Bethesda Conference Recap - E3 2017

Bethesda’s third E3 conference is under way, with a countdown leading to an amusing video of Bethesda employees’ kids trying to explain what their parents do for a living, followed by comments from the game developers themselves introducing the conference. Another video plays, this time with clips from various Bethesda games such as Doom and Fallout. Eventually, a “Bethesdaland” logo appears, the theme for the company’s showing at E3 2017, with cartoon visuals playing behind Pete Hines as he takes the stage. He gives a nod to recent Bethesda titles such as Doom, Dishonored 2, Prey, Fallout Shelter, Fallout 4 and Skyrim, with a special nod to the recent addition to modding for the previous two games on consoles.

Pete transitions into some VR talk, with announcing two VR games will coming out this year. The first one looks to be Doom related, and shows the player teleporting around and shooting up enemies in what is dubbed DOOM VFR. Next up is Fallout 4 which seems to be getting VR treatment as well, appropriately named Fallout 4 VR.

The Elder Scrolls Online is up next, with a plug for the recently released Morrowind expansion. We then get a compilation of streamers reacting to a trailer it, followed by an actual trailer. After some stats about mods for Elder Scrolls games, the narrator claims that in 2017 something called Creation Club is on the way, allowing for easier access to custom content for Skyrim and Fallout 4 like new weapons, armor and gameplay enhancements. The content here seems like it will have to be vetted by Bethesda meaning it could be of a higher quality on average than typical mods. The Elder Scrolls: Legends card game gets the floor next, with in-game tournaments coming next month, and a Skyrim-themed expansion dubbed Heroes of Skyrim announced for the 29th of June 2017.

After this, a trailer for Skyirm’s arrival on the Nintendo Switch plays, with Link as the player character being shown in one segment, and the joycons being used to fire the bow in a unique control method. Dishonored is next up, with the announcement of more content for Dishonored 2 in the form of a new DLC expansion with a trailer showing a new protagonist Billy taking out some guards in a high-chaos manner. The expansion is dubbed Dishonored 2: Death of the Outsider, coming on September 15th of this year.

Quake Champions is next up, with an e-sports centric video showing serious-faced gamers pressing buttons on keyboards eventually leading to gameplay, with various clips from the fast-paced arena shooter and introduction of B.J. Blazkowicz from Wolfenstein as a playable character, snarking his way across the battlefield. The game will have a tournament on August 26th at QuakeCon in Texas and is available now in Beta.

Now we get a look at something new, seemingly a sequel to The Evil Within. There is no gameplay shown and a voiceover explains a convoluted premise that I won’t even attempt to summarize here. The trailer is indeed bizarre, showing a man being born from a vat of white goo, and ending in the confirmation that this is indeed The Evil Within 2, and a few short gameplay clips showing third-person horror themed action in the same vein as what the first game offered. The game will come out on October 13th of this year

We get one last coming attraction to end the showcase, with an old-school looking and sounding FMV clip of a girl carrying groceries eventually interacting with a huge robot dog, indicating it will be a new Wolfenstein. A few edits through random clips later reveals they are being controlled by a lemur hitting buttons on a remote in the room next to Mr. Blazcowicz who is once again in a hospital bed, though he soon wakes up. The game looks to center on the female Nazi antagonist who players might remember from The New Order. The next clip shows a Nazi walking into a diner and conversing with BJ and asking for his ID. This cuts to a sequence on some kind of airship, soon followed by plenty of actions, explosions and mayhem. At one point, a metal hood comes out of BJ’s jacket to protect his head, possibly hinting at some new mechanic. It looks like BJ will work with a resistance group full of colorful characters this time around as we see more cutscenes.

Finally we see a few brief gameplay clips, showing BJ laying waste to a variety of Nazis, duel-wielding weapons and firing a sort of laser-beam at one point. It looks like it will be very much in the same vein as The New Order, and is dubbed Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus. The game will be releasing on October 27th of this year. Pete returns for closing remarks, reiterating that everything shown at the conference will be out this year. Thus ends the Bethesda E3 2017 conference.