Editorials
Dead Pixels Predicts What We’ll See At E3 2012
Continuing our annual tradition of using our seemingly endless knowledge of the gaming industry to predict what will happen at the biggest gaming event of the year, we have again donned our mystic robes and whipped out our big crystal balls. Also, my crystals balls are way bigger than TJ’s, just in case anyone was wondering about that. So if you’re one of the unlucky many that won’t be attending E3 this year, I suggest you head past the break for much prophesying and soothsayery.
Oh and before we dive into the predictions, here are the dates you should mark off on your calendars:
June 4 – Microsoft, EA, Ubisoft, and Sony’s pre-E3 press conferences
June 5 – Nintendo’s pre-E3 press conference, E3 begins
June 6-7 – E3
Adam’s Predictions
I’ll start things off with my predictions for Microsoft’s press conference. The biggest difference I foresee in their conference over what they’ve done in previous years is there will be less of an emphasis on exclusives. They’ll of course have Halo 4, there will almost definitely be some sort of timed exclusivity with Black Ops II’s DLC, some Forza Horizons, a little Fable, and hopefully a lot of Deadlight and more on Crytek’s upcoming Ryse.
Speaking of the Kinect, it’ll be a major focus as well. The Kinect’s catalogue of games has been disappointing so far, so I hope they’ll give us something to make the peripheral seem worth its high price tag–which I wouldn’t be surprised to see lowered.
While we’re on prices, I could easily see Microsoft dropping the Xbox 360’s price tag substantially. The $99 subscription console has been confirmed but I can see the console itself getting a price drop of around $50 as they continue pushing it as an affordable all-in-one entertainment device.
If you’re looking for some crazy exclusives or big game reveals, I don’t see much of that happening this year. There will of course be some exclusives, but Microsoft’s arsenal is pretty low right now since they’ve refocused their efforts on expanding the Xbox 360’s suite of apps and other features. I think we’ll get details on a reworked dashboard, some new apps like the long-rumored web browsing that’ll almost certainly be Kinect compatible, and hopefully an iTunes style game store for bite-sized Kinect games–though that last one’s really just hopeful thinking on my part. One thing that’s guaranteed not to be there is the next Xbox, so forget about that for now.
Now for Sony. They’ve managed to scrounge up a number of exciting exclusives, including the multiplayer-centric God of War: Ascension, Battle Royale All Stars, The Last of Us, and potentially even Killzone 4, though that one hasn’t been officially confirmed. I also wouldn’t be surprised to hear more on The Last Guardian, which as a huge Ico and Shadow of the Colossus fan I desperately hope it hasn’t been cancelled.
The Vita is obviously going to be something Sony tries to push, since like the Kinect, its library of games is pretty shallow (however, unlike the Kinect, the Vita is selling horribly. Oh and forget about the PS4; Sony has said they aren’t announcing any new hardware at E3.
The last of the Big Three is Nintendo, which has been struggling with some money losses as the Wii’s popularity continues to decline and the 3DS struggles to capture the magic its predecessors have had. I can see them shifting more of their efforts on rebranding and reintroducing the Wii U after last year’s horrendous debut. I think (read: desperately hope) the console will be renamed because right now it’s fairly confusing. Is it its own console or just a tablet peripheral? Is it compatible with the Wii? Nintendo needs to make the answers to these questions clearer for the people who don’t keep up with gaming blogs.
Now for the games. The game I’m most looking forward to hearing more about is Shinji Mikami’s Zwei, which was revealed recently. All we know is it’s a “pure” survival horror game and that it could potentially be Mikami’s last project as he shifts his focus to running his Tango Gameworks studio.
Right up there with Zwei is Dead Space 3, a game I’m almost positive will make an appearance at E3. We already know there’s a new Dead Space arriving by March 2013, but that could be one of the many Dead Space-related projects EA supposedly has in development right now.
A week ago I would’ve said there’s a very good chance Valve would announce Left 4 Dead 3 this year, but that’s already been shot down, along with Portal 3 and Half-Life 3. I also would’ve liked to hear something from Condemned 3, because the longer that game stays silent the more worried I get about it ever seeing the light of day.
The game that worries me the most is InSane, because if THQ is going to scrap any of their projects–because of their recent monetary woes–InSane is going to be the first game to get the axe. We haven’t heard from it since its debut teaser at the Spike VGAs last year, and now that Guillermo Del Toro’s At The Mountains of Madness film has been put on hold It’s looking more and more difficult to get my GDT fix.
If I were to come up with a wish list, it’d include Condemned 3, InSane, Dead Space 3, Left 4 Dead 3, Eternal Darkness II, and something from Heavy Rain developer Quantic Dream. Unfortunately, it looks like only one game on that list has a chance of being unveiled. I was going to mention The Secret World, but TJ’s up next and we all know that’s on his list, so without further rambling, here’s TJ!
TJ’s Predictions
There’s a few heavy hitters I’m pretty excited to hear about at this years E3. News always gets slow right before E3. It really just builds the suspense for all the news that’s going to blow us away.
Since Adam literally just announced the next Dead Space, I’m super excited now. But we don’t know what it could be. Dead Space 3 would be ideal. What I really don’t want is for the series to take a Resident Evil type of turn, where we end up with a bunch of shitty games. Which in turn means we have to wait longer and longer between the good ones. Something I think would actually be awesome is a Dead Space FPS. That would probably end up being super scary.
Resident Evil 6. Last year I was just hoping they would announce it. They didn’t. But now that the zombie cats out of the bag I can’t wait to see what they show us at E3. The story so far is very shrouded in mystery and honestly I hope they keep it that way. I want to be shocked at every turn when playing 6.
I really want to hear more about Shinji Mikami’s new survival horror game Zwei. I’m incredible intrigued by the game, I want to see what he’s been up to.
Is it too much to ask to see something from the next Dead Island? I believe Dead World was the name they had bought the rights to. It’ll be cool to see where they take the next game, and if they are able to create a trailer as good as Dead Island’s announcement.
I’m really excited to see more about Halo 4, so I’m hoping 343 is there to show us more on the game since it was passed onto them from Bungie.
I’m actually pretty excited for the whole show in general. Out of all the video game conventions/shows etc E3 has the most reveals, info, videos, screens etc. I haven’t thought too much about it this year and I’m pretty glad. I’m excited to be surprised and I’m hoping to see some really awesome stuff this year.
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Having grown up in a religious family, Christian movie night was something that happened a lot more often than I care to admit. However, back when I was a teenager, my parents showed up one night with an unusually cool-looking DVD of a movie that had been recommended to them by a church leader. Curious to see what new kind of evangelical propaganda my parents had rented this time, I proceeded to watch the film with them expecting a heavy-handed snoozefest.
To my surprise, I was a few minutes in when Denzel Washington proceeded to dismember a band of cannibal raiders when I realized that this was in fact a real movie. My mom was horrified by the flick’s extreme violence and dark subject matter, but I instantly became a fan of the Hughes Brothers’ faith-based 2010 thriller, The Book of Eli. And with the film’s atomic apocalypse having apparently taken place in 2024, I think this is the perfect time to dive into why this grim parable might also be entertaining for horror fans.
Originally penned by gaming journalist and The Walking Dead: The Game co-writer Gary Whitta, the spec script for The Book of Eli was already making waves back in 2007 when it appeared on the coveted Blacklist. It wasn’t long before Columbia and Warner Bros. snatched up the rights to the project, hiring From Hell directors Albert and Allen Hughes while also garnering attention from industry heavyweights like Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman.
After a series of revisions by Anthony Peckham meant to make the story more consumer-friendly, the picture was finally released in January of 2010, with the finished film following Denzel as a mysterious wanderer making his way across a post-apocalyptic America while protecting a sacred book. Along the way, he encounters a run-down settlement controlled by Bill Carnegie (Gary Oldman), a man desperate to get his hands on Eli’s book so he can motivate his underlings to expand his empire. Unwilling to let this power fall into the wrong hands, Eli embarks on a dangerous journey that will test the limits of his faith.
SO WHY IS IT WORTH WATCHING?
Judging by the film’s box-office success, mainstream audiences appear to have enjoyed the Hughes’ bleak vision of a future where everything went wrong, but critics were left divided by the flick’s trope-heavy narrative and unapologetic religious elements. And while I’ll be the first to admit that The Book of Eli isn’t particularly subtle or original, I appreciate the film’s earnest execution of familiar ideas.
For starters, I’d like to address the religious elephant in the room, as I understand the hesitation that some folks (myself included) might have about watching something that sounds like Christian propaganda. Faith does indeed play a huge part in the narrative here, but I’d argue that the film is more about the power of stories than a specific religion. The entire point of Oldman’s character is that he needs a unifying narrative that he can take advantage of in order to manipulate others, while Eli ultimately chooses to deliver his gift to a community of scholars. In fact, the movie even makes a point of placing the Bible in between equally culturally important books like the Torah and Quran, which I think is pretty poignant for a flick inspired by exploitation cinema.
Sure, the film has its fair share of logical inconsistencies (ranging from the extent of Eli’s Daredevil superpowers to his impossibly small Braille Bible), but I think the film more than makes up for these nitpicks with a genuine passion for classic post-apocalyptic cinema. Several critics accused the film of being a knockoff of superior productions, but I’d argue that both Whitta and the Hughes knowingly crafted a loving pastiche of genre influences like Mad Max and A Boy and His Dog.
Lastly, it’s no surprise that the cast here absolutely kicks ass. Denzel plays the title role of a stoic badass perfectly (going so far as to train with Bruce Lee’s protégée in order to perform his own stunts) while Oldman effortlessly assumes a surprisingly subdued yet incredibly intimidating persona. Even Mila Kunis is remarkably charming here, though I wish the script had taken the time to develop these secondary characters a little further. And hey, did I mention that Tom Waits is in this?
AND WHAT MAKES IT HORROR ADJACENT?
Denzel’s very first interaction with another human being in this movie results in a gory fight scene culminating in a face-off against a masked brute wielding a chainsaw (which he presumably uses to butcher travelers before eating them), so I think it’s safe to say that this dog-eat-dog vision of America will likely appeal to horror fans.
From diseased cannibals to hyper-violent motorcycle gangs roaming the wasteland, there’s plenty of disturbing R-rated material here – which is even more impressive when you remember that this story revolves around the bible. And while there are a few too many references to sexual assault for my taste, even if it does make sense in-universe, the flick does a great job of immersing you in this post-nuclear nightmare.
The excessively depressing color palette and obvious green screen effects may take some viewers out of the experience, but the beat-up and lived-in sets and costume design do their best to bring this dead world to life – which might just be the scariest part of the experience.
Ultimately, I believe your enjoyment of The Book of Eli will largely depend on how willing you are to overlook some ham-fisted biblical references in order to enjoy some brutal post-apocalyptic shenanigans. And while I can’t really blame folks who’d rather not deal with that, I think it would be a shame to miss out on a genuinely engaging thrill-ride because of one minor detail.
With that in mind, I’m incredibly curious to see what Whitta and the Hughes Brothers have planned for the upcoming prequel series starring John Boyega…
There’s no understating the importance of a balanced media diet, and since bloody and disgusting entertainment isn’t exclusive to the horror genre, we’ve come up with Horror Adjacent – a recurring column where we recommend non-horror movies that horror fans might enjoy.
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