3 June, 2026 il2k 0 Comments 1 category

The big PlayStation showcase of 2026 just dropped and the takeaway, as ever, is this: Sony is still the standard-bearer for the big, bold, single-player experiences that are, for many of us, what gaming is all about. Though it still showed that the firm hasn’t given up on live-service just yet, despite everything, this week’s State of Play felt like affirmation that PlayStations are still the place where PlayStation games live. Which sounds like stating the obvious, but that most basic of propositions has never been in more jeopardy than it has been in the last couple of years.

In a lean show with very little faff or flatulence, we got a steady line-up of gameplay-heavy trailers checking in on returning classic franchises, such as a fresh look at the hotly anticipated unified timeline remake of the original Tomb Raider, and a new batch of characteristically disturbing shots from Silent Hill: Townfall, the most upsetting of which showed the use of a Welsh postcode in a Scottish address. Did none of you ever work in data entry, lads?

You could accuse this State of Play of playing the hits – there was next to nothing in the way of new IP, and almost everything shown was either a sequel, spin-off, or an update on a previously announced title. Despite that, there are some big swings being taken here.

We’re getting another big pivot in the lore-steeped God of War saga. A series shaping up to have more reinventions than Kylie Minogue now has its first female lead in Faye, the deceased wife of Kratos, whose memory cast such a huge shadow over the Norse-themed games that God of War Laufey is spun off from.

This being set in the grotesque new lands of the “afterlife of the gods”, however, means that there isn’t one specific vein of ancient religion being tapped here: Faye finds herself trapped in a mesmerising mish-mash of world mythologies featuring deities, architecture and iconography from Asia and North Africa, as well as a big gelatinous cube called Phranque. Mum of War features acrobatic, soul-shearing combat befitting of its new protagonist, who gracefully whips around the battlefield in stark contrast to her lumbering tank of a husband. So this represents two massive shifts for God of War: once again, an all new moveset, and a completely different plane of existence to explore. One drawing from many influences this time, ones a lot less familiar to Western audiences than Olympus or Asgard.

There is a reassuring sense of confidence coming from this project. Where 2018’s God of War was a semi-reboot clearly intended to be an onramp for the uninitiated, this game assumes prior investment and dares to radically alter the formula, knowing that Ragnarok fans will be along for the ride no matter what.

Exuding a similar confidence, Insomniac’s upcoming return to its very own corner of the Marvel Multiverse is going to be vastly different to the Spider-Man games it shares an Earth with. I mean, it’s still a Marvel game about a guy who kicks the shit out of people while doing quips, but in terms of its traversal, its overall structure, it’s a very different proposition. Not an open-world Manhattan with an endless to-do list and angsty slice-of-life asides, but a globe-trotting action adventure with the cadence of Uncharted.

Because Grand Theft-a-Mania will settle down after its release, the games industry needs to have an answer to “What now? What next?”

On the subject of Uncharted, one thing State of Play failed to do is provide proof of life of Naughty Dog, in a world where we’re almost at the end of an entire console generation without a single new Uncharted. This should be scandalous in a generation where it seems everyone but Naughty Dog has stepped up to scratch our Uncharted itch.

As far as Wolverine goes, It’s a bold move to follow up an open-world game with something so unabashedly linear – just ask Red Faction Guerrilla fans. So, though it’s undoubtedly a tentpole release that nobody is expecting to push the medium in any interesting new directions, I think it’s fair to say that Marvel’s Wolverine does display a reassuring conviction: this is a game built around what’s best for the titular character, not for a back of the box feature list.

Whatever you might think of PlayStation’s immediate future, however you feel about triple-A, it’s good that there’s still plenty of money sloshing around in the system to bring these sorts of games, that are hugely expensive to produce, to market. In a nutshell, they keep a hell of a lot of people employed, and inspire future investment.

I’ve lost count of how many years it’s been since single-player games were supposed to have died off, since consoles were supposed to have disappeared and been replaced completely by PCs, the cloud, standalone VR headsets, or god forbid, smartphone gaming. But time and time again, this crucial pillar of the games business – not necessarily the most lucrative, but certainly a hugely important nexus point of artistic expression and mainstream viability – has shown itself to be a survivor in the midst of brutal upheaval.

And nothing exemplifies the fact that the games industry is in a perennial state of sweeping change than this particular week, where a bunch of disparate showcases dutifully paper over the hole where E3 used to be, like a tenant desperately trying to keep their deposit after kicking a wall in.

Incidentally, tune into IGN Live from June 6.

The purpose of E3 and its derivatives isn’t just to generate consumer hype for upcoming games, although that’s a much bigger piece of it than it used to be. It’s also to put on a show for the stock market, the investor class, anyone with their hands on purse strings. To show that this is still an industry worth betting on, that it has not only an endless list of beloved legacy brands in its various vaults, but also that it is capable of innovating and growing even as it becomes that most dreaded thing: a Mature Market.

This year, Not E3 essentially has one crucial task to pull off: to show that there is life beyond the oncoming freight train that is GTA 6. Which is why you’re probably not going to see or hear much about it from any of the publishers showing off their upcoming wares this week, despite the fact that everyone – even Take-Two’s rivals – has a vested interest in Rockstar’s latest proving itself to be the recession-proof, expectation-busting release that it needs to be.

Because Grand Theft-a-Mania will settle down shortly after its release, the wider games industry needs to have an answer to the inevitable question that will be asked by millions of gamers once they roll credits on it: what now? What next? Where may I chuck these 70 sheets that are burning a hole in my pocket?

Well, we know that what’s next is another banner year for major releases. Before Not-E3 even kicked off we got word that Microsoft’s long-awaited Fable reboot would be shunted to early 2027. A delay like this is usually bad news for beancounters and consumers alike, but I think it’s actually a prudent move. February next year is probably the best possible slot for it: a grand, expansive fantasy RPG that has a lot of crossover appeal with GTA 6 while being, on every conceivable level, a totally different beast. By that point, the brunt of GTA 6 fever will have settled down into a mild simmer, and most of us will have finished the campaign. And, it’ll be after the January pay day, so there’s a fleeting chance that some of us might actually have the money to spare for it. Assuming that a loaf of sourdough doesn’t cost a wheelbarrow of tenners by then.

We’ll get an idea of how Microsoft plans to plug the Fable-sized gap in its 2026 plans in the coming days, no doubt. But really, Sony is the crucial barometer for AAA’s ongoing health in a post-GTA 6 world. It will likely have the best hardware to play GTA on until the PC version rolls out, with some pretty persuasive rumours flying around that nobody except PS5 Pro users will get to play it at 60fps at launch, so it stands to gain a lot of hardware sales off the back of GTA Fever despite the eye-watering cost of consumer electronics these days. But more importantly, PlayStation is traditionally and consistently where you go if you love the big triple-A experiences we’re talking about here. Your Uncharteds. Your God of Wars. Your Spiders-Men.

And so it’s enormously reassuring that it has, in its opening salvo of this hallowed advert season, shown that there is most certainly life beyond GTA 6. Because there has to be. Because there will be, whether publishers are prepared for it or not. It has often felt, in the last year or so, that the fortunes of this entire sector are tied to the success of one make-or-break release. And it has coincided with the floundering of triple-A: ultrabudget projects that have failed to do the business. Live-service games that have flopped out and died within days of release. Vast sums of money being urinated blindly onto the altar of trend-chasing, and unspeakable amounts of irreplaceable, generational expertise being chucked on the bonfire of short-term gains. Not to mention the ongoing Global Situation that’s making a stick of RAM cost more than a night at the Savoy.

Unfortunately, that is all still happening. But, despite giving us a show with very few genuine surprises and a no-show of from one of its key studios, Sony has done enough, I think, to demonstrate that, in spite of some pervasive narratives, gaming hasn’t fallen off, consoles aren’t dead, and yes, there is vastly more to look forward to than another 30 hours of car crime and nob gags (although I am really looking forward to that 30 hours of car crime and nob gags). But triple-A has a lot of work still left to do this week to shore up excitement for life after the dust settles in November. We need to see some new momentum, not just the fruits of money that was spent during the COVID boom.

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