E3 2018 is in the books and it was an interesting year, with each of the three hardware manufacturers finding itself in completely different positions; Sony, the market leader, took things slow, Microsoft, the distant runner-up, showed signs of life, and Nintendo, the exciting upstart, doubled-down on what brought it to the races. It wasn’t an E3 that will live long in the memory for incredible reveals and surprises, but I believe we will be able to look back at it as a turning point, specifically for one company, but we’ll get to that.

Today we’re ranking the E3 conferences, from worst-to-best, and of course the results are largely subjective. I think all but two of this years showcases were either good or great, with none quite reaching mind-blowing levels of previous years. However, enough beating around the bush, let’s get on with the ranking.

Square Enix

Hardly any surprise here. I mentioned in the introduction that two companies were not on the level of the rest, delivering conferences that were below good, or impressive. One of those companies is Square Enix.

I’ve seen a fair few outlets and personalities ranking EA as the worst conference of the week but I think that’s just a tad too harsh on Electronic Arts. Square Enix hadn’t delivered a showcase at E3 since 2015, and with a fair few exciting titles in the pipeline, the time seemed ripe for a return. Sadly, the company failed to deliver on almost every front.

On one hand, the conference was short and tight, akin to a Nintendo Direct, and offered glimpses into some great-looking games like Shadow Of The Tomb Raider, The Quiet Man, Kingdom Hearts III, Just Cause 4, Babylon’s Fall, and The Awesome Adventures Of Captain Spirit. So there’s certainly things to be excited about coming out of Square Enix. However, most of the hype was muted when Kingdom Hearts, Tomb Raider, Just Cause and Captain Spirit were already shown at Microsoft’s conference – with Kingdom Hearts even being the exact same trailer, and that closed Square’s show with the impact of a wet fart. Worst of all? Where the hell is The Avenger’s game that was announced in January 2017? Obviously that game is a ways-off yet but a teaser trailer would have been enough to end the conference on a significant note. All-in-all, Square’s presence at E3 was made redundant when it gave most of the trailers and reveals to Microsoft a day earlier. I don’t think anyone will be disappointed if they no-show next year’s E3.

EA

I said that people were being a little harsh on EA when they ranked them last of all the E3 showcases, because it certainly wasn’t as poor a showing as Square Enix, however it wasn’t a far cry from it.

Electronic Arts rolled into E3 2018 with the worst reputation the company has ever had – a pretty astounding statement when you look back a few years. So the company needed to emerge, hat-in-hand, and show us that it had learned from its many errors. For the most part, EA did just that; Dice admitted it mishandled Battlefront II‘s launch, no loot boxes or micro-transactions in Battlefield V, and CEO Andrew Wilson said the company constantly strives to be better. I’m not convinced EA won’t simply fall back into old habits in a year or two but it’s nice to see the company re-positioning after a hard year. and focusing on the gamer. At least for now.

As for the games, Anthem was shown-off and talked about in-depth; Sea of Solitude was shown-off as the next EA Originals title; Battlefield V looks great and features a, surprise surprise, Battle Royale mode; Unravel Two was revealed and released; Command & Conquer returns to mobile; and Visceral Games’ Star Wars game got a title and setting. Beyond that there was the standard sports title sections, which is where the conference sagged, as is the norm.

So what was bad about EA’s showcase? Well, I don’t think there was anything outright bad about it, but it lacked any real oomph. There was no big reveals of new IP, the titles that were shown were by-the-numbers affairs, and the big Anthem feature was little more than a developer Q&A with gameplay that looked a little lacklustre. So, in all honesty, it was a fairly standard E3 for Electronic Arts.

Nintendo

What?! Nintendo this far down the list?! Blasphemy, I know, but here’s the thing: I don’t care about Super Smash Bros.

Nintendo’s E3 2018 Direct showcase was a good offering, with some nice announcements, immediate releases, and some more looks at upcoming titles. The first half of the Direct was really great with highlights being Super Mario Party, Fortnite, Fire Emblem, and Hollow Knight. The second half of the conference focused entirely on Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and that’s where I lost interest.

Now, I understand this was the plan going-in, I understand how much people love Smash, I understand it was supposedly all great stuff, and I understand why they did it. However, as someone who doesn’t give a damn about Smash, I have to judge the conference as a whole, and half of the showcase hinged on viewers loving the brawl game. People criticised Sony for focusing heavily on four games from its first-party line-up but, by the same token, praised Nintendo for the laser-focus on Smash. We have to be fair across the board.

Regardless, Nintendo’s Direct was a good show, perhaps amazing if you are a fan of Super Smash Bros. For everyone else out there, it was basically only half the length of a regular Direct, and for that it loses points.

Bethesda

Bethesda at E3 2018 was a tale of two companies: one was the Betheda we’ve come to expect at E3, the other was a company trying to warrant its presence at E3.

On one hand, we got great announcements like Doom: Eternal, Wolfenstein: Youngblood, Prey DLC, and more VR support, as well as in-depth looks at Fallout 76 and Rage 2. On the other hand, we got head-scratchers like The Elder Scrolls: Blades, Starfield, Quake: Champions, The Elder Scrolls VI, and an awkward Andrew W.K performance – through no fault of the man himself. I know people were excited to hear about a new Elder Scrolls game but that teaser trailer couldn’t possibly have pleased anyone, it didn’t even feature a sub-title! And the same can be said for Starfield. Why reveal two new AAA titles if you have nothing whatsoever to show? Seriously, we know just as much about those two games now as we did going into the showcase. And in regards to The Elder Scrolls: Blades, it looks like a very cool experience but E3 is not the place for a lengthy demo of a mobile game and the crowd’s momentum plummeted.

In those respects, Bethesda dropped the ball when it didn’t even have to play. The rest of the conference was pretty great however; as a fan of the original, I think Rage 2 looks awesome; Doom Eternal is an exciting sequel to the acclaimed 2016 reboot, Wolfenstein: Youngblood looks like a great spin-off, and continued support for Prey and VR is a fantastic touch that is gamer-friendly. Then there was Fallout 76. Personally, I am not a multiplayer gamer, and the idea of an online Fallout game was horrid to me, but coming out of Bethesda’s E3 showcase, I think I’m going to give it a shot. The title is a beautiful improvement of Fallout 4‘s world and tech, the new creatures are a welcome change to the formula, and overall it’s certainly closer to a mainline Fallout game than it is Destiny. I think Bethesda needed to explain to the world what Fallout 76 is, and convince us why it needs to exist, and I think Todd Howard did a great job in that respect.

Ubisoft

Ubisoft seems to have finally figured out who it is. For years it felt like the company was attempting to emulate EA, Activision, and similar giant publishers, but in the past year or two it has embraced its place in the gaming landscape and this years showing further cemented that. Ubisoft is a fun company with a diverse line-up of exciting games, and a finger on the pulse of the industry.

Ubisoft is on par with Activision at this point, in regards to servicing every subset of the gaming community, but does so with a much more consumer-friendly spin. Games like Rainbow Six: Siege, For Honor, and The Division 2 appeal to competitive gamers; families and kids are set with titles like Just Dance 2019, Starlink and Mario + Rabbids; and the likes of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, Beyond Good & Evil 2, Skull & Bones, and Trials Rising, provide a little bit of everything to the hardcore and casual audiences.

Ubisoft’s E3 2018 conference was mostly great with very little drag. The company’s continued partnership with Nintendo is an exciting pairing and it quietly provides some of the best solo and multiplayer experiences available. The only nit-pick with this years conference would be the lack of a surprise announcement as the end-cap, we’re looking at you Sam Fisher.

Sony

Sony rolled into E3 2018 as the polar opposite of Microsoft: the comfortable market leader. The company got ahead of the hype a few weeks ago by announcing it would be taking a different approach to this year’s showcase, and taking a deep-dive into four of the six known titles from Sony’s Worldwide Studios. That’s exactly what we got and, for the most part, it was a fantastic conference.

Sony opened the show, in a low-lit church, with a demo of The Last Of Us Part II. The setting was odd but intimate, and made much more sense once the demo started playing. The near 12-minute demonstration of The Last Of Us Part II was, to put it mildly, incredible. Without a shadow of a doubt, this was the most impressive game shown at E3 2018 and it looks both brutal and touching, a blend that I trust only Naughty Dog to get right. The game looked so good that Edios Montreal’s Studio Head, David Anfossi, called it “fake” – Anfossi’s studio makes the Tomb Raider games. Chop it up to sour grapes but Anfossi’s statement is actually a huge compliment to the team at Naughty Dog; that’s how far ahead of the competition they are.

After the mind-blowing Last Of Us demo, Sony took a head-scratching interval to move the entire crowd from the church to a regular E3 conference space. Not only was this move pretty inconsiderate of the live audience, it totally killed the momentum of the conference for over 10 minutes. Thankfully, once everyone was seated and we returned to the real show, it was all go from there.

Ghost of Tsushima was the next game shown and it’s a hell of a departure from Infamous. The game, set during the Mongol Invasion of Tsushima, looks to be a very promising and unique title that slots perfectly into Sony’s stable. From there we saw Remedy’s new game, and first on a PlayStation system, Control, the jaw-dropping remake of Resident Evil 2, yet another Kingdom Hearts III trailer, and Nioh 2. Beyond the third-party titles, we also got gameplay demo’s for Insomniac’s Spider-Man, which launches in September, and Hideo Kojima’s mysterious title, Death Stranding. I’m more excited about the latter now than I was before E3, and I genuinely want to play every game shown on Sony’s stage, which I can’t say for any other showcase. While it was far from a regular Sony E3, the PS4 is steaming towards 100 million copies and we have a great idea of what we will be playing for the next two years. E3 2018 for Sony was a confident and laid-back approach that reflects the PS4’s position in the market.

Microsoft

If Sony had all the incredible-looking games, then how could Microsoft possibly rank number 1? Well, it all boils down to long-term planning, and Microsoft is crafting a master-plan.

Microsoft came to E3 with a massive point to prove: that it may have lost the battle but it refuses to lose the war. While it secretly has conceded defeat this generation, the team at Xbox are looking ahead to the next generation, as confirmed by Phil Spencer at the end of the showcase. This is nothing new, to be honest, as the company has been making some incredible, forward-thinking decisions for a couple of years now. Whether it’s Xbox Game Pass, backwards compatibility, or the the 4K Xbox One X, Microsoft is playing the long-game unlike anyone else. And the company took its biggest step towards the future on Sunday when it announced it had opened a new studio, The Initiative, and purchased four more: Playground Games, Undead Labs, Compulsion Games, and Ninja Theory. Xbox’s biggest failure, particularly in contrast to PlayStation, has always been the lack of exclusive games, but the acquisition of five new studios will hopefully fill that gap. Don’t expect this to lead to Uncharted/God Of War quality experiences right off the bat, but it will ensure a greater stable of exclusive games next generation.

Speaking of the games, Microsoft showed 50 at E3, 18 of which had some form of exclusivity. The first was Halo: Infinite, a brand new title from 343 Industries that is set to take the series in a slightly different direction. The most noteworthy thing about Infinite, is that it’s being made on the new Slipstream Engine and the trailer said “game engine demonstration” at the beginning, indicating that this was nothing more than a tech demo. Halo Infinite is clearly a long way off and I think you can bet money that it will be a launch title for the next Xbox console. The other big exclusives shown were Ori and the Will of the Wisps, Forza Horizon 4, We Happy Few, Crackdown 3, Gears 5 and a new Battletoads. A mixed-bag line-up if you ask me, with Gears 5 being the clear stand-out. Microsoft once again suffered from having no new IP announcements and developing sequel after sequel. although it’s understandable – you can’t course-correct in a night, it takes some time. There were a plethora of impressive third parties showings however, from Devil May Cry 5 to Cyberpunk 2077, and Metro: Exodus to Dying Light 2.

While there may not be a lot of reasons to own or buy an Xbox One, Microsoft is ensuring that you will want to own the next Xbox system. It may not have any upcoming games that can rival Sony’s output, but Microsoft is working hard to change that next time around. With forward-thinking and consumer-friendly initiatives and adding five new studios to its roster, Microsoft has regained some momentum and confidence it lost so severely at the beginning of the generation. E3 2018 was a massive step in the right direction for Xbox, and though it may not mean much in the immediate future, this year’s showcase will have long-standing ramifications for the next decade.