Summary of Summer Game Fest 2024

GameCentral takes a look at the most exciting titles from this year’s Summer Game Fest and what they mean for the future of the industry.

The Summer Game Fest 2024 live stream was very much like a glimpse of the future. Not only because it showcased dozens of new and upcoming games, but also because the nature of these titles was very different from other non-E3 events of the recent past.

After briefly acknowledging the more than 10,000 job losses the industry has suffered over the past year, presenter Geoff Keighley spoke about how gaming is “evolving and changing”, with indie games becoming more prominent and more than one game on show. made by only one person.

A more cynical mind would argue that this was just a pretext to explain the fact that relatively few big names were revealed, but Keighley warned that this would be the case even before the event began, stressing that we now live in a time when triple-A games are emerging much less often than before.

The question is whether this is a temporary state of affairs or the new norm, but that’s not something that should ever be answered at an event like this.

Instead, you got the usual conveyor belt of trailers interspersed with the occasional on-stage appearance from the developer. None of them were particularly informative, and it was disappointing that so many of the trailers were clearly pre-rendered, but unfortunately that’s not surprising either.

It was also less than shocking that all of the games’ biggest reveals were revealed in advance, including Sony’s oddball Lego Horizon Adventures, Civilization 7 and Slitterhead – although the latter two were the fault of the game makers themselves, who both managed to update their games. website / YouTube channel too soon.

The entire event lasted two hours and was followed by the Day of the Devs event and then Devolver Digital. Since the Summer Game Fest started in the UK at 10pm BST, it clearly wasn’t aimed at anyone outside of North America.

Still, we recommend watching the whole thing at least in the background, because there must have been over 40 games in total, and we’re definitely not going to discuss them all now.

Many of the bigger budget games only appeared as short pre-rendered trailers with Quidditch Masters get a September 3 release date, Star Wars Outlaws teasing that Lando Calrissian is in the game, Black Myth: Wukong revealing various collector’s editions and Dune: The Awakening reveals that his story revolves around a what-if scenario where Paula Atreida’s sister is born instead.

A recently announced VR game Batman: Arkham Shadow was also only pre-rendered, but was given a fall release date and confirmation that the villain is the Rat King, who appears to be a new character – either that or the existing supervillain Ratcatcher upped the ante. The return to the Arkhamverse is very welcome (even though Suicide Squad was technically set in it as well), but the absence of voice actor Kevin Conroy is sorely felt.

Metaphor: ReFantaziofrom the team behind Persona, got a demo on stage and… it looked very similar to Persona, with a similar art style and ordinary people turning into fantasy warriors again – although this time it was presented as a Final Fantasy style transformation jobs, called archetypes. It looked good, and it’s always nice to see a company use its success to launch a new IP.

Capcom had a large presence at the show, with a brief look at Monster Hunter Wilds gameplay is the penultimate revelation; there was also interestingly strange Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess sand new DLC fighters for Street Fighter 6namely M. Bison, Elena and Terry Bogard, and Mai Shiranui from Final Fight.

Fatal Fury: City Of The Wolves also got a standalone trailer and an early 2025 release date, while the co-op fighting game Dragon Ball: Sparkle! Zero will be released on October 11.

One of our favorite moments of the night was the reveal Blumhouse Games. We haven’t been interested in many of their films in the past, but they seem to have tackled gaming in the most interesting way possible, with several indie titles, all of which are radically different from each other.

Fear The Spotlight is the first to come out and looks very similar to the lost PS1 game, with very basic 3D graphics that still manage to look extremely creepy.

The demo reel of other games includes everything from a cozy Stardew Valley-esque game that turns evil into what looks like some kind of first-person shooter, a very meta game where you play as a developer, and the promise of a collaboration between Immorality’s Sam Barlow. and Brandon Cronenberg – son of David Cronenberg.

A developer among us InnerSloth he also had something to show, and not just a clip from the new TV show Mezi nami. They started a new publishing label called OuterSloth and signed up a number of indie games to help other developers who, in their own words, weren’t as lucky as they were.

Although we’ve never seen an episode of the show, we also really liked the look Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind, which is a purposefully retro scrolling beat ’em-up mixed with gorgeous looking 3D levels with old school sprite scaling. It appears to be part of Hasbro’s new Retro Arcade label, so we’re really hoping this means a future Transformers game in a similar vein.

Not all the bigger budget games were pre-rendered trailers because there was a different take on the medieval action role-player Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2release date announcement October 25th Generation Sonic X Shadows (which was also previously leaked), a short and painfully unfunny trailer for the Skate. announces that testing begins this summer and the first DLC for Alan Wake 2.

Alan Wake 2’s DLC is called Night Springs, and it features three different scenarios and player characters that tie together pastiches of The Twilight Zone gameplay. It all looks awfully self-indulgent, with waitress Rose wielding a shotgun, Control protagonist Jesse Faden and Quantum Break star Shawn Ashmore clearly playing themselves. The final surprise is that the DLC will be released today, June 8, with physical editions of the main game to follow later this year, including a $200 collector’s edition.

Remedy’s Sam Lake also appeared on stage, but even more time was devoted to the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5 versions of Riot Games’ shooter. Valiant. Very little content has been said, no release date – just a closed beta that you can try and sign up for here.

With the recent revelations about how much it costs to attend Summer Game Fest, we can only imagine how much this publicity cost Riot or how much Chinese company S-Game paid Phantom Blade 0 be the last game of the night. It seems to have been shown at a previous event, but we’ll admit we don’t remember it at all, but it seems like an interesting enough Soulslike event reminiscent of a fantasy version of Stellar Blade.

There were plenty of other interesting indie games, including Neva from the creators of GRIS, self-explanatory Deer & Boy by Lifeline Games, a single developer creation Killer Beanfrench climbing sim Cairn (not to be confused with the French climbing sim Jusant), fascinating Wanderstop from the creator of The Stanley Parable and real-time strategy Combat aces from the new studio Uncapped Games.

It may be the de facto replacement for E3, but Summer Game Fest has become a very different experience, not in terms of format, but the types of games on display. There have been plenty of interesting revelations, but also plenty of things to still be concerned about when it comes to the health and sustainability of the triple-A gaming business.

Email gamecentral@metro.co.uk, leave a comment below, Follow us on Twitterand subscribe to our newsletter.

To submit inbox letters and reader features more easily without having to send an email, use our Submit Content page here.

You can find more similar stories on our game page.

MORE: Summer Game Fest 2024 is set to be the closest thing to E3 this year

MORE: Summer Game Fest 2023 recap with every game announcement and trailer

MORE: Summer Game Fest 2023 was fine, but the death of E3 really hurts gaming

This page is protected by reCAPTCHA and Google’s privacy policy and terms of service apply.