Xbox Games Showcase July 2020 Hit Expectations

July 24, 2020 at 7:38pm
By Jason Stettner

With the Xbox Games Showcase having wrapped up the other day, I generally was left with a feeling of it being an enjoyable presentation. With that, I also felt that it met the expectations I had set for the show prior to it being shown off.

That being a mix of understanding it was to showcase some of the games coming to Xbox Series X and other Xbox consoles alongside the comparison to the what to expect article I had produced earlier on. To follow up on that; I thought I’d go over how my predictions went, and how the show largely did deliver on them.

While it didn’t quite blow me away in terms of what was showcased, it did hit the mark on what I had expected to see. I do believe we’ll get some more teases down the road, and I look forward to seeing what is happening with Xbox alongside the Playstation 5 too as both likely have some more events planned, or well reveals to present towards their respective holiday releases this year.

Time to jump in, I did expect some more third party here. It seems like this was mostly a first party exclusives show with a mix of console launch exclusive titles. With a deep focus on Xbox Game Pass, that feels as though it lends to the idea that we might see another event next month looking at more games.

I’m saying the likes of Cyberpunk 2077 which was kind of shown here in a hilarious way, and also of course Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. When you have the marketing of those big releases for the holiday that are pushing the Xbox Series X Optimization, you want to make it known they’re attached to your platform.

We saw Halo Infinite, that was definitely assumed since the big messaging was that it would be present at the event with a showcase. Regardless of the opinion folks have on it, I expected the game to be there and it most certainly did show up.

I was a bit surprised that the only Battletoads mention was a gimmick Grounded figure, so maybe that series is being overhauled at the moment. I played it at E3 last year, and it really shouldn’t take that long to release an arcade game like that. I honestly expected a shadow drop of it, so maybe that’s being held for another time. I also had anticipated more of a showcase reel for games being enhanced.

They teased it a bit, and I’m surprised they didn’t pull out a little gameplay of say Forza Horizon 4 running at 4k 60fps which has been confirmed as an Optimization. We did see Ori and the Will of the Wisps alongside The Outer Worlds so those two were expected. I did put Fable under rumored with the note that I actually expected to see it at the show, and that was present.

By the way, nice to see Fable returning. I had Everwild under might see, so that hit the mark there and it looks lovely. I had hoped to see more of Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 or another of the Ninja Theory projects, but that was another might see title. I had Psychonauts 2 and Forza Motorsport 8, the latter of which is being reimagined without the numbers so two more marks down.

Wasteland 3 and InXile Entertainment’s title after that weren’t present, but it would make sense to show the former in August now with that apparently being a month of an event since Wasteland 3 is supposed to be releasing then last time I checked. None of the third party titles I thought might show up were there including The Lord of the Rings: Gollum, Gothic Remake, Elden Ring and Dying Light 2.

I did note most Ubisoft titles wouldn’t be present since they just had their own conference, so that did come to happen. We also saw State of Decay 3 get announced, and Obsidian Entertainment’s next game which is Avowed. Those were on my rumored games list, so nice to see that happen. We didn’t however see my other rumored games which were Age of Empires IV; Perfect Dark, Compulsion Games’ next and whatever extra project Mojang Studios is working on.

We also didn’t get any of my dream games which included a Shadowrun remake; Ninja Gaiden, Conker, MechAssault, Fuzion Frenzy or Killer Instinct 2. Probably none of those would be the highest on folk’s lists, but they’re semi-niche titles I would personally like to see pop-up. So in general the show touched upon almost all of the games I expected to be there, alongside a number of the might see ones. It didn’t have that wow hit I was expecting for a next generation showcase, but still a solid time that was well presented. I think we do need to drop livestreaming events though as the quality of streaming just butchers the visuals.

Whatever the case, I had a good time watching it and chatting with a pal. I rarely get to do that while attending E3 so it was different. I did expect some sort of other wow factor in this too, some sort of game we haven’t seen before if you get what I mean. I don’t know if it’s just the global situation, but I was hoping some weird third party big announcement. Something mind blowingly next gen and I don’t think I’ve seen that from either platform yet. You can read about why the Halo Infinite Ascendance demo was fine below, or check out the general next generation Xbox hub for further coverage as well.

Read Why Halo Infinite's Ascension Demo Was Fine
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