STACK July 2017 Issue 153

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052 JULY 2017
visit GAMES FEATURE
An additional part of the three hour hands-
on session (which included some of the best
breakfast burritos I’ve ever eaten) was what
Microsoft called the Xbox One X Experience.
Groups of attendees were led up to a theatre,
where we were privy to a few behind-closed-
doors presentations from a few select Xbox
devs showcasing the power of the XOX and
its Dolby Atmos sound support. Much of
this consisted of the 4K upscaling for many
of the games receiving patches, like Ge4rs,
Minecraft, and Forza Horizon 3. It was a short
presentation, but still pretty cool to check out
the Dolby setup.
The Xbox One X Experience
on the booth), as well as Crackdown 3 and
Forza Motorsport 7 .
One of the biggest announcements to
come out of the conference was what
Spencer says the fans have been asking for
most – original Xbox Backward Compatibility
for the Xbox One. I, for one, can’t wait to get
back into Blazing Angels and Top Spin, but
there’s no word yet on when it’s launching.
Aside from the conference, this year
Xbox shook things up a little by holding an
outside-E3 hands-on session on the Monday.
Here, media could check out their most
anticipated games before the show floor
opened to the general public, leaving little
chance to jump on anything.
This allowed us to get hands-on with
Forza Motorsport 7 (the GT-R looks bloody
gorgeous), the playground platformer Super
Lucky’s Tale, and even Hello Neighbour; if you
haven’t heard of it, it’s a quirky first-person
horror game about breaking into your creepy
neighbour’s house.
As far as the other new games were
concerned, I didn’t get to spend time with
Sea of Thieves until I hit the show floor at E3,
and I would go so far as to say it’s my game
of the show. Though it’s been around for a
while, waiting in the wings, pondering its next
move like a calculating chess player, it’s come
out this year – quite literally – all guns blazing.
I’ve seen it described as a ‘shenanigan
simulator’, and quite honestly that’s a really
good way of putting it. You’re a pirate, and
along with your pirate mates you must
sail the seven seas in search of booty and
other pirates to plunder.
As it turns out, there’s a fair bit more
to the peg-legged life than climbing crows
nests and yelling ‘land-ho!’ at the top of your
lungs. Between you and your crew, you’ve
got to coordinate steering the ship, raising/
lowering the sails, dealing with the anchor,
and actually navigating a map with a compass.
And that’s just the seafaring part of it. There’s
fighting off sharks in the water, swordfights
with skeletons on the beaches, deciphering
of clues... and that’s without worrying about
the other pirates on the loose. It's lot of fun,
and the Xbox team I played with on the booth
were an amicable bunch of lads, that also very
quickly discovered it’s possible to get your
avatar drunk and vomit all over everything. It’s
the pirate life for me.
With a new - and immensely powerful -
console on the horizon, and a bunch of new
(and improved) IP to back it up, Microsoft is
looking to have a steady year ahead of it. A
combination of triple-A and indie titles feature
something for every gamer, coming soon to
Xbox One.
I've seen Sea of Thieves
described as a 'shenanigan
simulator', and that's a
really good way of putting it
Ori
Sea of Thieves
Super Lucky'sTale
Cuphead
MICROSOFT