On June 13, Square Enix had their presentation at night during the E3 2021. They primarily showcased the new games Guardians of the Galaxy and Babylon’s Fall. Additionally, the publisher presented a fresh game related to Final Fantasy. However, many fans were not impressed by the show.
Last Sunday, June 13, several major conferences took place as part of E3 2021. Microsoft opened the evening together with Bethesda with a large game showcase for Xbox and PC. Shortly afterwards, the Japanese publisher Square Enix followed.
In their showcase, Square Enix revealed a new Marvel game and provided new information about the action game Babylon’s Fall. A new Final Fantasy game was also presented.
A large part of the fan reactions to the conference, however, were negative.
“Too Much Marvel”
The new game based on Guardians of the Galaxy was clearly intended to be the centerpiece of the presentation. It revolves around the adventures of the chaotic group led by the self-proclaimed “Starlord” Peter Quill, who was abducted from Earth as a child. Many of you will know Starlord and his friends primarily from the movies of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The third-person action game received about 20 minutes of airtime during the presentation. A good chunk for a single game, considering that the entire showcase by Square Enix lasted 45 minutes. For part of the audience, that was too much of a good thing. On Reddit and social media, the first jokes quickly surfaced that the presentation was actually being run by Marvel Enix. Square did not participate in E3.
The game itself did not receive a poor reception in the comments. Some fans praised the developers for making it single-player and were positively surprised by the substantial amount of gameplay shown. The top comment in the large r/games subreddit on the topic is: “Single-player with a story focus? I’m in” (via reddit).
Fans still remembered the failed Marvel’s Avengers, which was the first of several games developed in collaboration with Marvel. The multiplayer game was launched in September 2020 and failed miserably.
- 2 months after release, there were too few players on Steam to form a group
- Sales were poor and the Avengers game could not recoup its development costs.
Guardians of the Galaxy is now the second game of the Marvel-Square collaboration. Unlike Avengers, it was developed as a pure single-player game. Nevertheless, part of the players are rather skeptical about the title due to the association with Avengers.
My only worry about this game is that it’s coping this game: pic.twitter.com/CJ6VbvHjsW
— raging_man_2 (@man_raging) June 13, 2021
No Trace of the Flagship Titles Final Fantasy XVI and FFVII Remake
While there were complaints about too much footage for Guardians of the Galaxy, the opposite was true for the major Square Enix titles. Events like E3 are known for presenting news about really substantial games. Titles that many are eagerly waiting for. These include at Square Enix:
- Final Fantasy XVI under the direction of Naoki Yoshida
- The second part of Final Fantasy VII Remake under the direction of Tetsuya Nomura
- Forspoken, formerly Project Athia, under the direction of Hajime Tabata
There was no trace of all three games in the E3 presentation. In the case of FF7 Remake and Forspoken, the information drought seems not surprising. Forspoken is not coming until 2022 and the Remake of FFVII just received a PS5 version along with the Yuffi DLC a few days ago.
Final Fantasy XVI, on the other hand, is a different case. The release for it is still indicated for 2021, but little is known about the game. Furthermore, director Naoki Yoshida promised after the reveal at the big PS5 Showcase Event 2020 that there would be more information about the game in 2021.
A smaller info drop occurred at the beginning of 2021 when the official website for FFXVI provided background information about the game world and individual characters. A large part of the fans therefore expected a new trailer or further information about Final Fantasy 16 at E3 2021, which did not come.
It is likely that Naoki Yoshida currently has enough work with the new expansion Endwalker for FFXIV.
Final Fantasy Origin and the Broken Demo
At the end of the show, when a Final Fantasy game was finally shown, the disenchantment came very quickly as well. The game is the previously leaked Final Fantasy Origin, which is being developed by Team Ninja (Nioh, Ninja Gaiden, Dead or Alive). It is a souls-like action game in third-person perspective.
Players take on the role of the protagonist Jack, who fights his way through the shrine of Chaos with two companions. His goal: to kill Chaos. The man makes this clear during the trailer to such an extent that it quickly became a meme in the community.
In the comments under the trailer, which stands at about 4,700 upvotes and 4,500 downvotes at a near tie, players make fun of the dialogues in it:
- “Something tells me the guy wants to kill Chaos” – PolarSaurusRext
- “Who is Chaos? I think someone wants to kill him. Not sure though” – MichaelXboxEvolved
- “New drinking game: Drink one every time someone says ‘Chaos'” – Worek Poziomek
- “How many times does the protagonist have to say ‘Chaos’ in the trailer? Square Enix: Yes” – KiraNear777
Besides the dialogues, the graphics in the trailer were also criticized. For example, some characters lacked any shadows at times. So there were edited PlayStation 2 boxes in the Final Fantasy subreddit with the FF Origins logo on them (via reddit). The popular satire account of former Sony CEO Kaz Hirai tweeted that Origin would not be playable on PS5 because the PS5 is not backwards compatible with PS3.
Immediately after the presentation, a demo for Final Fantasy Origin was released on the PlayStation Store. However, reports about crashes and corrupted files quickly piled up. The demo currently seems unplayable, and this further dampened the mood in parts of the community.
Babylon’s Fall is Suddenly a Live-Service Game
Before the conference, Square Enix announced that after 2 years since the announcement, there would finally be new information about the action game Babylon’s Fall. The game is being developed by Platinum Games, who are popular for spectacle brawlers like Bayonetta and especially Nier: Automata.
Accordingly, the announcement of new information generated excitement. The first trailer had received positive feedback, and Platinum is a popular developer with a lot of experience in action games. However, the new trailer for Babylon’s Fall did not go over well.
On the official YouTube channel of Square Enix, it has over 3,200 downvotes with just over 600 upvotes. In the comments, players are complaining that Square Enix has kept quiet for 2 years that Babylon’s Fall would be a live-service game.
- “This trailer just saved me $70 for a big mistake” – Bearer of Bad news 13
- “What the hell happened to this game? […]” – nevikjames
- “Platinum is my absolute favorite developer, but ‘Live Service’ instantly took away all my hope. And the art style is also terrible” – NotPork
- “I was so excited when it still looked like a single-player game. Now, I’m no longer excited” – arta realmblazer
In the original trailer, released in 2019, there were no hints of multiplayer whatsoever. Throughout the gameplay presentation, only one player character is seen on screen. Only at the very end was there previously an artwork showing four characters standing together.
Furthermore, players note that the new trailer simply looks worse. The combat system appears slower and less fun, and the graphics are worse. Some, however, argue that the game is still in development.
There Were Also This
Aside from the big hitters, there were also a number of smaller announcements and games presented in short trailers.
- Square Enix reminded with a trailer of the remake of Secret of Mana,
- brought FFI to VI back to PC and mobile platforms,
- showed a short trailer for Hitman Sniper: The Shadows,
- and a whole series of trailers for their mobile games like FF Brave Exvius, Nier: Re[in]carnation, or FFVII The First Soldier
The biggest of these smaller announcements were the remaster of Life is Strange and the new entry in the LiS series: Life is Strange – True Colors. However, these were already shown during an earlier “Square Enix Presents” stream and probably offered little consolation to the frustrated fans.
What did you think of Square Enix’s showcase? Did you expect the announced games or were there surprises? Tell us in the comments.
At the Microsoft conference, there was quite a bit more to see:
E3 2021: All announcements and trailers from Xbox & Bethesda at a glance
