Holy cow, guys, this week. This week was gang. bust. ers. Today/Tuesday saw the release of Battlefield 1, sure, and I know a lot of you out there have been looking forward to that (good news: it’s fun), but in terms of trailers? In terms of news? For-fucking-get about it. The Internet lost its collective shit several times over this week.
We’ve got the official reveal of the Nintendo Switch, formerly known as the Nintendo NX. And then we had the weeklong trickling tease of Red Dead Redemption 2, for which we still have no idea what it’ll actually be beyond another Red Dead Redemption-style game. Oh, and Logan got its first trailer and goodness gracious (ass bodacious) is it not what you’d expect, and that’s for the better.
But what am I doing, why am I withholding from you. Let’s get to the trailers!
Nintendo Switch — First Look
This thing looks bonkers. It looks like the grand culmination of everything Nintendo can attribute its modern success to. Weird controllers, social gaming, handhelds, cartridge-based systems. Unfortunately, you can also put those at least partially into the failure column as well given Nintendo’s massive roller coaster-style financials.
Consumers may be excited, but investors, obviously, are not. And to be honest, I think both reactions are a bit premature. I think intrigued would be more appropriate. We don’t know detailed specs, intent, or titles outside of partners and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. But the trailer does do a good job of making it look interesting, especially with those four dudes playing across two Switches. We’re supposed to find out more next year but, like, before it comes out in March.
Red Dead Redemption 2 — Announcement Trailer
I’m actually genuinely disappointed this is not called something more interesting like Red Dead Rebellion or something. I like that in the first two Red Dead games, the third part of the titles were like little thesis statements about the story and the characters. But, seriously, it’s hard to be disappointed with a followup to one of my most favorite games of all fucking time.
But notice I’m hesitant to call it a sequel despite the sequentially numbered title. We know nothing about the game itself other than what we see in this trailer and there are some big hints to this being a prequel. That silhouette in the teaser tweets looks overwhelmingly like Bill Williamson, not to mention there are god damn buffalo still alive. And there’s not much Wild left in the West since the first Redemption took place at the tail end of that era. It should be releasing late next year for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
Logan — Official Trailer
Seriously impressive. I mean, the trailer itself is decent, but I mean that the Wolverine franchise would be so willing to step so far away from the X-Men universe it was born from. It’s taking a rather solemn, almost introspective look into the character itself, where the series used to be the youthful, impervious form and it’s now this aging, not-quite-indestructible set of rattling bones.
It’s also somehow an even darker take on the already dark inspiration material of Mark Millar’s Old Man Logan, a series on an alternate Earth where the US has been reformed into almost Mad Max-style territories and perilous rulers. Instead, this looks like a story set in that world but about a much more intimate arch of solace, redemption, and closure in the accepting of the end of a legacy and the beginning of a new, unknown one. Hopefully, anyways. It hits theatres on March 3, 2017.
Assassin’s Creed — Official Trailer 2
Yes. I’m into it. I like that there’s so much of this trailer built around the world outside the Animus. Granted, I would like to see a lot of Michael Fassbender jumping off of rooftops and stabbing dudes in the neck, but the first game intrigued me the most through all the subterfuge and intrigue in the lab with Desmond and Kristen Bell—uh, I mean Lucy Stillman.
It is incredibly awkward, though, how they call it “the Assassin’s Creed.” What is that even supposed to mean? Are the Assassins called the Assassin’s Creed in this film universe? Or did they just really want to shoehorn the name of the game into the movie and the trailer? Gah what a bad call either way. It comes out on December 21, 2016.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 — Sneak Peek
This is garnering a surprisingly tepid response given how much fandom came out of the first one. But the trailer itself is really just kind of…bland. We see some characters, some spaceships, and some shooting. There’s no context and zero reasoning. It all just sort of exists just to exist.
The only bit of personality in this trailer—and let’s be honest, personality is what made the first Guardians a success—is at the end with Drax and Star-Lord talking. It’s quietly quirky and funny, the best kind of humor that director James Gunn is capable of. I guess you see a bit of fun in that spacesuit warning label, but this was really kind of disappointing. Hopefully we’ll get a better trailer by the time it comes out on May 5, 2017.
Framed 2 — Teaser Trailer
Perhaps you don’t know, but Framed was one hell of a game. It looked great, it sounded incredible, and it told a ripping good yarn. It was so good, in fact, that Hideo Kojima himself named it his 2014 Game of the Year, if somewhat informally. If that doesn’t sell you on being excited for this prequel, then, well, that’s totally understandable because Kojima might be legitimately crazy (but also brilliant).
That is, unfortunately, all we have to go on in this case. Just hype and reputation. And that’s because this teaser trailer is perhaps the most teaser of them all. It basically reveals a title and, well, that’s it. That’s almost entirely it. I’m still pretty excited for it, though. It comes out early next year
Persona 5 — Introducing the Protagonist
So first off, yeah, the game is out in Japan and it’s apparently quite good. I’ve managed to play a little bit of it through some untoward means (i.e., asking a friend who owns a debug unit), and even though I don’t understand much Japanese, I also think it’s quite good. The music is all the way rockin’.
But this trailer confirms to me that it’s impossible to hear all the legacies of the various voice actors in the English cast. Xander Mobus, for example, is the protagonist and all I hear is the Wii U Super Smash Bros. announcer. You can actually hear him talk about his role in this Atlus-produced interview, but my god is it painfully awkward. In fact, don’t watch it. It comes out here on February 14, 2017, for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4.
Prey — The History of TranStar
Very obviously, you should be hyped to play Prey. It looks like a damn fine game so far from stage demos and trailer videos and Arkane Studios has a history of making these kinds of games really well. (Okay, not the studio exactly but the people comprising the studio’s leadership does.) But given their actual catalogue, it’s also safe to say they known how to build a world.
This video really just proves that point because this is so much more lore than necessary to get a game off the ground. Already you have an alternate history, so you have to consider consequences from that single turning point, which is Kennedy surviving his assassination in 1963. But then you have to keep going and going and going until you get to the point where we have the logical conclusion of this single facet of the narrative in TranStar, the corporation behind the space station you find yourself on. Pretty dang cool. Anyways, it comes out for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC sometime next year.
Snow — Beta Release Date Trailer
I’m very much intrigued by the promise of Snow. It’s supposed to be a totally open world set atop a mountain where everyone is either skiing or snowboarding (or, apparently, riding snowmobiles). I have no idea what sort of interactions you’ll be engaging with other than seeing someone and watching them do things. It’s very…odd.
But also so very promising. It’s ostensibly a replication of what it’s like to be on an actual mountain. You find people, you ride with them, and then you go back to the top and start again. I wonder how much of that either adrenaline-pumping or meditative experience translates to this. And, if their Twitter is any indication, how stable it will all be, but that is probably related to the DNS problems that plagued the Internet in general today. The beta hits PlayStation 4 on October 25 but is in Early Access right now.
Accounting — SteamVR Trailer
Sweet fucking christ.
It’s free right now for the HTC Vive and is that collaboration you heard about between the some of creators of Rick and Morty and The Stanley Parable and it’s fucking insane.
