The Top Ten Video Game Sequels for E3 2012

It seems that the events of Assassin's Creed III take place before, during, and after the American Revolution -- from 1753 to 1783 -- and while the underlying anchor to the series for us will always be the real-world protagonist Desmond Miles, the very limited and brief introduction to the game world that we received at E3 suggests that AC3 will indeed be the largest game in the series yet. In addition to the richly detailed environs of urban and suburban Boston, the fort, and harbor as well as the woods and Conner's home, the game includes a highly advanced naval warfare mode and exploration area that includes the ability for the character to sail nearly the entire eastern coastline.

Naval combat offers an incredibly impressive fighting experience and you do not have to be a fan of the Aubrey-Maturin series to find it a compelling and fascinating thing to watch, or strongly desired element to play! Check out the gameplay video above in order to better grok it...

One of the odd out-of-place feelings that we felt in viewing the presentation was the fact that the half-British, half-Native American Conner was at all times dressed in the traditional Assassin Brotherhood uniform -- what is widely called the Altair Outfit from the original Assassin's Creed, and from what I could tell, included the Altair Vambraces with the hidden blade and gun, which stood out quite well in the Colonial environment.

03 -- Far Cry 3

Publisher: Ubisoft

Platform: Xbox 360 / PC / PS3

Release Date: 4 September 2012

This open world first-person shooter sequel and next title in the Far Cry series, Far Cry 3, takes place on a tropical island found in the modern era somewhere at the intersection of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, with the main goal of the game being pretty much to escape from the islands (there will be more than one) and their crazed and bloodthirsty inhabitants!

The player takes on the role of protagonist Jason Brody, a tourist who has been stranded on an island chain in the grips of violent local conflict for years, and who has recently been separated from his girlfriend and, while desperately searching for her, is forced to deal with a wide cast of mostly unstable characters who have been trapped on these islands for years and who are now openly demonstrating their insanity...

In the original demo trailer Jason has met one such character, a castaway named Vaas, who offers him a rather disturbing monologue about the nature of insanity, all the while trussing him up and then tying a stone block to his body in preparation of throwing him into the water nearby -- something he has evidently done before if the human bones and stone blocks at the bottom are any indication!

Between the presentation at last year's E3 and the one at this year's the game has received considerable polish, with the naked native girls and half-naked tourist girls offering a contrast to the dire almost hopelessness that Jason feels as he searches for his girlfriend.

The measure of desperation still shines through, though a wide variety of distractions are present, from vehicles to the complex selection of weapons that includes pretty much every variant of modern pistols to machine guns to your bog standard knife, providing a pretty good idea of what "escape" really means for most of the characters on the islands...

The previous game in the series, Far Cry 2, took place on the wide-open African savanna, while the first and founding game in the series, like this one, largely took place on tropical islands, so it is fair to say that Far Cry 3 is something of a return to the classic roots of the series.

02 -- Halo 4

Publisher: Microsoft Studios

Developer: 343 Industries

Platform: Xbox 360 Exclusive

Release Date: 6 November 2012

The eighth installment in the classic Halo franchise developed for the Xbox 360, Halo 4 is the first chapter of the three-chapter-arc that is called "The Reclaimer Trilogy" having been broadly hinted at in the last two game in the previous core games of the "Halo-Arc" with the opening sequence for the second stage of the saga being set in the closing minutes of the game as the wreckage of the ship upon which the Master Chief is a passenger -- the UNSC frigate Forward Unto Dawn -- falls into a decaying orbit around what turns out to be a mysterious Forerunner planet called Requiem.

The three core games of the first saga were developed by Bungee, with Halo 3 being the final title to be completed before the baton was passed to 343 Industries, the in-house development studio that was created by Microsoft specifically to continue the Halo series, with Master Chief serving as the primary protagonist, being joined by the AI Cortana -- who has been with him the whole time -- and who may or may not be aware of the ancient prophecy that foretold their being stranded there, and their eventual "rescue" (if it can be called that) in which the Forerunner's return.

Posted: 15th Jun 2012 by CMBF
Tags: Hitman: Absolution, Xbox 360, Wii U, Wii, PlayStation 3, PC, Halo 4, Far Cry 3, Assassin's Creed III, Splinter Cell: Blacklist, Borderlands 2, Gears of War Judgement, Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, ARMA 3, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2