EA’s E3 conference highlights – FIFA 17, Battlefield 1 and more

EA kicked off E3 this year with many trailer and announcements. Battlefield 1, Fifa 17, Titanfall 2 and more… this is EA’s E3 conference summary.

Vince Zampella was the first developer on stage to reveal Titanfall multiplayer in a new trailer. He promised a “deep progression” system and we saw a lot of grappling hook use and wall-running in a game that prioritises speed. The new game will feature six different Titans this time around, which will be customisable. A story mode trailer was shown on stage which is a first for the series, take a look below:

Aaryn Flynn from BioWare entered the stage to talk about Mass Effect: Andromeda and asked “how far will you go?” He said the dev team is pushing itself more than ever, and wants to offer more freedom in this game, which features an all-new cast built using the Frostbite engine. We got a glimpse of cinematics showing new planets, aliens and characters, the Mako, as well as mo-cap and other work in progress. Watch the trailer here and see for yourself:

According to EA’s Peter Moore, Madden NFL 17 will bring the “most balanced gameplay to date” to the series. He revealed three new ways to play online: Premier, Challenger and EA Major events. These range from personal competitions between players (Premier) to major corporate broadcasts (EA Major). On top of that, the Madden 17 Championship series next year will offer a $1 million prize fund.

FIFA 17 introduces a story mode called The Journey featuring a player, Alex Hunter, as he begins his career in professional football. For the first time the game is also adding Premier league managers – Jose Mourinho wandered on stage for a little panto back-and-forth with Peter Moore.

Four pillars of gameplay have been overhauled for FIFA 17 this year: Set Piece Rewrite (new penalties, free kicks, corners, and throw-ins), Physical Play Overhaul (Pushback Technology changes the way players physically interact in every situation), Active Intelligence System and New Attacking Techniques.

Star Wars Battlefront will get new content based on the new movies next year.

In 2018 Visceral Games will release a new Star Wars game featuring new characters and new narratives. We got to see a tiny glimpse of concept art and in-game footage featuring a Star Destroyer. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

And a Star Wars game from Respawn is in the works. It’s a third-person action adventure game in a different time period, according to EA. We knew about that already, but it doesn’t hurt to speak about it again.

EA Originals was revealed as a new initiative that will help small indie teams fund, develop and release smaller games. All profit will go to the developers. The first game under this label is Fe from Zoink Games. The game is about our relationship with nature and has no words or dialogue. Instead, you play as a cub, and every animal, creature and plants in your forest communicates through song. Apparently the game won’t hold your hand or tell you what to do, you have to go and explore the forest and learn the game yourself.

Patrick Bach set out his ambitions for Battlefield 1, saying he wants no battle to play out the same way. Destruction, weather, weapons and vehicles will make Battlefield really stand out, having different impacts on your play. You’ll be able to take controls of airships, armoured trains and battleships, just in case normal guns aren’t enough for you – watch all of that in the new trailer. Also, a full hour of multiplayer matches was played live by a number of celebrities and battlefield veterans and it showed the game in action. It looks awesome watch it below as well: