Sony skipped Gamescom this year and instead focused on Paris Games Week. The shift led some to believe Sony would use this different timing to announce some cool stuff. While the conference itself wasn’t mind blowing, there was a lot of little bits of information. Lucky for you, we watched the conference. Read and watch through the bigger droplets of information and trailers from this morning’s Sony conference.
First up was a new trailer for Street Fighter V, which included the reveal of Dhalsim to the roster. That’s a total of fifteen announced characters out of sixteen total. Set for release on February 16th, the game is coming pretty soon. Hopefully all those beta issues can be hammered out by then.
Then Sony announced that Tekken 7 would not only be coming to the PS4, but will also be some sort of prequel.
Continuing the conference with more already announced games, we got a new Battleborn trailer. Following that was a new rhythm game called Vector. The trailer featured heavily from DJ Avicii and lots of techno beats. Sony loves their panning shots of trailers being played on a large screen, so it was hard to really see the game. It looks interesting as a downloadable title, especially if they’re packing in real DJs and their work.
Next was a litany of trailers for games all coming out in 2016. Matterfall is coming from Housemarque and will be a 2D shooter similar to Resogun. Ratchet and Clank is still coming, and looks really good on current-gen technology. No Man’s Sky was slipped in, and finally has a release date – kind of. June 2016 will forever be known as the month of Persona and No Man’s Sky. Drive Club is getting a motorbike DLC, launching later this evening.
Thankfully Sony moved on to my most anticipated game, Horizon: Zero Dawn. Though the gameplay was the same demo shown behind closed doors at E3, with elements of the public reveal, it was still impressive and fun to watch.
Gravity Rush 2 got a trailer as well. The game looks similar to the original Vita version but it was amazing to see gravity effect items and objects around the world. Uncharted 4 was up next revealing some multiplayer footage and announcing a multiplayer-only beta later this year. Dreams, the Media Molecule game from E3, was up next, with a new demo. A bit strange to see them on stage since after E3, since I had heard they were reworking the entire game. It did look like the idea was beginning to form for them, but I’m still very unsure what Dreams really is.
Sony then shifted to full Playstation VR mode. I was hoping to hear more about pricing or potential release dates but Sony was entirely focused on new games for the peripheral. Until Dawn: Rush of Blood is some sort of horror game for the helmet. A new Battlezone game is also coming along with two new games called RIGS Mechanized Combat and Robinson: The Journey. RIGS looks embarrassing and Robinson only has hints of what it might be. See for yourself.
Buckle up! Gran Turismo is still a thing and the seventh entry in the franchise will be called Gran Turismo Sport. No word if this means a shift in how you’ll play the game but from what they showed it seemed like another full game.
Sony started winding down but revealed a new game called WiLD. You seem to play as a tribesman who is attempting to get medicine for a sick villager. Then you summon a hawk, ride a bear, scout a camp with a rabbit, attack some dudes with a flock of crows, then attack those dudes with your bear. It looks very early in development even in the demo trailer but holy cow, do I want to ride a bear now.
Sony left off with David Cage coming out and being very David Cage. He talked about emotions, that robot tech demo from when the PS4 was launching, and how he made it into a game called Detroit. The trailer looked really good but I couldn’t help but imagine floating button prompts telling me to feel or to yell “Jason!” over and over. Maybe Cage will have more options and more inspiration on the new hardware. Or maybe my French-Canadian accent will improve.
That was it for Sony in Paris. This was pretty much the kind of conference you’d see at Gamescom. A lot of smaller announcements but nothing major of headline producing. Nice to see No Man’s Sky and Street Fighter V both get dates but the lack of VR news is really strange. Sony has their own event soon in San Francisco and that is where I imagine they’ll announce any VR information. Stay tuned to Chooch for more Paris Games Week coverage!
