What We Want to See From Sony

It’s that time of year again: the frenzied speculation, the mess of leaks, the potential for breathtaking surprise and bitter disappointment. It’s E3 season, and as we prepare our trek to Los Angeles for the yearly conclave of all things gaming, it’s hard not to count our chickens before they hatch. Or rather, count the games we want to see before we know if they’re even there. Sony is midway through its third year with the PlayStation 4, and with lineups as impressively as the past two years we’re eager to seem more from upcoming titles like Horizon: Zero Dawn and the Final Fantasy VII Remake. Here are all the games we expect to see–and want to see–at E3 2016.

Horizon: Zero Dawn

Horizon: Zero Dawn and its heroine Aloy won us over with an impressive unveiling at E3 last year. Set in a post-apocalyptic world that has been overrun by magnificent, deadly robotic animals, Horizon is the first new IP from developer Guerilla Games since the inception of Killzone in 2004. Although Horizon was revealed with a 2016 release window, it was recently announced that game wouldn’t launch until February 2017. Despite this brief delay in getting the full game into our hands, we are still stoked to get some facetime with Horizon: Zero Dawn in demo form at E3.

Final Fantasy VII Remake

What began as a tease demonstrating the PlayStation 3’s power is now becoming a fully-realized game for PlayStation 4. It almost seemed impossible, but here we are: we live in a world where an actual remake of beloved RPG Final Fantasy VII is happening. Touted as a story-driven remake that will be broken up into parts–multiple full-sized games, apparently, with a release plan similar to the Final Fantasy XIII trilogy. The footage we’ve seen of the game so far has been brief, and we’re hungry for another glimpse of Cloud and friends at this E3.

The Tomorrow Children

Announced at Gamescom 2014 and coming from Pixeljunk developer Q-Games, The Tomorrow Children is another post-apocalyptic game with an unusual twist. When Soviet Russian attempts an experiment to unify human consciousness, the entire universe is wiped out, leaving nothing by white fields stretching beyond the horizon and a handful of survivors. These survivors collect the scattered souls of humanity into identical ambulatory dolls, who then rejoin the Soviet Union-like society as dutiful laborers. The Tomorrow Children has hosted a handful of betas, where players got a crack at the Minecraft-like multiplayer, but we’re hoping to get another peek of what the game’s dystopian future can offer us.

Nier: Automata

Never in our wildest dreams did we imagine we’d get a sequel to weird Square Enix RPG Nier. Square and Nier director Yoko Taro announced “Nier New Project,” later revealed as Nier: Automata. In development with Platinum Games, a studio known for its lauded work on action titles including Bayonetta and The Wonderful 101, Automata tells the story of humanity using androids to carry out a proxy war against alien machines that have overrun the earth. After a glimpse of the project at E3 last year and a trickle of new footage over the past few months, we’re hoping to see more gameplay from Automata.

Rime

What happened to Rime, the next game from Deadlight developer Tequila Works? It was announced all the way back at Gamescom 2013, but the developer has shared little information on the title’s progress since 2014. Details have been scarce, as it was conspicuously absent from major events in 2015. In addition, in March, the studio bought the rights to game back from Sony, casting doubt on its PS4 exclusivity. In spite of this, however, everything we actually know about Rime makes us eager to learn more. The few glimpses of its art style and gameplay are promising, especially since Tequila Works has stated that it is inspired by artists like Salvador Dali and films like Spirited Away. Hopefully we’ll finally get a better look at Rime at E3.

What Remains of Edith Finch

Developer Giant Sparrow made something special with The Unfinished Swan, a first-person adventure game that tasks you with using paint to define its setting. The studio’s next game, What Remains of Edith Finch, suggests that Giant Sparrow is taking its experience in narrative games to a much darker level. Players follow a number of different members of a cursed family, experiencing each person’s story as they live and eventually die. We haven’t heard or seen much of the game since last E3, but Giant Sparrow has already shown that it can tell an interesting story in an unconventional manner with The Unfinished Swan. We’re excited to get another glimpse at the studio’s follow-up effort and how it creates this cursed family’s tale.

Persona 5

It’s been 7 years since the much beloved Persona 4 graced players with a game about daily high school life mixed with demons and JRPG dungeon crawling. In the years following we have had plenty of spin-offs to keep us busy, but now the sequel fans have been waiting for, Persona 5 is almost here. Starring students turned master thieves, Atlus looks to be going all-out with this game, featuring a stylish art style and look that makes it stand apart. We know the game is out September is Japan, but details have been scarce on the North American release. We’re hoping this E3 will give more details for westerners eagerly awaiting it.

Shenmue III

Speculation on a possible third Shenmue game has been brewing for years. At Sony’s E3 press conference last year–like a scene plucked from a frothy PlayStation lover’s fanfiction–announcements of The Last Guardian resurgence and the Final Fantasy VII Remake were followed by the reveal of Shenmue III. Under the direction of Shenmue creator Yu Suzuki, Shenmue III is currently slated to launch at the end of 2017. Its development was funded through Kickstarter; the initial asking amount of $2 million was achieved just eight hours after the campaign launched, and to date the project has raised more than $6 million from more than 72,000 backers. We’ve yet to see the game in action: perhaps this E3 is the time.

The Last Guardian

Since the game’s initial debut in 2007, Sony has been teasing us with The Last Guardian for nine years. People waited for a game following in the footsteps of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, but development has been famously protracted and problematic. Once thought to be a game that would forever be in development hell made its appearance at E3 last year, resulting in a craze of jubilation from fans. The trailer was also accompanied by a gameplay demo showing environmental puzzles being solved by a boy and Trico, much to everyone’s excitement. Here’s hoping E3 will offer more gameplay to get a taste of what the final game will be like, considering it’s currently slated for a 2016 release.

No Man’s Sky

The quintillions of planets in No Man’s Sky won’t be explorable until August, meaning that it’s likely we’ll see more of the game at E3. Due to several delays, however, No Man’s Sky is stuck in a strange place. Developer Hello Games has shown it off a lot, and we’ve seen some extensive demos of planetary and space exploration, but for many people, the game is still shrouded in mystery. No Man’s Sky is so expansive with many different gameplay systems that it’s hard to get a grasp of the experience of playing it before it’s released. We’ve heard about the mathematically generated galaxy we’ll get to explore, but what about the nature of the exploration itself?

No Man’s Sky is still an enigma, which is why we’re excited to see more of it at E3. Maybe we’ll get a better understanding of the process of upgrading your ship, mining planets, or trading with space merchants.

Gravity Rush 2

She’s running up and down streets, sideways on buildings, upside down and pretty much anywhere she pleases. The original Gravity Rush was a pleasure to play, exploring the cel-shaded open world and the thrill of manipulating gravity with the help of your trusty black cat, Dusty. An enhanced version of the game, titled Gravity Rush Remastered, came out later for PS4, but hopes for a sequel were high. During TGS 2015 Sony announced Gravity Rush 2, boasting a larger world with destructible environments, more characters and deeper gameplay. With a tentative release date of 2016, it seems likely we’ll get a look.

Nioh

When Koei’s Nioh re-debuted at last year’s Tokyo Game Show after nearly a decade of being absent from trade shows, our collective jaws dropped. This once dormant action game based on an unfinished script by director Akira Kurosawa started out development on the PS3, but years of prolonged development kept it from releasing. With development duties shifted to Team Ninja, Nioh takes the precise action elements from the studio’s previous work and combines it with the tense, atmospheric dungeon crawling of Dark Souls. While the game’s alpha demo gave us a small but exciting taste of what’s to come from this dark samurai epic, we’re eager to hear more about what it has to offer.

I am Setsuna

Square Enix wants to return to its roots with I Am Setsuna, a classical-style RPG created to invoke memories of Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI. Set in a snowy world of magic and monsters, players will guide the retinue of Setsuna–a young woman who will sacrifice herself to save her people–to the end of the ends of the world. This is the first game from developer Tokyo RPG Factory, a Square Enix subsidiary founded specifically to make titles that call back to the golden era of JRPGs. I Am Setsuna is coming out in July, so we’re hoping to see more at E3.

God of War 4

Let’s be honest, Kratos has overstayed his welcome. It’s time for that God of War to put the Blades of Chaos down and let another maladjusted mortal work through their issues. Rumours have suggested developer Sony Santa Monica may finally be ditching Ancient Greece to let players paint the walls of Valhalla blood red. A new protagonist and a whole new pantheon of Gods to crush is exactly what the franchise needs to inject some new life into it. And we don’t know about you, but we’d really like the opportunity to take Odin down a few pegs and give Loki a taste of his own medicine. Fingers crossed.

Gran Turismo Sport

It may not be the next numbered entry fans expected, but Gran Turismo Sport still carries on the racing sim series’ long running commitment to car worship. Sport contains 137 vehicles, including high-end consumer cars, track-tuned hyper cars, and even totally out-there concept cars. Each and every ride has been painstakingly modeled inside and out and should, in theory, handle similarly to its real-world counterpart. The audio and environments have been upgraded as well.

In addition to the usual car porn, Sport adds customizable liveries, damage modeling, and a few new modes focused on online competition. Longtime developer Polyphony Digital certainly seems to be positioning its latest title as an automotive esport, though the inner-workings of its online modes remain a little hazy. But hey, that’s exactly why we can’t wait to see more of the game at E3 2016.

Dreams

Developer Media Molecule has long focused on imbuing players with the power to craft their own experiences. The LittleBigPlanet games, for example, provided a robust suite of level creation tools that proved so sophisticated that users managed to craft everything from recreations of classic games to functional analogue computers. The studio’s latest project, Dreams, also seeks to empower players with nuanced creation tools, but rather than relying on cutesy platforming to draw people in, they’ve opted for a more ambitious, artistic aesthetic. The ability to create and share playable spaces and in-game assets remains the same, but the creations we’ve seen so far have ranged from hyper-realistic objects to surreal fine art. The level of creativity on display in Dreams is exhilarating, yet two full years after the game’s unofficial unveiling, we still haven’t had an opportunity to play it ourselves. Maybe we’ll finally get some hands-on time at E3 2016.

Detroit: Become Human

David Cage is not for everyone. His dark, largely cutscene-driven adventure games Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls drew both praise and ire from fans and critics alike. While some were enamored by the cinematic storytelling, others claimed both were barely games at all. Regardless of your stance, clearly Cage and his studio Quantic Dream consistently elicit strong reactions, which is why we’re excited for Cage’s next project: Detroit: Become Human. We know Detroit will grapple with the classic conundrum of defining humanity in the face of sentient AI that’s capable of experiencing emotions (see also: Blade Runner, Fallout 4), but beyond that, we’ve learned very little since the game was revealed last October. Here’s hoping E3 changes that.