7 Ups & 6 Downs From E3 2019

4. All CGI, No Gameplay

Halo Infinite
343 Industries

One of the weirdest features of this year's event was just how dominated it was by CG trailers rather than actual gameplay. Every time a new game was announced, it was via a flashy short film that didn't exactly represent what the game actually was. Of course, there were a few exceptions - and Square Enix thankfully bucked the trend by showing actual gameplay from its projects - but for the most part, fans spent the entire time watching CG tone pieces.

While that's to be expected for releases that are still early on in development, it was baffling to see games that are coming out before the end of the year not receive any gameplay trailers or walkthroughs. Gears of War 5 is out in September, yet Microsoft spent 10 minutes showing off new cinematic trailers set to Billie Eilish songs.

It was the same over at Ubisoft's conference as well, with no gameplay shown from Ghost Recon: Breakpoint despite its October release date quickly approaching. While it's good to see the company move away from the embarrassing, canned banter gameplay sessions of years gone by, omitting gameplay completely wasn't the best alternative.

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Josh has over 11 years of experience as a published writer, having worked nine of those years as a full-time content producer at WhatCulture. In that period he has created hundreds of articles, videos and podcast episodes for multiple WhatCulture channels, specialising in gaming, horror and film & TV. He now primarily works as a senior content producer and presenter on WhatCulture Gaming where he co-hosts the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, a top 3 UK most listened to gaming podcast that he co-created in 2018. Over the years he has reviewed several high-profile gaming releases, covered industry events with on-site reporting, opined on breaking news, and even kicked off his interviewing career by chatting to childhood hero, Tommy Wiseau.