Gaming Nexus' E3 2015 Predictions

Written by The GN Staff on 6/15/2015 for

Despite the rise of nearly a half dozen other events, the Electronic Entertainment Expo is still the main event of the video game industry. It's where all of the key industry players get together and show off what they have been working on and will be releasing over the next few years. With the 2015 show right around the corner, the Gaming Nexus staff submitted their predictions for what we will see next week. Due to the submission time, some of these might already be confirmed or refuted by the time this is published. Enjoy and let us know what you think in the comments.

Michael Passalacqua

• It's obvious that Bethesda will reveal Fallout 4 and even demo it at their presser, but my prediction is that they'll also announce a Fall 2015 release date.
• Dishonored 2 will also be revealed, made again by Arkane Studios. We won't see a demo, but we'll get a full reveal trailer.
• EA will show off all of their sports games and say, "All-new physics," and, "This will change the game!" at least 10 times. 
• A new PlayStation Vita model will be revealed alongside a new version of the PS4. A PS4 and PS Vita bundle will also be announced.

Rob Larkin

• Fallout 4 will be the Fallout game I've always wanted. The world of Fallout 3 meets the gameplay of New Vegas. The dog companion will be around from the beginning and we'll get a refined and improved hardcore mode.
• We will be blown away by some Uncharted footage.
• Konami will announce something, but no will be there to hear it after they alienated their last fan.

Sean Cahill

• Dark Souls 3: I expect to see a ton of information coming out about the next chapter in the series. The IP itself has grown large enough where it's going to get regular versions, though I really hope it avoids "Assassin's Creed Syndrome" so that we don't get one every single year that feels like an unfinished product or lackluster effort.
• Fallout 4: Gimme! It's already had the trailer come out and the world has exploded as we know it (heck, we even got a Half-Life 3 meme out of it already from the internet), but I want to hear specifics. What engine is it using? When is the launch date? We know it's in Boston, but why are we going to Boston? We had pretty good storylines set in D.C. and New Vegas, but what's special about the location?
• Final Fantasy XV: So the demo got a patch just recently (Never heard of a demo being patched) with another update and more gameplay added on, yet I can't help but feel like this is a ruse—because the title keeps getting pushed back. We've been hearing about this game for so long, have seen gameplay footage, have a demo for it. Eventually, you have to come with the goods. Give us a hard launch date.

Nathan Carter

• Mirror's Edge 2 and the new Mass Effect will finally be revealed. After two years of nothing but concept footage and slide shows of concept art, I am hoping that this year we finally get some in-game footage. 
• Sony breaks my heart again and doesn't announce a new Syphon Filter. One of my favorite game series of all time. I have been anxiously awaiting the return of Gabe Logan and Lian Xing for years, and every year E3 comes along, and every year Syphon Filter is nowhere in sight. 
• Nintendo will do something stupid. This is inevitable. Every year Nintendo always announces great games, but then they always do something that makes everyone groan. I can see it now: "We know everyone has been waiting a long time for the return of Samus and Metroid, so we have a special announcement. Metroid Prime (wait for it) Puzzle Fighter is coming to 3DS this year." 

Sean Colleli

• With Zelda slipping to 2016 and already confirmed as an E3 no-show, expect Nintendo to focus on Xenoblade Chronicles X, pull back the curtain on the new Star Fox, and hopefully reveal a new Metroid for next year. I also hope we get to see what Retro Studios has been working on for two years. And if we're lucky, the new Metroid and new Retro project are one and the same. Here's hoping Star Fox is their centerpiece, Devil's Third gets a big reveal, and both are playable and slated for a Q3-Q4 release.
• For the love of God—Disney/Lucasfilm/EA better have a Star Wars game besides the disappointing new Battlefront at E3. The slash and burn Disney did on 1313 and Attack Squadrons was heartbreaking enough, but handing the exclusivity keys to a publisher like EA was adding insult to injury. We want our Boba Fett Assassin's Creed on Coruscant and we want it yesterday.
• Everyone is losing their mind about Fallout 4, but I'm far more interested in Bethesda's other big property, Doom 4 (or just Doom, rather). The game has been in development hell (no pun intended) for years and was scrapped/restarted at least once. Quakecon attendees got a nice live demo last year, but the gaming public at large has seen a handful of pathetically brief teasers (like 10 seconds!) and that's it. Bethesda and id better have a bank of LAN'd kiosks at their booth and a Q3 2015 release date ready. Doom fans have waited way too long for this one, and, frankly, I want to know what kind of specs I need to plan for when I start building my next rig this fall.

Matt Mirkovich

• JRPG Renaissance. We're going to see a lot of JRPGs this year, and they'll be on pretty much every platform under the sun. And while Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward and Final Fantasy XV will probably steal the most attention, I think Square Enix has some funny business up its sleeve that it'll reveal at the press event. Count on Microsoft to have some sort of big JRPG reveal as well.
• Bethesda has more than Fallout 4 to show off at their press event. Count on seeing Doom, and the long-awaited sequel to Dishonored will finally be announced. I'm also expecting a port of Skyrim to PS4 and Xbox One to hold gamers over until Fallout 4 is ready to launch.
• Nintendo steals the show for me. This is a personal wish. They've got Xenoblade, they've got Fatal Frame, they've got Starfox, and they've got Zelda. Hopefully they'll have some improvements to Virtual Console and the Amiibo situation.
• So long PSVita—third-party support is only going forward.

Jeremy Duff

• We will finally get a full reveal for Mirror's Edge 2. The original is one of my all-time favorite games, and it really scares me that they feel the need to reboot the franchise already. I am praying that they show something that doesn't disappoint me.
• Red Dead will hopefully return in one form or another. I would be just as fine with an HD remake as I would with a full-fledged sequel. I just want some more of this franchise.
• Nintendo will make a complete fool of itself. Once again, it will bring a huge announcement that it expects the world to go crazy over, and it will be met with an awkward silence.

Randy Kalista

• Sony has two new PlayStation 4 models: One is the inevitable PS4 Slim with a smaller footprint but the usual 500 megabytes of memory, and the second is a same-sized (fat) PS4 but with a beefed-up 1 terabyte of memory.
• BioWare introduces Mass Effect 4—but it's actually Mass Effect Online. BioWare had panicked after doctors Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk departed in 2012, so the developer has been building an MMO cash cow. MEO will simul-launch on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. 
• Markus "Notch" Persson becomes a full-fledged angel investor and reveals the first third-party game he's funded from the ground up. This kicks off a Notch branding license, similar to a Tom Clancy or Sid Meier, which starts off with small, esoteric, undefinable games.

Chapel Collins

• Rumors are swirling around Dark Souls 3. Dark Souls is my favorite game of all time, and I love the series dearly, so I'm remaining cautiously optimistic about this. It seems unlikely to me, but signs do point towards some kind of Dark Souls reveal. Maybe an offshoot or something separate but related? Trying not to get my hopes up too high.
• I'm expecting the Battlefront gameplay to upset a lot of people. It's a sequel to a much-loved game that is 10 years old, and there's a very vocal group of fans that seem to hate the idea of anything breaking away from its predecessor. Not to mention it's EA, and everyone loves to hate EA when it isn't responsible for one of the most beloved franchises of all time.
• Elder Scrolls VI will be hinted at. There's a new Elder Scrolls every five years or so, and Skyrim was out in 2011. Fallout 4 will be the big thing, but I wouldn't be surprised to see some kind of Elder Scrolls something. Hopefully something aside from Elder Scrolls Online.

Travis Huinker

• Possible slim console announcements for the Xbox One or PlayStation 4 along with larger built-in storage (1 TB most likely, based on recent reports) and the introduction of either HDMI 2.0 or DisplayPort for 4K video with Netflix and other video sources. I'm also curious if Sony will finally offer media playback support via USB devices and such for the PlayStation 4.
• With the upcoming release of the next Star Wars movie this December, I predict we'll see more games announced for the movie series alongside Battlefront. With the recent loss of canon from previous games and other media, Disney has a lot of room to create stories to tie in with the new movies.
• Finally, I predict that we'll get to see the reveal of Mass Effect 4 at either the Microsoft or Sony press conference. I don't believe it will be gameplay footage, but simply some sort of cinematic reveal that will get fans excited for a release in 2016.

John Yan

• I'd love to see something, anything, on The Last Guardian. There have been rumors of the game being cancelled, then not cancelled, and it would be nice to get some closure on this one. If it's not going to happen, let us know. 
• Like what they did for Grand Theft Auto IV and Grand Theft Auto V for next gen and PC, I think Rockstar will have Sony or Microsoft announce a sequel to Red Dead Redemption at one of their press conferences. There's been a lot of smoke about the game, and I wouldn't put it past Rockstar to let one of the big boys announce it as part of the show. Or even have both of them, with one announcing timed DLC exclusivity.
• Microsoft already let us know what the new studio handling Gears of War would be called, so I'm going to say that we'll see our first glimpse of the Xbox One Gears of War game at the press conference. The reveal of the remastered editions (already leaked) will precede the first footage of the next Gears of War game, and I'm going to say that Marcus Fenix will be back as well.

Charles Husemann

• I expect VR to be the dominant storyline out of this year's E3 as companies either add VR support to their games or they announce their own VR hardware. I'm hopeful that either Sony or Valve announce firm release dates for their hardware, which will finally set consumer expectations for when they can finally buy the gear.
• Sony and Microsoft will do minor refreshes to their hardware. These won't be slim models but just larger hard drives and possibly some controller tweaks. Nintendo drops some hints at the NX, but no major announcements.
• People notice that E3 continues to get smaller each year. The show organizers have been shuffling the layout of the halls for the last few years in an attempt to hide the shrinking number of large exhibitors. But this year, people finally notice that the halls (especially South Hall) are not as full as they used to be.

Those are our predictions, let us know what you think of them, or submit your own in the comments.