongside other Pokémon like Lechonk and new Legendaries.

The fact that we’re seeing a trailer for the newest Pokémon title now could be a slightly ill omen for Nintendo holding their once-typical E3 Nintendo Direct as scheduled this month. This doesn’t entirely rule it out, considering Pokémon showcases have been previously held just before Nintendo’s E3 presentations before. But it nonetheless reduces the chances when this was the kind of trailer they would have wanted to save for such a stream. The lack of an actual E3 means Nintendo can hold a stream any time they desire.

Sega told the audience what they were in for with Sonic Frontiers in 2021, a truly open world take on the Sonic the Hedgehog formula. The Sonic Adventure games somewhat toyed with this, with levels accessible through a hub world in a large, explorable city, the most Sega and Sonic Team could have done within the Dreamcast’s limitations. But the less said about the Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 reboot, the better, a game bad enough that it put the idea of more open Sonic games largely on ice for several years. Well, until now.

Sega, through IGN, will post updates about the title through the entire month of June, starting with a gameplay demonstration. This isn’t a surprise considering that it’s still planned for release by the end of 2022 on every current platform, though the gameplay on a barren field suggests it might need more time if it’s representative of the final product. There will be no doubt as to precisely what this game is, and whether it can be legitimately nicknamed “Sonic of the Wild,” soon.

It would be a stretch to consider a SaGa stream only held for Japan as part of not-E3, but it happened close enough to June, and came with an announcement that wouldn’t have been entirely out of place at E3 if it happened. Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song Remastered is coming, a, well, remastered version of the PlayStation 2 title of the same name that was itself a 3D remake of the original Romancing SaGa. This version will be as feature complete as the other superlative remasters from director and producer Akitoshi Kawazu, with enhanced graphics (unsurprisingly), refined gameplay features that have yet to be detailed, and brand-new content. There’s a reason why the other Square Enix remaster teams should talk to these people immediately.

I’ve heard good things Minstrel Song, and it’s nice that we’ll have a new opportunity to play it since the PlayStation 2 days. I’m also well aware that, similar to other SaGa games, it has a reputation of being difficult to fully grasp, particularly for anyone making this their entry to the franchise. Perhaps this is what they mean by “refined gameplay,” with key features being explained better. But I’d still expect some vagueness considering the desire to uphold the franchise’s reputation.

Minstrel Song Remastered will release sometime this winter for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, PC, iOS, and Android. Xbox is sadly being passed over yet again. Kawazu previously mentioned that a SaGa remake (perhaps SaGa Frontier 2?) and brand-new game are also in development, which we’ll hopefully see by the year’s end.

This is already quite a bit of game info for just the start of June, but there’s more coming between the other conferences and streaming events. A new PlayStation State of Play will happen on June 2nd at 6PM ET, though its promised focus on third-party games and PSVR2 titles and the around 30-minute runtime suggest it won’t be an E3-style announcement stream. Microsoft, however, is putting on an Xbox and Bethesda Showcase on par with their E3 one on June 12th at 1PM ET, at even same time it would have occurred during E3 if it was happening. There could be others that haven’t been announced yet, but you get the point: It’s not-E3 season. Have a good one, assuming you enjoy announcement events.

Related posts:

The Pokémon Train Never Stops Pokémon Direct 01/09/2020 — Armed with Mystery Three Nintendo-Published 3DS Games from E3 That Deserve More Attention Cognition Dissemination: Why Pokémon Won’t Make the Switch Soon