Xbox E3 2017: What to Expect

It's almost that most exciting time of the year for games and heading to my third E3, I'm going to discuss Xbox E3 2017: What to Expect. This will be based on my past experiences with Xbox at E3, current industry news and nothing to do with bookings as they haven't fully begun to form yet. Xbox is somewhat of a mystery going into this year as we're not sure what they're doing and with so many big projects just not happening as of recent I'm at mostly a loss.

That aside, we do know that the Xbox 4k 2017 console will be the full focus of their event and this could point towards a strengthened third party approach. Games are often displayed for the most powerful console on the market and Microsoft may be aiming to recreate that from the Xbox 360 era. This would be great as it's been an odd couple of years with all the third party support being for Playstation including the big hits such as Destiny, Call of Duty and Star Wars Battlefront. Unlike Playstation, Xbox likes to keep things somewhat secret so I fully expect some surprises and really do hope they have something else coming out this year than what's been shown before.



One of the big surprises of E3 2017 is that Microsoft moved their conference to the Sunday. This is bold as it will make them the first to have their go at the event and I expect big surprises. There might also be a shift to teasing things far ahead like Playstation does, but they need something in 2017 to counter the Playstation onslaught. The event like usual will open with a heated reel going over the big games on the console and this is typically good for hype. The venue is nice and the entire conference feels like a concert, I just wish there was something more to it. I have heard rumblings of an event later in the evening, but I'm unsure if this is their usual media type party.

We'll probably get some demos at the conference for Sea of Thieves, Crackdown 3 and State of Decay 2. While I'm personally really excited for these games, they're all online focused experiences so I imagine something story based might be sitting there to be surprised announced. Forza Motorsport 7 will get a trailer, Halo 6 will be teased (would be amazing to get in 2017 though 2018 sounds more correct) and maybe a remaster of an old game which has been the tradition recent. I also would assume we'd get a Halo 3 Anniversary due to an AMD conference leak and that it would be stupid of them not to celebrate probably the biggest game from Xbox 360. Some ID@Xbox games will follow and third party with the Shadow of Mordor sequel certainly being one of them. I'd imagine some other surprises, but I can't guess what else would be shown. The VR is being put off until 2018 apparently and maybe they'll showcase 4k upgrades for old games though that would be odd for the conference. It would be nice to see original Xbox Backwards Compatibility, but I'm not entirely confident on that happening though Xbox 360 games might make their way to Windows 10.

The showroom floor will probably be the biggest change for Xbox since they have a tiny area. I believe this is because they're moving operations to the close Microsoft LA Live area that EA occupied last year so that should be better. EA Play was amazing there since it was more relaxed and less crowded, so hopefully that's the case. I imagine it'll have a focus on indies with some small areas to watch a demo of the large three games. It's an odd E3 for Xbox as we haven't a clue what they're doing, but expect surprises as they want the next Xbox to be successful.

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